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There have been couples of events since 2014 that made the rest of the world watch the confrontation between Russia and the Western nations in a mixture of fear and surprise. These actions include taking over the government airports and buildings in the Ukrainian Crimea Peninsula. These events have been overshadowed by the developments in the global arena. However, despite the fact that there have been other major events like the Syrian civil war, the United Kingdom referendum and Europe immigration crisis, the 2014 events are the main reasons why the western nations have found themselves in a confrontation with Russia. This paper seeks to elucidate why the Western nations should not continue with their actions towards Russia as it will bring more harm, other than a lasting solution.
Recently, the western countries have expanded their military exercises precisely in the NATO-united Baltic States along the outskirts of Russia to deter more aggression, and they aim to isolate and sanction Russia over its actions in Ukraine. On the other hand, Russia has tried to develop the European partners who could part the counter Russian coalition. It has also threatened to utilize atomic weapons to prevent the western assault. However, the capital of the west policymakers are more centered on Middle Eastern issues, for example, Iran. Those giving careful consideration have warned against Russia for it may split NATO permanently. The two sides should therefore seek to come up with an amicable solution as the standoff will only continue heightening the tension.
The sanctions against Russia have failed to achieve political goals as the Russian leaders think they have nothing to lose. The Russian leaders have seen the strategies used by western countries as consistently actions that tend to humble them. However, as described by one of their ambassadors, the economic sanctions in place since the Crimean annexation of 2014 is a merely latest phase in the aggressive western activity which can be traced back to the days of tsars. He said it is a trouble that arises every time Russia began to stand on its own.
The most common United States policy response to Russia across the past three decades has depended on either Russia becoming a friend and fellow democracy or can be entirely defeated. Nevertheless, Russia is not a democracy, nor is it democratizing. However, although the country may be in a secular decline, it is still a significant power on the stage of the world. The president of the United States needs to accept that Russia cannot be contained in the emerging multipolar, globalized world order or defeated. To agree, it must be engaged in an overall balance of competition and cooperation.
All the actions taken against Russia will fail; therefore, the president of the United States will have to persuade it to cooperate. The cooperation is needed in order to prevent a proliferation of weapons of mass destruction while limiting space for Russia maneuvering countries such as Syria that largely oppose America. The new United States Policy should also perceive that strains with Russia do not isolate the lines of individual or topographical issues and the common interests can hardly overlap completely. Therefore, the objective should entail constructing a web of interactions in both competitive and cooperative which will yield the most beneficial balance for the interests of the nation. Thus, instead of configuring how to transform or defeat Russia, the United States should find a new approach to use.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the primary cause of the conflict between Russia and the western countries is due to its support for the local rebel powers in eastern Ukraine. To defeat this country, other nations have arisen with strategies such as increasing military exercises on the borders to deter any form of aggression. However, the sanctions against Russia have failed to achieve the political objectives as the leaders in Russia are of different opinions. For Russia and other nations to come to term, the United States policymakers must change their approach on the matter.
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Experts on democratization posit that a political society starts its journey to becoming a democracy by establishing an electoral democracy first, followed by polyarchy/liberal democracy, and then advanced democracy. They are all democratic but they differ in content. Electoral democracy is one that is on the borderline between democracy and authoritarianism. Hence the notion of hybrid regime. It is sometimes referred to as pseudo democracy. Polyarchy, as Robert Dhal calls it, or liberal democracy, adds to democracy the classical liberal political liberties of free speech, freedom of association and the rule of law. These features enhance democratic consolidation by preventing its erosion. Lastly, advanced democracy is one that has completed the democratic journey and cannot reverse to authoritarian regime or electoral democracy. These are found in the global north.
Where then can we place Nigeria in this trichomization? Having failed in terms of the desired deliverables of democracy in its 17 years of democratic experiment, with visible traces of autocratic tendencies on the part of the ruling elite, the country falls under electoral democracy. Unfortunately, both scholarly and policy concern has been focused more on the need for increased democracy in Nigeria than the all-important issue of state-building.This view is commonly referred to as the “sequentialist debate”. Exponents of the “Stateness First” like Francis Fukuyama and Fareed Zakaria contend that “state-building and liberal constitutionalism must precede electoral democratization if democracy is to achieve stability and deepening”. In other words, central to attaining and sustaining democracy is the construction of a strong State. Failure to adhere to this sequence would eventually lead to Samuel Huntington’s notion of “premature democratization”. This is the story of Nigeria and most democratizing states in Africa that lack the Weberian legitimate monopoly of force in their territory, which is essential in providing social order,which in turn paves the way for economic development and democracy to thrive. Conversely, others like Mazzuca and Munck maintain that “state construction can be confronted in the course of democratization or through democracy”. This seems to be the pathway taken by Nigeria which started with the attainment of political independence. Their line of argument stem from the widespread belief that today, it’s almost inconceivable to have a developmental sequence than the one which starts with electoral competition largely because the pursuit of liberal democracy has become the zeitgeist of the late 20th century.
However, as persuasive as these contentions are, empirical evidence shows that the former path happened to be the Western sequence. Before the Industrial revolution, bellicose strategy was adopted in state formation by despotic European monarchs. Democracy was not the guiding idea at that in developing Europe. During the industrial revolution between 1780 and 1840, Europe had no democracy. Western Europe and its satellite colonies first established a sequence of state-building, liberal constitutionalism, before large scale electoral participation. It was later in the course of development that measures of limiting state powers like rule of law and democratic accountability were introduced. As I will explain momentarily, this was also the sequence in some East Asian countries.
The failure to build a strong state, limited by the rule of law and electoral accountability, all of which contribute to deepening democracy explain why Nigeria is still a basket case that privileges electoralism which profits political entrepreneurs at the expense of state-building.Yes, democracy might have triumphed in some ideological sense as vociferously acclaimed in The End of History thesis, it is not sufficient to say liberal democracy is the one and only way for democratizing countries like Nigeria to follow in order to attain political development.Based on this, Thomas Carothers, an avid liberal scholar posited that, “it is a mistake to assume that democratization – especially open national elections – is always a good idea. When tried in countries that poorly prepared for it, democratization can and often does result in bad outcomes”. The Nigeria situation is a representation of this assertion. If the “Democracy first” sequence was the surefire way to attaining political development and stamping out poverty, India, with an impressive democracy would have accomplished this given it long democratic history. Rather, the country is extremely corrupt (79 least corrupt nation according to the 2016 transparency international (TI) report, trailing behind Nigeria which conveniently occupies the 136th spot), and cannot deliver democratic deliverables because it doesn’t have a strong state. This also applies to South Africa (45); and Brazil (40) which seems to be facing the risk of democratic breakdown.
China, which is not a democracy in the Western sense has done so well. In spite of its sheer problems of human rights deficit, China has been able to achieve one of the world’s remarkable economic transformation in human history. This has seen it lift over 400 million people out of poverty (See Weiwie’s China Wave: Rise of A Civilizational State), a figure that accounted for the bulk of global reduction in poverty. Take China out of the equation and you will be left with an abysmal result in this regard. China was able to achieved this because of its strong state system that is driven by Confucian tradition, which it establish long before it started modernizing, and a merit base bureaucracy. Conscious of this impressive achievement, Fukuyama remarked in 2011 that “U.S. democracy has little to teach China”. Interestingly, despite China’s phenomenal economic rise using it development model, “China has learnt so much from the West and will continue to do so for its own benefit…;” said Weiwei. There is a lot of wisdom in this which poorly governed countries like Nigeria where the Lincolnian idea of democracy has failed to work should learn.
Countries like Singapore, South Korea, and Japan first started out like China, building state first along Confucian tradition, before establishing democracy. The Western argument against does not see the China option as a viable alternative worth emulating by countries in search of development. This is to suggest that the Western liberal democratic model is the most preferred option as though it doesn’t have loopholes. The Western model itself is in deep trouble as seen in protracted financial crisis in the global north in spite of its nuanced strengths, excessive money in politics and the role special interests in the electoral process – America and Nigeria. Obviously, it is on account of these unpleasant developments in America that Joseph Stiglitz concluded that the U.S. market driven economic model only works for the top 1 percent than the bottom 99 percent. This shows that even liberal minded scholars are dissatisfied with the current structure of liberal democracy in the West.
Coming back to Nigeria, it’s no news that the country has been detained in the state of premature democratization for the past 17 years without any possibility of attaining political development should the country maintain the status quo. As I noted before, this is so because Nigeria does not have a strong and impersonal state. The state is neopatrimonial in nature. Like America, its democracy is one that works for the elite. No doubt about it, democracy is good because it engenders the existence of some basic freedoms that are central to the pursuit of happiness and development. But this will make no meaningful impact if the state, to which the institution of democracy is grafted is not strong enough to provide the foundation for democracy to flourish. Bearing in mind the Western and East Asian development sequence, I am of the opinion that Nigeria does not need free-wheeling democracy at the moment. Seventeen years of its practice has only kept the country perpetually in electoral mood at the expense of pursuing developmental courses. The country needs a strong state, after which it can take measures of limiting political power by instituting liberal democratic institutions. | https://intervention.ng/10278/ |
Why are representative governments so ineffective in developing nations?
On Christmas Eve in 1951, the Kingdom of Libya gained its independence from Britain and France, forming a new monarchy under King Idris. Libya’s independence marked the beginning of one of the largest movements of the 20th century: the decolonization of Africa. In the course of three decades, 50 African nations gained political autonomy from the colonial powers of Western Europe. After Rhodesia became independent in 1980, European authority in Africa was essentially non-existent.
However, independence did not exactly spell prosperity for Africa. The well-organized bureaucracies lead by European administrators were initially replaced by corrupt, incapable dictators who struggled to avoid civil conflict. Back in Libya, King Idris was overthrown in 1969 by military commander Muammar Gaddafi. Gaddafi’s authoritarian regime lasted for 42 years, until he too was overthrown in the 2011 Libyan Revolution. As of 2014, the nation is still engaged in a three-way civil war. However, they have also been through two popular elections since Gaddafi's ousting: a sign of a burgeoning democracy.
A similar chain of events have taken other countries across the continent. Nearly all African nations now have some sort of democracy or republic as their governmental structure. Yet at the same time, the Economist Intelligence Unit’s annual Democracy Index ranks African governments among the weakest and least democratic in the world. The only “full democracy” on the continent, Mauritius, is an island located over 1000 miles away from the African landmass.
So why are these African democracies so ineffective? What is causing this political futility?
Government efficacy is an incredibly complex issue, but there are three main reasons as to why democracies tend to fail in Africa, or any other developing region in the world.
1. Lack of political participation and involvement
The base of any democracy is the ability of citizens to participate in government, whether it be through voting, lobbying or running for office. Unfortunately, this base does not stand strong in most developing democracies. The numbers don’t lie: the people of emerging countries tend to be disconnected and uninvolved with their nation’s politics. Although citizens may participate through protests or other unconventional methods, voter turnout is often lower than in developed countries. This is due to a number of reasons. First, developing countries have poorer education systems, leading to a less educated electorate. History has shown that countries with lower literacy rates tend to have lesser voter turnouts. Without being able to read or write, or without being properly informed on an election, it is nearly impossible to cast a ballot. Secondly, many citizens in developing countries have low political efficacy. They may believe their government is corrupt and/or incapable in solving the nation’s issues. When these citizens feel as if their vote doesn’t matter, political involvement plummets. Third, many people in developing nations simply do not have access to a polling station. Areas plagued with violence and instability, along with isolated rural areas, can be essentially forgotten during an election. During this summer’s Libyan elections, many polling stations in cities remained closed for “security reasons.” At the end of the day, political participation is weak in emerging countries, which undermines a key idea behind democracy.
2. Disproportionate representation of demographic groups
Another main principle of democracy is that the entire population is evenly represented in the government. Once again, this is a principle that is not upheld very well in developing countries. Africa is known to be extremely diverse, with thousands of ethnic groups with unique cultures spanning the continent. The implementation of democracy was intended to end ethnic conflict and provide a forum where all ethnic groups could sort out their differences. In reality, democracy has marginalized millions of citizens across Africa, leaving them without political power. The problem is that the governments of developing nations are not proportionate reflections of their country’s population. Granted, misrepresentation is an issue even in the strongest democracies. However, unlike the two-party system in many first-world countries, African nations are home to dozens of political parties. These parties are usually created by geographic or ethnic divides. Unfortunately, these smaller political organizations are often drowned out by larger political groups. In many African democracies, there has been a single party that has dominated the government for decades, such as Angola’s MPLA. Minority parties never yield the president or other important authorities, and only have limited power within the national legislature or assembly. This dominance of a single party sidelines the interests of smaller demographic and ethnic groups. As a result, the strength of the nation’s democracy is diminished, since the populace is not equally represented in government.
3. Prevalence of corruption
Abraham Lincoln provided an excellent definition for what a democracy should be in his Gettysburg Address in 1863: “a government of the people, by the people, for the people.” The last part of that definition is almost nonexistent in many developing nations. Its true that African countries have a governmental structure which puts power in the hands of the people. However, the governments of Africa struggle to truly serve their population and give back to those who elected them. All thanks to corruption. The 2014 Corruptions Perceptions Index from Transparency International notes that Africa competes closely with Asia for being the most politically corrupt region on the globe. Yet, there is a difference between corruption in Africa and corruption in other parts of the world. Governmental corruption in developing countries has a direct impact on the daily lives of citizens. Money that is meant to go towards sustainable development and economic growth often disappears in the hands of dishonest politicians and officials. These “illicit financial flows” cost emerging nations over a total of $1 trillion dollars each year. When those funds vanish from the already-impoverished countries, it becomes harder for those governments to provide their citizens with the aid they desperately need. It’s a completely undemocratic system where the electors struggle while the electors prosper. African countries have taken some large steps to tone down corruption in recent years. However, the issue still plagues the continent today. Just this week, a high-ranking minister in Tanzania was sacked for a financial scandal which sent devastating waves through their government. Until developing nations can win their battle against corruption, they cannot claim they have a government “by the people, for the people.”
So democracy doesn’t work all that great in developing countries. What’s the solution?
As with many other policy issues, the best medicine is patience and perseverance. Countries in Africa and around the world must strive to build fair, transparent systems in which all citizens has equal rights and abilities. Strengthening relations with the international community for foreign aid could be a smart first step.
It took only a few decades for the countries of Africa to achieve full independence from Europe. Hopefully, their journey of achieving true democracy will be just as successful. | http://pagesixtyone.com/DemocracyInAfrica.html |
Democracy is championed as a universal good by the West, but we over-estimate its power to guarantee personal and political freedom, argues Roger Scruton.
For some time, the leading Western nations have acted upon the assumption that democracy is the solution to political conflict, and that the ultimate goal of foreign policy must be to encourage the emergence of democracy in countries which have not yet enjoyed its benefits. And they continue to adhere to this assumption, even when considering events in the Middle East today. We can easily sympathise with it. For democracies do not, in general, go to war with each other, and do not, in general experience, civil war within their borders. Where the people can choose their government, there is a safety valve that prevents conflicts from over-heating. Unpopular governments are rejected without violence.
The championship of democracy has therefore become a settled feature of Western foreign policy. In retrospect, the Cold War has been seen as a conflict between democracy and totalitarianism, in which democracy finally triumphed. And with democracy came the liberation of the people of the former communist states. Where there had been tyranny and oppression, there was now freedom and human rights. And if we study the words of Western politicians, we will constantly find that the three ideas – democracy, freedom and human rights – are spoken of in one breath, and assumed in all circumstances to coincide. That, for many of our political leaders, is the lesson to be drawn from the Cold War and the final collapse of the Soviet empire.
In my view, the idea that there is a single, one-size-fits-all solution to social and political conflict around the world, and that democracy is the name of it, is based on a disregard of historical and cultural conditions, and a failure to see that democracy is only made possible by other and more deeply hidden institutions. And while we are willing to accept that democracy goes hand in hand with individual freedom and the protection of human rights, we often fail to realise that these three things are three things, not one, and that it is only under certain conditions that they coincide… MORE
Democracy in a few words
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George Bernard Shaw: «Democracy is a device that ensures we shall be governed no better than we deserve»
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Winston Churchill: «Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.»
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Clement Atlee: «Democracy means government by discussion, but it is only effective if you can stop people talking»
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Tom Stoppard: «It’s not the voting that’s democracy, it’s the counting»
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John Gray examines the trouble with toppling tyrants (August 2012)
Andrew Whitehead speaks to historian Eric Hobsbawm about the possibility of Arab democracies (December 2011)
And in 2009, Clive James argued liberal democracies are are the ‘first and essential requirement for all countries of the world’
Noted: Is democracy overrated? < don’t agree, but worth a read http://dmsc.me/13b3ep3 (
12:06 PM – 11 Aug 2013)
Democracy in the developing world: The role of social capital and crime. Journalist’s Resource
Research from Pepperdine and Oxford University examines how Latin American citizens’ perceptions of security influence support for democratic governance. | http://felipesahagun.es/is-democracy-overrated/ |
Half of all Ukrainian children have been displaced since Russia’s attack began on February 24.
“It’s mind-boggling,” UNICEF spokesperson James Elder told CNN. “Since the start of the war a month ago, out of every boy and girl in the country, 1 out of 2 now has had to flee their homes.”
President Joe Biden joined an emergency meeting of European allies with a promise that the US would accept up to 100,000 Ukrainians displaced by Russia’s attack on their country.
It’s a large commitment by the US. The last time it accepted 100,000 refugees in a single year was in the mid-1990s.
How will 100,000 Ukrainians be admitted? Stay tuned
Many questions remain about the pledge to bring 100,000 displaced Ukrainians to the US, and the White House does not plan to raise the cap of 125,000 refugees for the 2022 fiscal year.
84 million displaced people, 26.6 million refugees
While the Russian attack of Ukraine and the unexpected flood of refugees has shocked the global community, the worldwide problem of displaced people is not new.
Most of these people are displaced within their own countries. But more than 26.6 million of these are refugees who have fled their native countries, usually to nations nearby.
Most of these refugees were from just five countries: Afghanistan, Myanmar, South Sudan, Syria and Venezuela.
Syria, Venezuela and now Ukraine
Looking at the UNHCR data from prior to the Russian attack on Ukraine, two countries accounted for the most refugees: Syria (6.8 million refugees), which has been decimated by war for more than a decade, and Venezuela (4.1 million refugees), with its authoritarian government and economic distress. In both cases, the crises built over years.
One thing that ties these countries together is political unrest and authoritarianism.
“The decline of democracy, the rise of authoritarianism has led to greater numbers of refugees in the world,” Michael Abramowitz, president of Freedom House, told me over the phone this week.
Freedom House gets most of its funding from the US government and pushes democracy around the world. It issues a report each year giving countries democracy scores. The number of countries with declining scores has outnumbered those with gains for 16 years.
Not simply a choice to leave
The response to the Ukraine crisis has been as swift and massive as the refugee crisis itself. That has not always been the case for other countries.
Selectively welcomed
“We are painfully seeing that refugees are selectively welcomed, and war criminals are selectively punished. It’s not just the Western media that is biased; it’s the Western world,” Damon wrote. | http://adokesh.com/the-refugee-crisis-is-much-bigger-than-ukraine/ |
Westerners and Muslims generally agree that relations between them are poor. On balance, the Western publics polled tend to say relations are bad, and the same is true among the Muslim publics in the survey, with the exception of Indonesia, where views are divided.
However, Westerners are less likely to believe relations are poor today than was the case five years ago. Negative assessments have become less common since 2006 in Russia, Britain, Germany, the U.S. and France. Overall, there is no improvement, however, in predominantly Muslim nations, where assessments are at least as negative as they were five years ago. Again, the only exception is Indonesia, where fewer now say relations between Westerners and Muslims are bad.
While Westerners and Muslims generally agree that relations between them are not good, they largely disagree over whom to blame. Many Westerners think Muslims are at fault, although a substantial number believe that Westerners themselves share at least some of the blame. Meanwhile, Muslims – and in most countries, large majorities of Muslims – blame Westerners.
Similarly, while both sides agree that Muslim nations are not as prosperous as they should be, they differ over the reasons why. In particular, many Muslims blame the policies of the U.S. and other Western countries, while few in the West take this position. However, government corruption in Muslim nations is considered a primary cause by Muslims and Westerners alike. And since 2006, several Muslim and Western publics have become more likely to blame the lack of prosperity in Muslim countries on a lack of democracy in these countries.
Many Muslims continue to believe both Americans and Europeans are hostile toward them, and in several nations this perception has become more pervasive over the last five years. For their part, Americans and Europeans continue to believe that Muslims in the West want to remain distinct from the rest of society. There is no Western country in which a majority says their country’s Muslim minority wants to adopt the customs of the broader society.
Among Western nations, assessments of Muslim-Western relations are especially negative in France, Germany and Spain. In all three countries, roughly six-in-ten say relations between Muslims and people in Western nations such as the United States and Europe are poor. Somewhat fewer in Britain (52%) and the U.S. (48%) hold this view.
The percentage of Russians describing relations as bad has fallen 15 points since 2006, and notable declines have also taken place in Britain (-9 points), Germany (-9), the U.S. (-7), and France (-4).
Of all the publics surveyed, Palestinian Muslims offer the most negative assessments of Muslim-Western relations (72% bad), although roughly six-in-ten Muslims in Turkey, Lebanon, Egypt and Jordan feel this way. Only 45% of Pakistani Muslims say relations are bad, although this is up from 25% in 2006; 8% say relations are neither good nor bad and fully 29% have no opinion on this question.
Indonesia is the exception among the Muslim publics surveyed. Just 41% of Indonesian Muslims say relations are bad, down from 54% five years ago; 43% currently believe relations between Muslims are Westerners are good.
When Westerners who characterize relations as bad are asked who is responsible, they tend to say Muslims. This is especially true in France, where 56% of those describing relations as poor place most of the blame on Muslims. About half in Spain (49%) blame Muslims, up from 32% five years ago. Roughly half (48%) also hold this view in Germany.
About four-in-ten Russians (41%) who think relations are bad primarily blame Muslims. Somewhat fewer express this opinion in Britain (34%).
While 40% of Americans who describe relations as bad blame Muslims, this view is much more common among Republicans (60%) than Democrats (33%) or independents (32%).
Many Westerners hold their own countries responsible. More than one-quarter in the U.S. (29%), Russia (27%), France (26%), and Britain (26%) place most of the blame on people in Western countries.
In Spain (29%), Germany (24%), and Britain (24%) many volunteer that both sides share responsibility for the poor state of relations.
Among Muslims who say relations are bad, majorities in six of seven nations think Westerners are mostly to blame. This view is especially common in the non-Arab nations surveyed: Turkey (75%), Indonesia (74%), and Pakistan (72%). In the four Arab nations, significant minorities volunteer that Jews are primarily to blame, including 35% of Lebanese Muslims. Across the Muslim publics included in the survey, fewer than one-in-five believe Muslims are mostly to blame for the poor state of relations.
Should Muslim Nations Be More Prosperous?
In 12 of 14 countries, majorities say that, all things considered, Muslim nations should be more prosperous than they are today. More than three-quarters hold this view in Spain (86%) and France (76%), as do 60% in Germany and 59% in Britain. A slim 52%-majority of Americans think Muslim countries should be wealthier. Views are more divided in Russia, where 37% say they should be more prosperous, 31% say they should not, and 32% give no opinion.
In Israel, views are sharply divided along religious lines – just 44% of Jews believe Muslim nations should be more prosperous, compared with 88% of the country’s Muslims.
Among the predominantly Muslim publics surveyed, there is an overwhelming consensus that the Muslim world should be better off economically than it is today. At least eight-in-ten Muslims express this opinion in all seven of these countries.
Across the 14 countries where this question was asked, those who think Muslim nations should be more prosperous point to a variety of causes for these economic troubles. Americans and Europeans tend to say government corruption is a major cause – majorities in the U.S. and all four Western European nations name this as one of the top two reasons why Muslim nations are not more successful economically.
Many Americans and Europeans also say that Muslim nations’ economic difficulties stem from a lack of democracy. This is a particularly common view in France, where 65% of those who believe Muslim nations should be richer say that a lack of democracy is one of the top two reasons for their economic problems, up from 48% in 2006. This view has also become much more prevalent over the last five years in Germany (+25 percentage points), Spain (+19), Britain (+14), and the U.S. (+14).
In contrast, the percentage of Westerners blaming Islamic fundamentalism for the economic challenges in Muslim nations has declined over the last five years in most countries, with notable drops in Germany (-20 percentage points), Russia (-13) and France (-11). Drops have been more modest in the U.S. (-5) and Spain (-4).
Relatively few in the U.S. or Western Europe think American and Western policies are responsible for the lack of prosperity in the Muslim world. However, roughly four-in-ten Russians (39%) list this as one of their top two reasons.
Placing blame on U.S. and Western European policies is also quite common among the Muslim publics surveyed. This is especially true in Jordan – a country with close diplomatic ties to the U.S. – where two-thirds list American and Western policies as one of top two reasons for the lack of prosperity in Muslim countries. In Pakistan, the percentage of Muslims voicing this opinion has almost doubled since 2006 (47% vs. 24%).
Muslims also believe corrupt governments are to blame. Eight-in-ten Palestinian Muslims say official corruption is one of the top two reasons for the lack of prosperity. Nearly as many Israeli Muslims (76%) hold this view, compared with 49% of Israeli Jews (Jews in Israel tend to mention a lack of democracy – 60% list it as a top reason).
Many Muslims also cite a dearth of democracy, including a majority (56%) in Lebanon. And as is the case among Westerners, Muslims are more likely to believe this today than they were five years ago. Notably, more now express this view in Egypt, which itself is in the process of transitioning to democracy (48% now; 32% in 2006). This view has also become more common in Indonesia (+14 percentage points) and Jordan (+14).
Significant numbers of Turkish (50%), Pakistani (40%), and Egyptian (39%) Muslims say a lack of education is responsible for the economic problems of Muslim nations. There is no Muslim public in which as many as one-in-five name Islamic fundamentalism as one of the primary reasons.
Muslims continue to believe there is widespread hostility toward them in the West. More than seven-in-ten think most or many Americans are hostile toward Muslims in the Palestinian territories, Turkey, and Pakistan, and solid majorities feel this way in Egypt and Jordan.
Moreover, perceptions of American hostility have increased since 2006 in four of the five countries where trends are available, with the percentage describing Americans as hostile rising 11 percentage points in Turkey and Pakistan, six points in Egypt, and five in Jordan.
Roughly six-in-ten Lebanese Muslims (59%) also hold this view, although there is a large gap between the country’s Shia (69%) and Sunni (49%) communities on this question.
Slightly more Israeli Muslims believe just some or very few Americans are hostile toward Muslims than hold the opposite views (52% just some/very few; 47% most/many). Somewhat more Indonesian Muslims view the West as non-hostile on balance (50% just some/very few; 42% most/many).
Overall, Muslims’ perceptions of Europeans are very similar to their perceptions of Americans on this issue, although Egyptian Muslims are more likely to see Europeans as hostile than to feel this way about Americans. Conversely, Israeli Muslims consider Americans more hostile than Europeans, as do Lebanese Muslims. In particular, Lebanese Shia believe Americans are more hostile than Europeans (69% vs. 55%).
The view that Europeans are hostile has become more common since 2006 in Turkey (+13 percentage points), Jordan (+11), Egypt (+7), and Pakistan (+7).
On balance, respondents in the non-Muslim nations surveyed believe Muslims in their countries want to be distinct from the larger society. Majorities or pluralities hold this view in Western Europe, the U.S., Israel and Russia. This opinion is particularly widespread in Germany (72%), Spain (69%), and Russia (66%).
France is the country in which the largest percentage believes Muslims want to adopt national customs: 45% think French Muslims want to embrace the French way of life.
Across the U.S. and Western Europe there is a notable education gap on this question. Consistently, the opinion that Muslims do not want to assimilate is less widespread among those with a college degree. The largest gap is in France where 42% of those with a college degree say Muslims wish to be distinct from the rest of society, compared with 62% among those who do not have a college degree. Double digit differences also exist in Germany, Britain and the U.S. | https://www.pewglobal.org/2011/07/21/chapter-1-the-rift-between-muslims-and-the-west/ |
Piketty, who has previously written about the uneven distribution of wealth in the world, believes that while there are a number of factors at play, the entrenched inequality and high concentration of oil wealth within Middle Eastern countries are significant factors driving the support of jihadist and terrorist groups in the region.
Setting out his argument in French newspaper Le Monde, Piketty believes that the political and social systems of the Middle East have been made fragile due to the fact that a small number of countries own a majority of the region's wealth, and that wealth is unevenly divided among those countries.
He calculated that oil-wealthy Middle Eastern countries, consisting of Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Oman, account for only 16 percent of the region's population, but close to 60 percent of its gross domestic product (GDP).
He says that such inequality makes the Middle East region the "the most unequal on the planet."
Then to make matters worse, Piketty says that even in the oil-rich countries, the wealth still isn't evenly shared, with many parts of the population, including women and refugees, held in a state of poverty and "semi-slavery."
Western Intervention Also to Blame
While arguing that the inequality across the Middle East, shown through the various political and social structures, is a major driving factor in terrorism, Piketty also blames a series of western military interventions in the region for consolidating the wealth in the hands of the very few and leading many to experience the horrors of war.
Thomas Piketty blames inequality for the rise of ISIS. https://t.co/k5sodJ5gkO— Blake Hounshell (@blakehounshell) December 1, 2015
He argues that exposure to constant poverty and a sense of suppression, along with the stresses of war and suffering, create a "powder keg" for terrorism and lead many to justify the use of violence as a way of protesting against their situation.
He also is also particularly critical of western support for abusive regimes.
"These are the regimes that are militarily and politically supported by western powers, all too happy to get some crumbs to fund their [soccer] clubs or sell some weapons. No wonder our lessons in social justice and democracy find little welcome among Middle Eastern youth."
Terrorism Needs to be Fought Economically
In a dramatically different approach to the one currently being initiated by western governments, Piketty believes that terrorism and inequality are ultimately linked, and as a result need to be combated economically.
He says western nations should show that they are more concerned with the overall social development of the region, rather than their own financial and strategic interests, as a way of winning credibility in the region.
According to a research paper co-authored by Piketty last year, he found that the richest 10 percent of people in the Middle East held over 60 percent of the wealth, while the top one percent held more than 25 percent of the wealth.
This inequality, according to Piketty, exceeded that in the US, where the top one percent held 23 percent of the wealth and western Europe, where the top one percent had 11 percent of the wealth. | https://sputniknews.com/middleeast/201512011031066179-thomas-piketty-rise-daesh-inequality-theory/ |
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SALT Report 2212 – A Washington Appeals judge upheld a ruling by the Department of Revenue that disallowed the machinery and equipment exemption and the high technology tax deferral for purchases of materials used to build a medical device prototype.
Initially, the Taxpayer was approved for the High Technology Sales and Use Tax Deferral Program by the Department of Revenue. The Taxpayer was issued the appropriate certificate which was valid during the audit period. However, during the course of the audit, it was determined that certain materials the Taxpayer purchased to build its prototypes did not qualify for the M&E exemption.
To build its prototypes, the Taxpayer purchased “consumable” items which were incorporated into the R&D control testing tools. The Taxpayer kept detailed files that listed all of the items that were incorporated into each testing tool as well as records of every use of that particular tool. The Taxpayer stated that each prototype was developed for the purpose of testing software, testing the product’s design, testing or calibrating tools, making and building other tools, or in various stages of the medical device’s manufacturing process. Further, the Taxpayer claimed that the entire testing process was done in an effort to comply with the FDA’s guidelines.
However, in the audit report, the auditor determined that the consumable items used to build the prototypes did not qualify for the exemption and were subject to tax. The Taxpayer appealed the decision and did not pay the assessment.
Upon review of the case, the Appeals Judge stated that, although the building of a prototype may be an integral and necessary part of the development of a new product, the ingredients and components used in the creation of the prototypes are not eligible for the high technology sales and use tax deferral program.
Further, nothing in the tax deferral statute or rule indicates that prototypes or their component parts and ingredients qualify as “machinery and equipment.” Therefore, the items used to create the Taxpayer’s prototype do not qualify for the manufacturing and equipment exemption provided in RCW 82.08.02565.
Additionally, the Judge stated that the only situation in which a prototype would qualify for the M&E exemption is if it was used to build or test a different product, or if it was used in “a supportive capacity in stages of the manufacturing operation.” However, the Taxpayer did not use its prototype to test other items of tangible personal property; rather it used the prototype to test new versions of the same product.
Based on the above, the Judge denied the Taxpayer’s appeal and upheld the Department of Revenue’s audit assessment. | http://report.saltcpa.com/2013/03/washington-medical-prototype-did-not-qualify/ |
As a Product Development Engineer on our team, you will be responsible for the mechanical design, development, and quality of consumer electronic products. We are looking for candidates who thrive in a fast paced start-up like environment and want to invent the future. In the role, you will wear many hats in working on the system design down to quick turn prototypes, manufacturing production process, testing, and quality control. You will play a role in defining processes and methods to improve the productivity of the entire team. You will identify and initiate investigations of production technologies, prototype and test solutions for product features, and design and validate production designs that deliver an exceptional user experience.
You will work in a small PD team to create a new experience and work with the team at large to ensure a functional and beautiful product. To be successful you need to be highly motivated, understand how to solve problems and dive deep while delivering to the highest standards.
You will demonstrate a strong working knowledge of mechanical systems, with expertise in systems integration; the desire to learn from new challenges and the problem solving and communication skills to work within a highly interactive and experienced team. Candidates must show a hands-on passion for their work and be able to communicate their ideas and concepts both verbally and visually. Candidates must demonstrate an ability to integrate feedback and to respond quickly to changing contexts and work environments. In this role, you will:
· Research into materials and component technologies to scope development opportunities
· Feature design and testing to meet program objective
· Test failure analysis and solution validation to complete successful product development
· Provide detailed part design and product documentation
· Field failure analysis and solution evaluation for production product issues
· Support positive team interactions to accomplish program objectives
· Provide cross-functional program integration support to ensure team success
· Apply technical expertise to problem solving throughout product lifecycle
· Mentor junior engineers in good product design practice
BASIC QUALIFICATIONS
· Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering or related field
· 5+ years of experience, consumer/handheld product development
· 5+ years of experience in product validation (Shock/Drop, Cycle Testing, Environmental Testing)
· Experience with 3D CAD skills, ProEngineer
· Experience creating surface model and top-down design architecture
· Knowledge of Tolerance Analysis and Statistical Process Control (Cp, CpK)
PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS
· Master’s degree
· Windchill
· Demonstrated knowledge of tooling and materials process validation (SPC, Cp, CpK)
· Demonstrated design experience with high volume/high finish consumer electronics enclosure materials
· Demonstrated design experience integrating component modules (I/O, Displays, Batteries, PCBs, etc.)
· Analytic problem solving skills, including knowledge of 8D, Six Sigma, DOE or similar disciplines
· Demonstrated leadership and mentoring skills
· Proficiency with Design for Cost and Design for Manufacture for consumer products
· Strong analytical skills. | https://www.theladders.com/job/senior-product-design-engineer-amazon-sunnyvale-ca_36104930 |
Fireworks erupted last week when Mayor Joyce Craig vetoed a proposal from Ward 3 Alderman Tim Baines to alter city ordinances to allow downtown business owners to control the use of sidewalks outside their storefronts year-round, despite a 12-0 show of support for the plan from fellow board members.
Encumbrance permits are issued to businesses between April 1 and Oct. 15 to control the use of sidewalk space outside their businesses as needed. Baines’ proposal would remove the date restrictions. Baines said such a change would allow business owners to maintain control of the immediate area outside their doors and prevent groups of vagrants from urinating and defecating in alcoves and doorways.
In vetoing the proposal, Craig repeatedly stressed her belief that “no fundamental difference” exists between the ordinance as currently written and Baines’ proposal.
Under the existing encumbrance ordinance, “Each license shall be valid from April 1 through October 15 and the hours of operation shall be from 9:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. The City Clerk, upon application by a licensee, shall have the discretion to extend the dates and times of operation.”
In a prepared statement explaining her veto, Craig references a letter dated Jan. 7 from ACLU-NH Legal Director Gilles Bissonnette that “put the city on notice” that the organization views the proposal as unconstitutional.
Craig quotes the ACLU-NH letter as saying, “The city is limited in its ability to simply designate certain public spaces — sidewalks, for example — as non-public fora (plural for forum) by bestowing exclusive use to a private business.”
“I don’t know why we would knowingly put the city in jeopardy of another lawsuit which will result in wasting taxpayer dollars,” Craig said after vetoing the proposal.
In his letter, Bissonnette doesn’t provide any formal policy recommendations to city officials, as doing so “may exceed the scope of our mission to fight for the rights of all individuals, regardless of income level, to freely use public places in accordance with the State and Federal Constitutions.”
“We do not have ‘silver bullet’ solutions to any of these issues; in fact, fully addressing these concerns likely involves systemic issues and implicates the need for broader community services for low income individuals,” Bissonnette wrote. “The ACLU-NH believes that to meaningfully address homelessness, policy makers must work to resolve the issues that cause people to be insecure in their housing. ”
Bissonnette goes on to address the loitering concerns raised by business owners, several of whom have attended aldermen meetings and offered testimony over the number of vagrants outside their businesses.
“Individuals, of course, have a constitutionally-protected right to be in public places,” Bissonnette wrote. “Accordingly, loitering and no-trespass laws implicating public places pose unique constitutional concerns, especially in so far as they provide the police with tremendous discretion and can be targeted against vulnerable communities. ... Moreover, a court would likely view any concern that the presence of individuals and their possessions in public places may make others feel uncomfortable as insufficiently compelling to justify an intrusion on one’s right to be in a public place, especially where the person being impacted has not committed a crime. The Constitution, of course, does not protect individuals from feeling uncomfortable.”
Craig stresses the city is making progress on the issue “on many fronts.”
“I respectfully ask the public and downtown business owners to stop giving people money or food, but rather to refer them to FIT (Families in Transition)-New Horizons, which is now open during the day, so they can get a healthy meal and the services they need,” Craig said. “And lastly, I want to remind everyone: We have a zero tolerance for anyone breaking the law, but we can’t help unless we’re notified. So please, if you see someone breaking the law — doing drugs, committing an assault, completely blocking a doorway or the sidewalk, call the police.”
Alderman At-Large Joe Kelly Levasseur questioned how Craig could veto a 12-0 vote by the board, but City Clerk Matt Normand pointed out that the mayor, by charter, has the ability to veto any action by the board, and the board can vote to override that veto.
A motion to override failed, with Levasseur surprisingly voting against it, saying he felt Craig’s comments left the city vulnerable to legal action.
“All 12 aldermen voted for the ordinance to help downtown,” Levasseur said. “Mayor Craig, in a prepared statement on live TV, unleashed all the legal advice received in non-public from our attorney. As an attorney, I sat there stunned. All I could think of was how the mayor’s video statement would look to a jury. She had recklessly come out and publicly stated the real reason for the ordinance change was done to intentionally get rid of homeless people. Even Benedict Arnold would have been impressed. She left me no choice.”
City Solicitor Emily Rice doesn’t feel the mayor’s comments were “setting the city up for a lawsuit,” as Levasseur claimed.
“I don’t think any liability has been created here tonight,” Rice said. “I think people are going to draw their own conclusions.”
Baines took to social media last week to thank board members who supported his proposal.
“I would like to thank my fellow (aldermen) for the 12-0 vote in support of my ordinance change that would have given a bit of relief to those conducting business in the downtown,” Baines wrote on his Facebook page. “Unfortunately Mayor Craig vetoed this ordinance change in a prepared speech and the ordinance change was killed. It is essential that we work together to solve issues. A ‘my way or the highway’ approach is never good in any business, and certainly not in city government. I will continue the fight to ensure that everyone that wants to conduct business, live in, and enjoy the downtown feels safe. We can and must do better.”
An app for needles, trash?
Following the veto, one reader of this publication suggested it may be time for the Queen City to invest in its own version of San Francisco’s “SnapCrap” app as a way to combat human waste on downtown streets.
The app is free and lets residents take photographs of feces, needles or trash on streets and sidewalks, and then submit the photos, generating a report to the city’s 311 hotline.
According to the San Francisco Chronicle, plans call for a dedicated “Poop Patrol” to respond to these fecal alerts, which total roughly 65 calls a day.
Mansfield named pro
Public Works Director Kevin Sheppard revealed last week that Cory Mansfield has been offered and has accepted the job as golf pro at Derryfield Country Club.
According to Sheppard, Mansfield has been a PGA Class A professional since 1996 and serves on the board of the New Hampshire chapter of the New England PGA. He most recently served as the head golf pro at Montcalm Golf Club in Enfield. In addition, Mansfield has owned and operated a golf academy and been employed as a golf pro at other courses around New England for more than 20 years.
“Mr. Mansfield’s vast golf experience, coupled with his demonstrated business capability, lead us to be confident in his ability to continue the success and growth at Derryfield Country Club,” Sheppard wrote in a memo to city aldermen.
Mansfield takes on the job following the death last November of longtime pro Mike Ryan.
Search firm chosen
School board members are expected to vote Monday to ratify a recent phone poll approving McPherson & Jacobson LLC out of Omaha, Neb., as consultants to head up the district’s search for a new superintendent of schools.
According to information provided in the firm’s response to a Request for Proposals (RFP), McPherson & Jacobson has been conducting national searches for governing boards since 1991. The firm has placed over 725 superintendents and other officials in public and nonprofit organizations across the country.
Members of the Committee on the Superintendent Search — consisting of Ward 9 school board member Art Beaudry as chairman, Mary Georges of Ward 3, Leslie Want of Ward 4, Lisa Freeman of Ward 5 and Kelly Thomas of Ward 12, with Mayor Craig serving as a non-voting member — recommended McPherson & Jacobson after reviewing responses to an RFP issued by the district.
According to the RFP, the firm chosen will be asked to “provide and facilitate community input and engagement efforts regarding desired superintendent skills, characteristics and qualifications; this may include focus groups, surveys and larger community meetings.”
The RFP also states these efforts must include “key stakeholders including but not limited to parents and parent organizations, under-represented groups, students and student leaders, employees, the business community, district partners, and key elected officials.”
The RFP also lays out the following details of the search process:
• Advise the school board on an appropriate compensation package for the position.
• Develop a position paper and/or job description with the school board designed to successfully recruit the best candidate.
• Screen, evaluate and rank qualified applicants and provide a report on each applicant, using criteria set forth by the school board.
• Conduct thorough reference and background checks on all interviewees, as required, including an extensive reference check on three to six finalists.
• Coordinate and facilitate community engagement receptions to provide the community an opportunity to meet and evaluate the final candidates in person. | https://www.unionleader.com/news/politics/city_hall/paul-feely-s-city-hall-alcu-nh-has-already-put/article_9dcbd33d-587c-559b-859c-1feb6b633a05.html |
Several months and revisions later the Optima development gets its final approval
A once-contentious development proposal for downtown Wilmette now has the needed approval to move forward.
Wilmette’s Village Board Tuesday, Oct. 27, granted final approval for a mixed-used development project in downtown Wilmette frequently referred to as the Optima development.
The development at 1210 Central Ave. includes the construction of a building containing approximately 5,900 square feet of commercial space on the ground floor and 109 new on-property residential units, according to documents detailing the project.
The subject property is located in the Village Center zoning district.
Of the 109 units, 100 will be located on floors two through six of the building, while nine will be located on the ground level. A roof deck on the seventh floor with enclosed amenity space will also be part of the project.
Approved plans for the development also include 28 new public parking spaces, with two public electric vehicle parking stations.
The project first appeared in front of the Wilmette Plan Commission in January of 2020 for a public hearing. The commission voted 5-2 on Feb. 4 to recommend denial for the developer’s request for a special-use permit.
After several revised applications and proposals, Wilmette’s Village Board voted 5-2 to approve the developer’s preliminary plans in early March; however, the board still needed to adopt several ordinances related to the plan before it could move forward.
Officials’ subsequent ordinance adoption included additional elements the village describes as “public benefits” of the project. Those are, according to village documents:
• A contribution from the developer of $1.6 million for potential use to further advance affordable housing within the village;
• A contribution of $120,000 for the streetscape improvements in the Village Center;
• The construction and maintenance of a public plaza, which will display public art; and
• Twenty-eight parking spaces for general-public use, two of which will be used for fee-for-service electric charging stations.
Several aspects of the proposal were changed from the time it received a negative recommendation from the Plan Commission until it was ultimately approved.
Community Development Director John Adler told The Record a key revision was the developer’s 5-foot setback of the second-sixth floors of the building along Green Bay Road, which eliminated a variation the project would have required. The ground floor was also setback an additional 5 feet from the original plan.
Most of the residential concerns raised during public meetings centered on how the building will impact the residences to the west. There’s several townhomes and some single-family homes located in close proximity to the west of the project.
The applicant — Green Bay Wilmette LLC, which is an affiliate of Optima Inc. — has previously developed three condominium projects in Wilmette. Those projects are the four-story mixed-use Optima Center in downtown Wilmette, the 10-story building at 1618 Sheridan Road and the Lake Courts mixed-use building on Lake Avenue.
The development team indicated it will be demolishing the current building in the first quarter of next year and will be starting construction in the fourth quarter of 2021, Adler said. Officials are targeting a completion date in 2023.
Village officials believe the approved plans are in line with Wilmette’s comprehensive master plan.
“One of the underlying goals of (the village’s comprehensive master plan) was to increase the number of people who live in and are able to enjoy our services and the transportation the Village Center provides, and this is definitely doing that,” Adler said.
“Also, the way that the corner of the building on the first floor was setback allowing sort of a public plaza on that corner there was something else that helped further the vision of the master plan. The idea of increasing the density is a positive. The money that will be provided for affordable housing is something that will allow us to also address goals of the comprehensive plan as they related to housing needs.”
Martin Carlino
Martin Carlino is a co-founder and the senior editor who assigns and edits The Record stories, while also bylining articles every week. Martin is an experienced and award-winning education reporter who was the editor of The Northbrook Tower. | https://www.therecordnorthshore.org/2020/10/31/several-months-and-revisions-later-the-optima-development-gets-its-final-approval/ |
A closer look: Ideas to curb bad behavior in Old Town
Thursday evening, Fort Collins city staff revealed four possible proposals to curb disruptive behavior in Old Town.
If approved by city council, any proposals would likely be enacted as one-year pilots. City council will further discuss the proposals and addressing homelessness in the city at an Aug. 25 work session.
MEETING:City meeting addresses disruptive behaviors in Old Town
Here’s a closer look at each of the four proposals and what they could mean for downtown.
Street outreach program
A street outreach program has been in the forefront of collaborative discussions between area homeless service providers and city officials for several months.
The program is based on best practices from other cities, including Burlington, Vermont. A group of six community leaders visited Burlington this week to learn more about their street outreach program, which has been operating for more than a decade.
Street outreach programs allow businesses and residents to reach out to a team of trained volunteers or paid staff when they encounter disruptive behavior. Deputy City Manager Jeff Mihelich said the proposed Fort Collins program would utilize a handful of paid staff who would maintain a regular presence in downtown.
Mihelich said a street outreach program would reduce burdens on police officers by preventing and reacting to non-emergent disruptive behaviors. Street outreach staff would help connect those in need of services with the appropriate venues to seek help.
“This isn’t 9-1-1,” Mihelich said. “This isn’t responding to an emergency. That’s police work. This is identifying aggressive behavior, preventing it before it happens and providing services.”
Shared public spaces ordinance
A shared public spaces ordinance would limit the amount of time an individual could sit or lie in the public right of way in Old Town.
The ordinance would cover sidewalks, plazas, curbs and benches in the downtown area. Mihelich said the exact time an individual would be allowed to sit or lie in enforcement areas hasn’t been decided.
“We’re not talking about a day, but we’re also not talking about 15 minutes,” he said. “It could be an hour.”
The enforcement area for this ordinance and any other pilot programs would be the same as the Old Town smoking ban. Rough boundaries for the ban are Mason Street on the west, Maple/Jefferson Street on the north and northwest, and Olive Street on the south. The southeast boundary of the smoking ban runs along portions of Mountain Avenue, as well as Matthews and Remington streets.
Mihelich said shared public spaces ordinances have had mixed results in other communities.
A similar ordinance in Seattle has had positive results. Business owners in San Francisco said they’ve seen no major change in disruptive behaviors since the city enacted a shared public spaces ordinance. In one area of Honolulu, a shared public spaces ordinance brought some success, but residents were concerned about displacement of “those with nowhere to go” if the ordinance were to be expanded, Mihelich said.
Enhancement of location diversion
An enhancement of location diversion program would offer a plea agreement for disruptive behaviors, such as assault, criminal mischief, trespass, damage to public property, disturbing the peace, disorderly conduct and harassment.
Depending on the severity of the offense or if an individual is a repeat offender, plea agreements would allow individuals to avoid fines and other penalties by agreeing not to go downtown for a set amount of time.
Mihelich said minor or first time offenses could warrant a week away from downtown. Major or second offenses could mean a month ban. Major crimes or multiple offenses, short of prison or jail time, could mean a ban of up to a year.
“If you’re downtown, no matter who you are, and you’re behaving, you’re welcome,” he said. “If you’re downtown and behaving aggressively, we’d rather not have you.”
Crime prevention through environmental design
Hints of this proposal are already in Old Town Fort Collins, where Mihelich said the Downtown Development Authority has placed some planters as an environmental barrier between benches and sidewalks.
Crime prevention through environmental design utilizes land use planning and urban design “to create safer environments,” Mihelich said.
While Mihelich said this proposal isn’t “the meat of the issue,” it could be successful in helping passersby feel more comfortable.
“It’s nice looking, but what it really creates is a buffer or safety zone for those folks walking on the sidewalk who are uncomfortable with folks sitting or lying on the benches,” he said.
READ MORE:Old Town businesses target transient disruptions
Follow Sarah Jane Kyle on Twitter @sarahjanekyle or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/reportersarahjane.
Share your thoughts
Share your thoughts on disruptive behavior in Old Town through an online survey at www.fcgov.com by 5 p.m. Monday. Surveys will be used to inform City Council during an Aug. 25 work session discussion on disruptive behaviors. | https://www.coloradoan.com/story/news/2015/08/14/closer-look-ideas-curb-bad-behavior-old-town-fort-collins/31711141/ |
Decatur — In a 4-1 vote, the Decatur City Council voted to ban the use of electronic cigarettes and vapor products inside public places. The ban includes areas within 10 feet of the entrances of public businesses. The city banned the use of cigarettes and cigars inside public places in 2007.
Bridgeport — City officials voted 16-1 to increase the legal minimum age to buy tobacco products to 21. The move makes Bridgeport the second municipality in Connecticut to pass Tobacco 21 legislation, following a similar vote by Hartford officials in October.
Gainesville — Alachua County lawmakers voted unanimously adopting legislation to raise the legal minimum age to buy tobacco products to 21. In addition, tobacco retailers will have to apply for a one-year license to sell tobacco products and they are prohibited from selling them within 1,000 feet of a public school.
Alachua County becomes the first county in Florida to increase the legal age. Each city within the county has time to opt out of the ordinance, which will take effect in nine months.
Arlington Heights — Members of the Village Board voted 8-0 to raise the legal minimum age of tobacco products to 21. Passed on Jan. 7, the ordinance went into effect in 10 days but enforcement will begin 30 days after adoption.
Lansing — A Tobacco 21 bill was introduced into the Michigan House of Representatives. In addition to hiking the legal minimum age to buy tobacco products and paraphernalia to 21 across the states, the proposal would also repeal language concerning the possession of tobacco products by minors.
Those who sell tobacco to anyone under 21 would face a fine of no less than $1,000 for the first offense, and a maximum of $5,000 for a second offense within two years. It also provides a provision that local municipalities may enact their own rules regarding tobacco sales that are stricter than those set at the state level.
The bill, which is co-sponsored by seven legislators from both sides of the aisle, is currently with the state's House Committee on Regulatory Reform.
Bemidji — The Beltrami County Board approved a motion to increase the legal minimum age to buy tobacco products to 21 by a 4-1 vote. The board will discuss the timeline and implementation of the ordinance at its Feb. 5 meeting.
Duluth — The Duluth City Council adopted a Tobacco 21 measure in a 6-2 vote on Jan. 28. The higher legal minimum age to buy tobacco products goes into effect in 120 days.
Minneapolis — Lawmakers in the Minnesota State Legislature will consider a statewide Tobacco 21 bill. State Rep. Heather Edelson (D-Edina) authored the proposal, and six other legislators have joined as co-sponsors.
The bill would prohibit the sale of tobacco products to anyone under 21, prohibit anyone under 21 from entering a retail tobacco shop, increase fines for selling tobacco products to anyone under 21, and would add charter schools to the ban of tobacco in schools. The legal minimum age to possess tobacco products would remain 18.
The bill is in the House Health and Human Services Policy Committee for its first hearing.
Concord — State Sen. Harold F. French (R-Franklin) proposed a bill that would prevent municipalities from raising the age to buy any product above the limit set by the state. The legal minimum age to buy tobacco products in New Hampshire is 18.
The proposal comes a month after city of Keene lawmakers approved an ordinance to increase the legal age to buy, use and possess tobacco products to 21. Dover became the first New Hampshire municipality to implement a Tobacco 21 law in July.
Tyler — The Tyler City Council voted to add electronic cigarettes to its 2008 ordinance prohibiting the use of tobacco products in public places.
Montpelier — State Rep. George Till (D-Jericho) introduced a bill that would prohibit the online sale of electronic cigarettes or e-liquids. It was referred to the House Committee on Human Services.
Specifically, the bill would prohibit "anyone from selling electronic cigarettes, liquids containing nicotine or otherwise intended for use with an electronic cigarette or tobacco paraphernalia in Vermont unless that person is a licensed wholesale dealer or purchased the items from a licensed wholesale dealer. It would also prohibit shipping these items to anyone in Vermont other than a licensed wholesale dealer or retailer."
Richmond — A bill to raise the legal minimum age to buy tobacco products from 18 to 21 is heading to the Virginia House of Delegates after the state Senate voted 32-8 to pass SB 1727. Senate Majority Leader Thomas K. Norment Jr. (R-James City) introduced the legislation. | https://csnews.com/tackling-tobacco-january-2019-legislative-regulatory-roundup |
The Government Operations Committee reviews all proposed city ordinances and home rule petitions and makes recommendations to the Council on their passage. As Chairman, I work with colleagues, the Mayor’s office, and various groups and individuals to hold public meetings on these matters. This year, the Committee held hearings and working sessions to discuss a wide range of issues. Below I have highlighted some of our most notable discussions from this past year.
The Committee on Government Operations held a hearing and two working sessions on a proposal from the Walsh Administration to regulate short-term rentals in the City of Boston. During a thorough Committee process, there was a consensus that - while short-term rentals allow people to set up businesses or make supplemental income , that concerns about the short term rental industry’s destabilizing impact on our neighborhoods and the lack of affordable housing across the City warranted further regulation. The final version of regulations removed the allowance of investor units; implemented fees and number of days allowed for Limited Share Units, Home Share Units and Owner-Adjacent Units, and called for data collection/sharing by the City.
This ordinance provides residents with more opportunities to submit voter registration forms when routinely interacting with the following City departments and agencies: Boston Public Library, Boston Transportation Department, Boston Public Schools and Boston Centers for Youth & Family. The ordinance’s final version includes the following provisions: a) BPS will have to implement protocol to allow students, who are eligible to vote, have sufficient accommodations to vote (i.e: starting the school day a little later with an “I voted” sticker as proof). b) The ordinance also requires the Boston Transportation Department provide voter registration forms to residents seeking parking permits.
The Committee on Government Operations held a hearing and working session on this proposal to increase resident engagement through the City Council by allowing any resident to submit a petition to the City Clerk, which the Council may act on at its discretion; and (2) a petition signed by at least 500 certified residents must be given a hearing within three months. The petition option would be bound by certain Council Rules, including that petitions must be action and/or content that could be passed or ordered by the City Council, would exclude certain matters, and would not require action if the Council had a substantially similar proceeding within the previous calendar year. The proposal remains in the Committee on Government Operations.
In response to the BI-Lahey merger, which has since gone through state approval procedurals, this hearing sought to provide a public platform for both proponents and opponents of the merger. The hearing allowed the City Council and other stakeholders to hear concerns about the implications of the merger, such as the creation of a “mega-hospital” system, which opponents argued would negatively impact the cost and access to healthcare - especially for low-income residents and communities of color, many of whom depend of community health centers.
This ordinance will allow the City to include revenue from the sale of alternative energy certificates and demand response program revenues produced by combined heat and power units located at Boston Public Schools sites in addition to the solar renewable energy certificates produced by the City’s photovoltaic arrays. Further, the Environment Department will be able to expand revenue by allowing the use of alternative energy certificate revenue and demand response program revenue produced by Boston Public Schools’ combined heat and power units. The revenues from the fund will be used to purchase offsets of greenhouse gas emissions which shall be associated with a portion of the electricity consumed by the City annually; to monitor, operate, and maintain existing solar arrays belonging to the City and the Boston Public School Department; and, to monitor, operate, and maintain Boston Public Schools’ combined heat and power facilities. Note: The proposal would also change the name of the fund to the Distributed Energy Resource Revenue Revolving Fund.
The Council voted to pass an ordinance that was sponsored by Mayor Walsh amending the City of Boston Code to update the fine schedule for specific categories of parking violations and violations for overnight street sweeping. The ordinance was passed in a new draft which amended the original proposal by lowering the fees for double-parking. The revenue generated from the fees will be used to to improve road safety, reduce congestion, ease resident parking burdens, help small business districts, and increase cleanliness on Boston's streets.
We held a public discussion about the possibility of allowing immigrants with legal status to vote in municipal elections and to examine other inclusive practices conducted by the City of Boston. An immigrant with legal status refers to a number of populations, including Legal Permanent Residents, visa holders, Temporary Protected Status recipients, and Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals recipients. While the Committee heard valuable testimony from various interest groups and individuals who expressed either their support or concerns on the matter, a memorable and key piece of testimony from Veronica Serrato, Executive Director Of Project Citizenship. Ms. Serrato testified that allowing immigrants to vote in municipal elections may have unintended consequences, explaining that any non-citizen who mistakenly registered to vote or votes in a non-municipal election, seriously jeopardizes their opportunity to become a legal citizen. There is no proposed legislation being considered by the City Council.
This ordinance created a new, optional permit for delivery vehicles. The permit has a four hour window, is intended to service residents with a one-off need for deliveries and is not required for residential or commercial deliveries. During the public hearing, Daniel Lesser, Director of Strategic Initiatives from the Boston Transportation and Public Works Department, explained that the permit arose feedback from residents requesting permits for delivery vehicles. The ordinance amends the City of Boston Code to add a new subsection under Chapter VIII, Section 1.16 “’P’ Fees and Charges” for the creation of a parkway or street occupancy permit for delivery vehicles, and amends Chapter XI, Section 6.16 to clarify that the new delivery vehicle permit will not require a bond.
The Committee held a productive and robust public hearing on a proposed ordinance for fair work week employment standards for City contractors. The proposed ordinance seeks to provide ‘covered employer’, defined as the City of Boston and any firm, vendor, contractor or supplier of goods and/or services to the City of Boston, and of its subcontractors, with predictable and advance notice of work schedules. Employees would also be compensated for any employer initiated change to the posted schedule, includes right to rest provisions and requires employers to offer work to existing employees before hiring new employees or using an external pool of applicants. The Committee heard testimony from the Office of Workforce Development and panels of representatives from the restaurant industry, retailers, and staffing agencies. The matter remains in Committee.
The ordinance seeks to establish a commission to have biannual reviews which would assess union and nonunion contractors’ performance in meeting the standards set by the Boston Residents Jobs Policy; and would require the Commission to also report biannually to the Council in a public hearing to discuss its findings. The Commission would be comprised of thirteen members, nine district appointees and four appointees appointed by the Mayor. Of the Mayor’s appointees, one should have a history of advocating for the rights of Boston workers and involvement with education, one with a history of advocacy for workers of color and one with a history of advocacy for women in the construction field. The hearing began with public support of the ordinance and included testimony from members of the administration, Union Labor and Non-Union Labor, Education and Community advocates.
This ordinance seeks to help the City of Boston leverage its purchasing and procurement power to support local economies, nutrition, a valued workforce, environmental sustainability, and animal welfare. It is modeled after the Good Food Purchasing Program (GFPP) developed in 2012 by the Center for Good Food Purchasing. During the public hearing we heard from Director of Food and Nutrition Services, Laura Benavidez who shared her experiences implementing the program in the Los Angeles Unified School District and highlighted some of the great work being done across BPS currently. Director Benavidez expressed her general support of the ordinance and noted that the Department is currently preparing to put out a “grocery list” RFP through which the Food and Nutrition Services Department plans to use as a baseline for the financial implications of implementing the GFFP. There was additional testimony from a variety of stakeholders that underscored the importance of the GFFP, the positive implications it could have for the local food market and our students access to healthy food, and the need for ongoing stakeholder engagement to ensure the ordinance is effective. The ordinance remains in Committee.
The Committee on the Community Preservation Act was created to continue the discussion following November 2016, when voters in Boston approved the implementation of the CPA for our city. Alongside with the appointments of an 9-member Community Preservation Commission, the City Council’s Committee on the Community Preservation Act approves budgetary requests for community-based projects seeking funding from the City’s CPA revenue.
The Committee held its first hearing on hearing from Administration officials (CFO Emme Handy and CPA Director Christine Poff) along with the 35 applicants for the pilot round of CPA funding approval. To iterate: the hearing was held on the appropriation order to fund 35 projects recommended by the Community Preservation Committee (“CPC”) from community preservation fund revenues. The revenues are authorized in the areas of historic preservation, open space/recreational use, and affordable housing. 12 projects are for historic preservation; 3 projects are for affordable housing; 13 are for recreational use and open space; and 7 are blended projects of historic preservation and recreational use and open space. The second round of funding-request approvals are expected to take place in early 2019.
This resolution, addressed to the state legislature, sought to restore and increase state matching funds available through the Community Preservation Act Trust Fund. One of the key aspects of the Community Preservation Act legislation is that the Commonwealth of Massachusetts provides matching funds to local CPA projects via the Community Preservation Trust, a fund created by the $20 Registry of Deeds filing fee. Given that the Department of Revenue has recently estimated a record-low state match from the Community Preservation Act Trust Fund, a substantial increase in matching funds would better allow many municipalities’ ability to address the topic areas of the CPA, particularly the housing crisis.
I cosponsored a hearing order to bring attention to the fact that the City does not have a straightforward way to provide parking permits to health care providers, instead relying on the Home Care Alliance of MA to decide which providers have access to these permits. Many other cities, including Washington DC, Chicago, San Francisco, and Austin have administered parking permit programs for health care providers that allow them to serve residents of each city’s neighborhoods without the worry of amassing parking fines.
The City website currently includes a way to apply for a Personal Care Attendant parking permit to use residential parking spaces, for Boston residents with severe disabilities. We held a hearing on this matter, and are continuing our research to come up with a policy and program that works for the people of Boston.
I co-sponsored a hearing order to examine new ways to support the agency's mission by improving access, removing any potential barriers in our city and providing equal opportunity to access. As we respond to the City’s aging population and updated infrastructure, it is absolutely vital to have a legislative response that ensures that these changes are facilitating full and equal participation in all aspects of life within the City for people with disabilities.
Councilor Flynn and I sponsored a hearing regarding the South Boston Waterfront and the South Boston Seaport Transit Strategic Plan. A primary goal of the hearing was to discuss the status of the South Boston Seaport Transit Strategic Plan that was authorized during a June BPDA Board meeting. Councilor Flynn and I wanted to learn about the expected project timelines and deliverables, opportunities for community input and the necessary transportation improvements to the neighboring areas. Commissioner Gina Fiandaca, from Boston Transportation Department, Chris Osgood, Chief of Streets for the Boston Transportation Department, James Fitzgerald, Transportation Planner, Boston Planning and Development Agency (BPDA), representatives from MassPort, MassDOT, Massachusetts Convention Center Authority and A Better City all attended the hearing and provided valuable insight about the next steps in creating a better transportation plan for the growing South Boston Waterfront.
Councilor Flynn and I sponsored a hearing to discuss the zoning deficiencies in South Boston. The South Boston Interim Planning Overlay District and the expansion of Article 68 was intended to advance the City’s housing-creation goals within a zoning code framework respectful of the day-to-day living conditions who have been significantly impacted by intense neighborhood growth. However, there are existing deficiencies, such as minimum lot size, in the new zoning scheme that need to be addressed. This hearing will be held in the community in the first few weeks of the New Year. We acknowledge that the residents, business owners and other stakeholders of South Boston are calling for a zoning blueprint that allows for reasonable and responsible growth and preserves what makes South Boston such a special and unique place to live. | http://michaelflaherty.ngpvanhost.com/page/2018-year-review |
Frederick County Council will hear public comments on its recommendations for the legislative package that the state delegation will present to the Maryland General Assembly in January on Tuesday.
The council’s four initiatives – two of which have been proposed in previous years – include issues ranging from vacancies on the county’s education board and the language used in property tax rates to restrictions on buildings used for agritourism and council support for a draft state climate law.
Council Chairperson MC Keegan-Ayer (D) said she expects a handful of voters to comment on the proposals at Tuesday’s meeting.
Councilor Steve McKay (R) ‘s recommendation would change the process by which vacancies are filled within the county school board.
Currently, the county executive appoints a replacement who serves until the end of the current term. McKay’s proposal would include vacancies on the Education Council on the ballots in the election closest to the vacancy occurring, giving voters the floor before term expires. A person appointed by the county executive would always fill the vacant seat before the election.
With board approval, McKay’s proposal would return to Annapolis for the third time, said Joy Schaefer, director of government affairs. County representatives, understanding the senses. Ron Young (R) and Michael Hough (R) and six delegates, will likely be familiar with the concerns of their colleagues that have prevented legislation from becoming law in previous years.
McKay’s was the last proposal in effect after two of the county’s three recommendations were withdrawn in 2021 in a session in which pandemic restrictions forced lawmakers to be more selective about their legislative priorities. Schaefer believed the proposal had a good chance of becoming law, but the rapid pace of the last session prevented county officials from addressing lawmakers’ concerns in time for it to pass, she said.
County officials are hopeful that another recommendation, from City Councilor Jerry Donald (D), would clear up confusion about the constant return tax rate – a property tax rate that, when paired with appraisals , ensures that a tax authority receives the same income in the next taxable year. done in the previous one, according to the Maryland Department of Assessments and Taxation.
If the county’s constant rate of return remains unchanged and the department determines that a property’s value has increased, the county’s tax bill also increases. State law requires the county to call this a tax increase, although the rate remains unchanged, according to county documents. The county’s tax rate has not changed since 2014, Keegan-Ayer said. Donald’s proposal would give county officials the power to change the wording.
Like McKay’s recommendation, Donald’s was part of the council’s 2020 legislative package.
A third proposal, from City Councilor Jessica Fitzwater (D), would add Frederick County to a list of counties exempt from certain building permits on structures used for agrotourism. Opponents of the proposal, including county executive Jan Gardner (D), said exempting buildings used for agri-tourism from state permit requirements could raise public safety concerns.
Another recommendation from Fitzwater would ask the Frederick County delegation to push for climate legislation that would increase the statewide greenhouse gas emissions reduction requirement by 40% by 2030. at 60%. State lawmakers proposed the legislation, known as the Climate Solutions Now Act, in the 2021 session. While sections of the law have been passed as part of other bills, the major part will return to Annapolis in the next session.
After hearing public comment on Tuesday, the board will reconsider the four proposals on September 28 for a vote. The body’s final recommendations will be part of the county’s legislative package, which will include initiatives from Gardner. County heads will then present the package to the state delegation in November. | https://www.hivfreechampions.org/frederick-county-council-to-hear-public-comments-on-recommendations-for-general-assembly-advice/ |
MONDAY, July 27 — A plan to use alleys and other downtown spaces for to-go cocktails in Lansing will likely be delayed until 2021 after officials realized allowing open intoxicants in public spaces would require a more substantial change to existing city ordinances.
The Lansing City Council charted plans this month to establish three “social districts” that provide added space for outdoor drinking and dining between local bars. But the proposal was delayed before it could come up for a vote tonight and likely won’t resurface at all this year.
“We discovered today that all of the social districts are actually in public spaces, which is prohibited and would require an ordinance change to move forward,” explained Council President Peter Spadafore. “It’s looking like this isn’t going to be a 2020 issue after all.”
State legislation amended this month enables municipalities like Lansing to establish social districts that would allow for “common areas” where two or more licensed bars, distilleries, breweries or restaurants can sell booze in special cups to be consumed outdoors.
The concept was first discussed among Council earlier this month following a brief presentation from Cathleen Edgerly, executive director of Downtown Lansing Inc., and Scott Ellis, executive director of the Michigan Licensed Beverage Association and president of MichiGrain Distillery.
Edgerly said businesses can also split the cost of outdoor entertainment, attracting customers downtown in a more socially distant fashion. Ellis said the idea has been in the works for years, but it can also help with maintaining coronavirus-related mitigation strategies at local bars.
Spadafore said the districts could be finalized by fall in preparation for next summer.
The three specific zones would include:
Spadafore said additional social districts could also be established in Old Town and REO Town, though those would require another separate state application from the city. But first, ordinances that prohibit open alcohol in public spaces would need to be tweaked, and that requires additional bureaucratic loops like a formal resolution, a public hearing and other formalities.
Council members have said they have no intention of broadly lifting ordinances on open intoxicants, only allowing them to be consumed in districts with signage and marked boundaries.
Those proposed districts in Lansing, if eventually approved by the City Council, would remain in effect until January 2022, pending approval from the Michigan Liquor Control Commission.
Councilwoman Carol Wood said local residents and businesses will be notified of any changes. | https://www.lansingcitypulse.com/stories/public-boozing-spaces-in-downtown-lansing-likely-delayed-until-next-summer,14778 |
Public streets and squares build the skeleton and the nervous system of today’s modern cities. These spaces have been built as “transit-zones”, allowing for a flow of goods that supply the city’s populace. They serve additionally as places of meeting and exchange, as well as having a history of being the target of artistic interventions (street art, urban art).
The project «Graphmobile – A Mobile Drawing Robot» seeks to question and redefine the classical functions of public space, as well as the artistic actions that take place there (such as graffiti, or guerrilla interventions). Streets and squares can become information highways, open to anyone to create their message on canvases, scrolls, and notebooks.
Graphmobile is an autonomous swarm of robots, each with the ability to leave traces on the ground over which they travel. With this network of robots, it is possible to describe the city as if with a gigantic plotting device, thus influencing the experience of being in public space.
Concept
In this project, we are especially interested in temporary interventions in public space, and the link this could have to questioning the habits of different cultures. At the same time, we would like to explore the tensions that exist between public space and electronic media by investigating the practices of visualization strategies.
We thus hope to create a flexible, usable platform for a drawing-robot that allows invisible structures to become visible, while materializing these structures in public space. This task will be performed by the individual robots, which can also be used in a swarm configuration, as a sort of mobile colour printer. The robots should have the ability to navigate on their own through the city, as well as posses the capability of reacting to obstacles and passers-by. When properly designed, the robots will present the potential to use the city as a great canvas, ready to be drawn on.
In regards to the materials that will be used to draw with, there are a variety of evanescent materials available, such as chalk. There is also the potential to investigate a series of different types of temporary media, such as coloured light or fluorescent pigments, as to whether they are appropriate drawing materials for the robots. Other possibilities will emerge through looking at both the project and the question of how to recognize a drawing through new and different perspectives.
The theme and content of this project is very consciously formulated in an open way, and can lead to many different possible outcomes, from sketches in an out-of-the-way courtyard to designing typography of a highway. At our core, we are primarily interested in investigating public space through the development of this platform. We hope to develop and deploy it through workshops with students, and in ad hoc performances with artists. Furthermore, we hope that, in a future phase of the project, we can make the whole platform open-source. | http://www.connectingspaces.ch/projects/lab/graphmobile-a-mobile-drawing-robot/ |
California’s Santa Cruz City officials are returning on Tuesday to make a renewed appeal to block large vehicles from occupying the city’s streets for a long time, a report said.
The officials cited impacts significant to the public’s health, safety, and the environment.
The ordinance, which was proposed for the second time in two months by Santa Cruz City Councilmembers, Shebreh Kalantari-Johnson, Renee Golder, and Vice Mayor Sonja Brunner, also suggests building an alternative three-tiered sanctioned parking program. This was a controversial idea that was last considered and rejected by the council in 2019.
The new law, which will run from midnight to 5 a.m. each day, would permit street parking in a limited manner only for parking spaces near the owners’ residential homes or for visitors from out-of-town.
The proposed ordinance does not announce fees for permits. The city excludes pickup trucks, vans, or sport utility vehicles less than 20 feet in length and 8 feet in height.
Concerns from the community brought to the council often revolve around illegal garbage and sewage dumps, vehicle fires, the increase in criminal activity, theft of private gasoline and water, and the obstruction of several parking spots.
Westside homeowner, Aethia Danforth on October 17, emailed the City Council, pleading with authorities to require RV drivers to use sanctioned campgrounds and parks.
Danforth stated that “RVs are rolling environmental health hazards”. The resident mentioned issues related to human waste, drug paraphernalia, improperly discarded trash, generator noise, and particular impacts to Antonelli Pond. Letter-writer Carole Mulford highlighted her concerns about impacts to her Mission Street Extension gym’s customers and Pacific Collegiate School student access to sidewalks.
The latest safe parking proposal is expected to cost from $300,000 to $500,000 to start the infrastructure and ongoing costs for staffing for the first year.
According to the report, the current nonprofit safe parking program costs $328,000 per year to park 30 vehicles. | https://moderncampground.com/usa/california/california-city-reconsiders-overnight-rv-parking-ban/ |
Four years after township and Philadelphia officials began looking at redevelopment of the City Avenue corridor, a rezoning ordinance that could dramatically reshape that prime commercial district is a step closer to enactment in Lower Merion.
The township’s planning commission on Thursday night voted to recommend to the board of commissioners advertisement of a draft ordinance for public hearing. The board could take action at its next meeting Nov. 16, putting the legislation on track for adoption before the end of 2011.
The planners did so, however, adding a new twist to the complex and still highly controversial initiative.
They have proposed making the changed zoning effective only after another piece, which they loosely referred to as a master plan for the area, has been created. It would show the preferred locations of such elements as public gathering spaces, new streets and trails to provide new walking or biking connections within the commercial district.
This plan would gain some force, they proposed, by being tied to incentives for greater density of development. To take advantage of any of a set of development bonuses, that is, a property owner would have to work generally in compliance with the master plan.
The idea, the legality and enforceability of which was somewhat uncertain, does not go so far as the more formal type of master-planning process that a number of township residents have called for. It also remains to be seen whether the board of commissioners will buy into the idea.
In the four-hour discussion, the planning commission again heard pleas both to press on with rezoning to boost revitalization in a commercial district that some say is losing ground to newer centers in Conshohocken and King of Prussia, and to take it slow. A number of speakers, repeating a common refrain from public meetings over the last several months, said the rezoning lacks a fundamental vision. Others were still concerned that rezoning puts the cart before the horse in dealing with acknowledged traffic problems.
The ordinance, in its present form, designates two areas for new zoning regulations, one generally comprising the Bala Cynwyd Shopping Center as a new Bala Cynwyd Retail District, and the other a Regional Center Area extending from Belmont Avenue east to the Schuylkill River. It permits taller buildings – up to 200 feet in parts of the Regional Center – and greater densities than are possible today, while also encouraging mixed-use development, including new residential development to promote a live-work-shop-play environment.
Philadelphia enacted its own new zoning overlay more than two years ago, following some of the same principles.
Under existing zoning, the argument has been, opportunities or incentives for redevelopment and investment in the district are extremely limited. Studies connected with rezoning in Lower Merion have projected that development could double by another 3.5 million square feet over the next 20 years with the changes.
“The township needs this ordinance. Our tax base needs this ordinance,” said Gary Brandeis, an area resident who also represents a property owner in the corridor. He urged the commission to look at the impact for the larger Lower Merion community. “This business district supports the whole township just like Center City . . . supports the whole city,” Brandeis said.
Lita Cohen, a former township commissioner and state representative, who has been a resident for more than 60 years, said she has seen City Avenue’s fortunes “ebb and flow,” and worries it is again on a “downslide.” If high vacancy rates and a decline continues, it will not only affect the immediate area, but “Where will Lower Merion Township get the revenues to keep us a first-class township?” she asked.
“No one is saying not to make City Avenue a better place,” said Joan Hindin of Wynnewood, a former planning commission member. She echoed repeated criticisms that the planning process was flawed; neither residents “most affected,” including near neighbors, nor the broader community were brought into early planning. Given current economic and market conditions, there should be no rush to implement rezoning of this scale, she said.
Mark Kocent, a director of the Neighborhood Club of Bala Cynwyd, said he had been involved from the earliest stages, through the recent, more public process and as a member of the committee that closely studied traffic impacts and needed road improvements.
After all that, “I would like nothing more than to support the ordinance, but regretfully, I cannot,” Kocent said. A planner and architect by profession, he went on to detail what he sees as a failure of the rezoning process, which he said “has not advanced a meaningful vision or a product very far from the original proposal outlined in 2007.”
That proposal, Kocent said, “started with a vision to maximize development on City Avenue and tried to back it up with a vision of how to do that, as opposed to starting with a vision that would lead to what was appropriate on City Avenue.”
“It has become apparent to me that a common vision needs to be created and endorsed by all stakeholders,” he added, “not one that, in my mind, has been essentially put on the table and routinely defended [by the development community] while we nibbled at the edges.”
In their own deliberations, planning commission members acknowledged concerns about some elements of the ordinance – Are incentives strong enough? Could public transit have been made a higher priority? – but also saw a need to move forward.
Among them, member Brian Hirsch was more reluctant, saying it is difficult to look at the rather abstract provisions of the ordinance and get a picture of future development. He had also questioned whether there really are no opportunities for redevelopment under existing zoning. In response to his questions, Building and Planning Director Bob Duncan said a property owner could, under some circumstances, build a new, more modern structure, then demolish an older building.
Commission Co-Chairman Robert Gray, addressing the traffic concerns, said the various studies told a compelling story that traffic will get worse, with or without City Avenue redevelopment. In fact, he said, the best hope for improvement may be growth on City Avenue, which will trigger not only developer contributions but interest by other funding sources to participate.
The conversation shifted when member Brian O’Leary, who also works as a planner for the Montgomery County Planning Commission, proposed the idea of a map or limited master plan that would tie development incentives to desired elements.
One option that was discussed was creation of what is known as an Official Map, a tool Gray and O’Leary had said was available in zoning. The drawback was that it might only have force in that it would give Lower Merion the first right of refusal to purchase a piece of land, if a property owner proposed development that did not comply with the map. That would assume the township would commit funds to make the purchase.
Instead, the commission settled on recommending creation of what it called a master plan for specific elements.
In response to a reporter’s question, Duncan said the plan would be drawn up by township planning staff.
With that, the five commission members present voted unanimously to recommend forwarding the ordinance to the board of commissioners. Those voting were Gray and Co-Chairman Alan Ritterband and members Hirsch, O’Leary and Charles Howland. Members Tony Vale, who had to leave before the vote, and Mark Vitale, who could not attend the meeting, had earlier indicated their support for the ordinance.
Scheduling of a public hearing for possible adoption in December is to be the topic of a special meeting of the board of commissioners’ Building and Planning Committee Nov. 16 at 6:30 p.m. at the Township Building, 75 E. Lancaster Ave., Ardmore.
If approved, the full board would take a final vote that same evening to move the ordinance forward.
Follow this reporter on Twitter at cherylmlmn
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Sartell considers ordinance to allow urban beekeeping
SARTELL — Sartell resident Nick Guggisberg said he grew frustrated as his garden and cherry bushes were not being pollinated properly, which meant he had very little yield.
"Last year there were 1,000 flowers and only 30 cherries," he said.
Guggisberg said he hoped he could answer the pollination problem by keeping a small hive of bees on his property. He is one of the number of citizens hoping the city will pass an ordinance allowing beekeeping within residential neighborhoods in the city.
For years, beekeeping in the city of Sartell has been allowed only in areas zoned for agricultural use.
Because of a rising interest in keeping bees in residential areas, the city is now considering an ordinance. Community Development Technician Nate Keller said this year alone the city has received seven inquiries from residents interested in hosting hives on their properties in residential neighborhoods.
Keller said the city once considered an ordinance allowing chickens and bees in areas zoned for residential use, but tabled the discussion because officials did not see any benefit to the city. He said because of interest, the city plans to revisit the possibility of keeping bees. Other agricultural animals will not be considered at this time.
"Sometimes it just takes a resident who is proactive," Keller said.
Rising interest in urban beekeeping
Jesse Jaskolka, one of the Sartell residents pushing for an ordinance, took an interest in beekeeping over the past year.
Jaskolka said he never had a desire to keep bees until he began researching colony collapse disorder, a phenomenon where adult bees are not present in a colony, but a live queen and immature bees are. The U.S. Department of Agriculture reports that between 2014 and 2015, 23 percent of managed bee hives were lost to colony collapse disorder and other circumstances.
"(Colony collapse disorder) has sparked my interest in it, to give back and do something that will help nature and help the neighborhood," Jaskolka said about beekeeping.
Jaskolka said he firmly believes bees will have an impact in his community by pollinating neighborhood flower and vegetable gardens.
Kathy Smith, member of the Minnesota Hobby Beekeepers, has helped multiple Twin Cities suburbs with beekeeping ordinances as interest continues to rise. Smith said the concern about bee decline and need for pollinators has skyrocketed throughout the state.
"People care about having a loss of their fruits or vegetables," Smith said.
Keller said urban farming — be it bees, livestock or produce — continues to gain interest. He pointed to Minneapolis as one city that has been proactive with regulations that address the trend.
"It's definitely becoming more popular as people are becoming more aware of where their food is coming from," Keller said.
Rules on the books
While Sartell restricts beekeeping in residential neighborhoods, many surrounding cities either allow it or don't have an ordinance that either prohibits or permits it.
Cities in the area that do have an ordinance on the books include Cold Spring, Foley and Sauk Rapids. Cold Spring has an extensive ordinance laying out the size of hives, the proximity of a water source and limiting how close a hive can be to a dwelling. The Foley and Sauk Rapids ordinances only limit the number of hives. In Sauk Rapids, a property owner can have six hives, while in Foley they are only allowed two.
Cities that currently do not have ordinances specifically addressing beekeeping include St. Cloud, Waite Park and St. Joseph.
Worried about colony collapse disorder as well, Leah and Chris Beack have been keeping two hives in their backyard in Sauk Rapids under the current ordinance with no issues. Leah Beack said before keeping bees, she and her husband first went to the city to see what it allowed.
She said after finding the ordinance, she then cleared her new hobby with the neighbors, one of them being a daycare operator. Beack said they all gave their approval with no hesitation.
"It's about educating people," Beack said. "I explain to them what we're doing and we've never had any problems.
"We had one neighbor offer, 'You can come put your bees in my yard if you want,' " she said.
Concern and moving forward
Members of the city's planning commission discussed the possible benefits of the hobby at their April meeting but were concerned about a concentrated population of bees in residential areas.
Commissioner Ryan Fitzthum said he could see a beekeeping ordinance as something the city could support, but feared passing an ordinance might lead to novices who do not properly care for a hive, creating a potential hazard. He suggested the city consider a ordinance like the one in Cold Spring that has tight parameters, including close water sources or fences surrounding the area where hives are kept.
"If you're truly going to keep honeybees it's not a, 'Hey I'll try it for a couple of weeks and see how fun it is.' It's a 'I've put thought and time into this,' " Fitzthum said. "That's the spirit we want to accomplish here and by no means limit someone's ability to do it, but put a parameter around it."
Fitzthum also pitched the alternative of allowing beekeepers to set up fenced hives in public parks, allowing bees to pollinate the parks and surrounding yards and gardens.
Chairman Gary Orman said he is very familiar with beekeeping, as he has hives on his North Dakota farm, but still has some concerns. Orman said while many adults are aware honeybees are only aggressive when provoked, he was uneasy about children who may come between bees and their hives or pollen sources.
"I'm concerned about kids who know little about bees," Orman said.
The discussion on urban apiaries did not end at the April 11 meeting, though. The group plans to continue examining other city ordinances and later consider what will work for the city of Sartell.
"Environmentally we need them, they're good for us. Honey is a good food source," Orman said. "But we need to think about the concentration of people and bees in the same place."
Keller said city staff plan to present amendments at the next planning commission meeting on Monday, May 2. He said one would mirror the ordinance in Sauk Rapids and only limit the number of hives while the other would put tighter restrictions on the hobby.
Keller said once the commissioners decide what they want the Sartell ordinance to look like, they will vote to recommend it to the City Council, which will then consider adopting it.
Keller said the city will continue to have conversations with Sartell residents to create flexible regulations allowing urban bees, but also address the concerns of those who may not be in favor of bees in residential neighborhoods.
Follow Ben Rodgers on Twitter at @benrodgers1 and on Facebook at Ben Rodgers — St. Cloud Times. | https://www.sctimes.com/story/news/local/sartell/2016/04/12/sartell-considers-ordinance-allow-urban-beekeeping/82481402/ |
by Jamel Brinkley.
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A Lucky Man Summary & Study Guide
A Lucky Man Overview
Jamel Brinkley's debut short story collection A Lucky Man presents a complex network of voices and experiences that open a window into the varied consciousnesses of the contemporary African American man. Brinkley's stories work to subvert tropes of the fatherless, amoral African American. Each of his stories grants an entrance into the lives of the young, middle-aged, and old, creating a layered multi-dimensional narrative of the human experience that transcends the minimizations of social stereotypes and myth-making.
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The authors of this volume are the members of Rice University’s Center for Engaged Research and Collaborative Learning Writing Collective: Anthony B. Pinn, Jessica B. Davenport, Justine M. Bakker, Cleve V. Tinsley IV, Biko Mandela Gray, David A. Kline, Jason O. Jeffries, Sharde’ N. Chapman and Mark A. DeYoung This volume builds on scholarship by scholars of African American religion that emphasizes the centrality of the body in religion and religious experience. The argument is grounded in Anthony Pinn’s understanding of religion as an embodied quest for complex subjectivity, or push for more life meaning. But if Pinn’s theory gets at what religion is, this volume picks up where he left off by giving careful consideration to religion’s forms. It interrogates the embodied nature of the quest for complex subjectivity. Through placing different theories of the body in conversation with specific case studies that reflect the variety of ways in which bodies are entangled and engaged in struggles for life meaning, the authors argue that African American religion takes on various forms, including modes of cultural production as well as mundane, everyday rituals and practices. The volume expands current scholarship on African American religion and embodiment by going beyond an understanding of black religion as the “Black Church” and underscoring the variety of religious experiences, in both marginal religious traditions and in non-traditional forms of religion. The sustained and rigorous attention to theories of the body in this volume allows for a more robust understanding of what the body is and takes scholarship beyond the implicit understandings of the body as solely discursive. Finally, the approach is interdisciplinary. While grounded in Religious Studies, this book puts various theories and methodologies—from the social sciences to philosophy, and from visual studies to literary studies—in conversation with the religious experiences of African Americans.
The introduction to Embodying Black Religion discusses the reason for the text’s emergence as well as its scope and trajectory. Surveying the two areas in African American religious studies where the body has been given the most attention—theology and ethics—we conclude that much of this theological and ethical work provides limited and narrow attention to the nature of embodiment. Such work calls for a more expansive conceptual and theoretical framing of both the body and religion, and we find a strong set of building blocks in Pinn’s work. His theory of religion as the quest for complex subjectivity provides an effective theoretical starting point from with which to further explore the nexus between religion and the body.
The first chapter, “Heaven Knows No Color: Hybrid Bodies in Father Divine’s Peace Mission Movement,” suggests several pictures of Mother and Father Divine, shot during their wedding day and artificially altered in such a way that both seem to have a similar, off-white skin color, should be understood as a performance that aims at creating a new racialized identity of hybridity. This argument puts bodies at the center of Divine’s post-racial imaginaries, and demonstrates a turn towards bodies – through these images – permits a new understanding of Father Divine’s post-racial imaginaries.
The second chapter, “Arm, Leg, Leg, Arm, Head: This is God body,” suggests the body is central to, in, and for Five Percenters religion – given that Five Percenters consider the black body proof of God’s existence and central to gaining what is known in the movement as “knowledge of self”.
Through an analysis of Jean Michel Basquiat’s artwork, we point to the function of visual art by arguing that Basquiat’s images of bodies without organs, or deconstructed bodies, reflect an understanding of the body that is fluid, undefined, and ever-changing. Basquiat’s paintings thus “re-present” black bodies and black life beyond fixed, stereotypical depictions.
We continue to interrogate the religious significance of creative reconstructions of the black body through cultural production by turning to two literary depictions of black women in Chapter 4, “Unchained Bodies: Female Embodied Experience and Radical Subjectivity in Black Literature.” Here, we posit that the female protagonists in Toni Morrison’s Beloved and Octavia Butler’s Wild Seed assume “gender fluid” identities that subvert patriarchal and white supremacist constructions of black women’s bodies.
In Chapter 5, “It Was Written on Her Face: Religion and Black Women’s Embodied Emotion in Film,” we maintain our specific focus on depictions of black women’s bodies, although from a slightly different angle. That is, while our larger emphasis in Chapter 4 is the religious significance of black women’s resistance to demeaning discursive notions of black women’s bodies, our focus in Chapter 5 is more on the material body. In turning attention to Ava DuVernay’s silent short film, The Door, we trace the ways in which the quest for complex subjectivity plays out through the embodied emotions displayed by the black women characters in the film. More specifically, we argue that DuVernay’s cinematic emphasis on their subtle facial expressions and bodily movements produces visual renderings of black women with emotional depth and dimensionality that eludes strict lines of representational categorization.
Chapter 6, “‘School Daze’: Embodiment and Meaning-Making in Black Greek Letter Organizations,” we give critical consideration to how black religion as the quest for complex subjectivity is worked out in the context of community and social traditions. In particular, we argue that the embodied practices of “branding” and “stepping” in Black Greek Letter Organizations (BGLOs) make these social spaces analogous to religious institutions, such that they signify processes of identity construction and meaning-making among their members, especially in the larger context of discrimination and limited life-options often experienced by black college students.
Using the events and controversies surrounding Trayvon Martin, Rachel Dolezal, and Sarah Valentine as case studies, Chapter 7 argues that dress and fashion are sites for both restrictive discursive constructions of black embodiment as well as expressions of the quest for complex subjectivity. Through Frantz Fanon’s understanding of the “historico-racial” schema that “fixes” bodies within an array of stereotypes and myths, this chapter begins by showing how fashion and dress can produce limited and/or dehumanizing understandings of identity, subjectivity, and embodiment. We then demonstrate how individual constructions of “fashion subjectivity” constitute an embodied push for meaning and more expansive ontological possibilities.
Chapter 8 argues that black veganism can be understood as a form of religious meaning-making. Black vegans’ food practices and belief systems are seen as a religious form of resisting the legacy of slavery that equated enslaved Africans with animals. By abstaining from eating animal products, black vegans see themselves as refusing the system that once enslaved them and continues to objectify and dehumanize black bodies.
Chapter 9 argues that contemporary understandings of racial genetics and its links to identity construction can function as part of a stronger push for an expanded sense of meaning. Looking at the practice of African American “ancestor tracing,” this chapter shows that knowledge of the body at the genetic level—which stands as an expansion of the biochemical dimension of the compound body—provides an occasion for experiencing the mysterium tremendum.
The epilogue to Embodying Black Religion provides suggestions for future and new directions of research. The authors suggest different ways in which the relationship between the body and the religious can be understood and explored. | https://www.equinoxpub.com/home/embodiment-and-black-religion/ |
Africa: Volume 2 is part of a series of books which adopts a new perspective on African history and culture, surveying the wide array of societies and states that have existed on the African continent and introducing readers to the diversity of African experiences and cultural expressions. Toyin Falola has brought together African studies professors from a variety of schools and settings. Writing from their individual areas of expertise, these authors work together to break general stereotypes about Africa, focusing instead on the substantive issues of the African past from an African perspective. The texts are richly illustrated and include maps and timelines to make cultural and historical movements clearer, and suggestions for further reading will help readers broaden their own particular interests. Africa provides new perspectives that challenge the accepted ways of studying Africa, flexibility for instructors to structure courses, and encouragement for readers who are eager to learn about the diversity of the African experience.
Volume 2, African Cultures and Societies Before 1885, provides a broad view of precolonial experiences and expressions in Africa. The book focuses on culture as a means of understanding both the traditions that thrived throughout Africa and the efforts of modern Africans to reclaim their cultural past in lands that have been divided and exploited by Western imperial powers. | https://cap-press.com/books/isbn/9780890897690/Africa-Volume-2-African-Cultures-and-Societies-Before-1885 |
When many think of comic books the first thing that comes to mind are caped crusaders and spandex-wearing super-heroes. Perhaps, inevitably, these images are of white men (and more rarely, women). It was not until the 1970s that African American superheroes such as Luke Cage, Blade, and others emerged. But as this exciting new collection reveals, these superhero comics are only one small component in a wealth of representations of black characters within comic strips, comic books, and graphic novels over the past century.
The Blacker the Ink is the first book to explore not only the diverse range of black characters in comics, but also the multitude of ways that black artists, writers, and publishers have made a mark on the industry. Organized thematically into “panels” in tribute to sequential art published in the funny pages of newspapers, the fifteen original essays take us on a journey that reaches from the African American newspaper comics of the 1930s to the Francophone graphic novels of the 2000s. Even as it demonstrates the wide spectrum of images of African Americans in comics and sequential art, the collection also identifies common character types and themes running through everything from the strip The Boondocks to the graphic novel Nat Turner.
Though it does not shy away from examining the legacy of racial stereotypes in comics and racial biases in the industry, The Blacker the Ink also offers inspiring stories of trailblazing African American artists and writers. Whether you are a diehard comic book fan or a casual reader of the funny pages, these essays will give you a new appreciation for how black characters and creators have brought a vibrant splash of color to the world of comics.
About the Author
FRANCES GATEWARD is an associate professor in the department of cinema and television arts at California State University-Northridge. She is the editor of Seoul Searching: Cultural Identity and Cinema in South Korea. JOHN JENNINGS is a professor of media and cultural studies, University of California Riverside where he is Nasir Jones Hiphop Fellow. He is the author of Black Comix: African American Independent Comics, the award-winning graphic novel The Hole: Consumer Culture, and the national bestseller, Kindred, a graphic adaption of Octavia Butler's classic novel.
Praise For…
"A fascinating look at the growing complexity and diversity in representations of Blackness in comics, graphic novels and sequential art."
— Bambi Haggins
"Like the comics selected for analysis, this collection of essays works to expand our understanding of the mediums of Blackness and comics. Through observant and meticulous close readings of comic books, newspaper comic strips, digital comics, and graphic novels, alongside the respective sociohistorical and cultural contexts of their production, dissemination, and consumption, the contributors shed light on overlooked and perhaps unknown cartoonists and stories from the past, provide new insight on well-known comics and histories, and challenge our understanding of what constitutes black comics."
— Cinema Journal
"An essential guide for anyone interested in the intersections between race and comics, this volume is full of startling and original insights about the creators, comics, and graphic novels that represent people of African descent from the 1930s to the present."
— Jonathan W. Gray
"This volume provides what has been lacking in some previous work—variety of content, precision of approach and execution, and depth of analyses … The Blacker the Ink advances the study of black comics significantly by offering new insights and a wealth of information free of gobbledygook ... Highly recommended."
— Choice
"An important collection for academics and fan communities as we continue to expand scholarship on Black comics, their histories and their creators."
— Journal of Graphic Novels and Comics
"The Blacker the Ink features an emerging methodology that may be characteristic of, and useful for, the continued development of black comics studies." | https://www.bookmarksnc.org/book/9780813572345 |
Since its debut on April 5, 2012, ABC’s Scandal has become one of the most popular, mainstream dramas on television. Scandal features on of the only, African American female lead characters on network television, Olivia Pope. This paper utilizes scholarship regarding intersectionality and stereotypical representations of African American women to analyze the character of Olivia Pope. I argue that Pope’s education, confidence, and boldness help to confront the lack of complex African American female characters, but her affair with the president simultaneously reinforces negative stereotypes regarding African American women’s sexuality.
Faculty Advisor
Sarah Stone-Watt
Recommended Citation
Evans, Lydia
(2014)
"Representations of African American Political Women in Scandal,"
Pepperdine Journal of Communication Research: Vol. 2
, Article 4. | https://digitalcommons.pepperdine.edu/pjcr/vol2/iss1/4/ |
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Due to the absences of racial dialogue in America and it’s obsession with restricting the population into neat, contrasting racial boxes, many African American women authors have written memoirs to disassemble these ideals. Shadowed by stereotypes that typecast an entire population as promiscuous, ill-kept, verbally loud, greedy and self-serving individuals, autobiographical writing provides personal as well as historical accounts that contrast these images.
Recognizing the need of texts that voice the true experience of African American women, Harriet Jacobs and Zora Neale Hurston wrote trailblazing narratives in hopes of providing their own philosophy. Incidents of a Slave Girl and “How It Feels to be Colored Me,” bravely challenged negatively held standards of African American women by disclosing accurate accounts of their experiences in America and challenged the nation to take action towards drastic change. In “Incidents of a Slave Girl,” Harriet Jacobs begins her narrative by exclaiming, “Readers, be assured, this narrative is no fictional” (Jacobs 5).
Aiming for her readers to sympathize with the traumatizing life of a slave, Jacobs focuses her life’s journey on her maternal strife. Early on, Jacobs begs her readers to understand the dilemma of the slave mother, who must suffer “peculiar sorrows,” and who must live in “the system that has brutalized her from her children” (Jacobs 27). Demonstrated through Dr. Flint’s ownership of her body as well as reproductive abilities, she shows numerous examples of the true nature of slavery and its negative effects on the experience of motherhood.
By focusing her writing on the victimization of slave mothers, Jacobs creates an intentional link between a female slave and the familiarity of motherhood. The condition in which the protagonist, Linda Brent, becomes a mother begins Jacobs’ emphasis on the female slave’s exclusions from true motherhood and ultimately true existence. Highlighting that the female slave’s journey into maternity was often unwelcomed, Brent’s swift decision to become a mother is prompted from Dr. Flint’s persistent sexual conquest.
Brent discloses: “No pen can give an adequate description of the all-pervading corruption produced by slavery. The slave girl is reared in an atmosphere of licentiousness and fear. The lash and foul talk of her master and his sons are her teachers. When she is fourteen or fifteen, her owner, or his sons, or the overseer, or perhaps all of them, begin to bribe her with presents. If these fail to accomplish their purpose, she is whipped or starved into submission… Resistance is hopeless” (Jacobs 79). Essentially the master’s property, this treatment of female slaves was acceptable and expected.
While male slaves were brutally beaten or killed for disobedience (Jacobs 47), the female slave’s interactions with her master also included the likelihood of being raped (Jacobs 50). An issue which was largely unspoken, Jacobs calls attention to the objectification of the female slave’s body and the terrorizing systems set in slavery. Instead of being forced to submit to the persistence of her master and lose her little self-respect as a human being, Brent strived to take as much ownership of her womanhood she could possibly attain.
Desperate, Brent becomes “reckless in [her] desire” (Jacobs 84) and seeks an affair with Mr. Sands in efforts to escape the powerful grasp of her master. By focusing on her reasoning skills, Jacobs displays humanistic traits in Brent which contrasts the animalistic portrayal that slaves often faced. Proving her incapability to follow the ideal standards of motherhood, Jacobs included Brent’s active desire to want to follow set standards of the caregiving, family oriented and childbearing mother.
Forced by Dr. Flint’s hand to submit herself willingly to Mr. Sands (Jacobs 85), Brent continuously demands that readers notice the female slave’s exclusion from motherhood and thus be cautious in their judgment of her actions: “But, o, ye happy women, whose purity has been sheltered from childhood, who have been free to choose the objects of your affection, whose homes are protected by law, do not judge the poor desolate slave girl too severely!
If slavery had been abolished, I also could have married the man of my choice; I could have had a home shielded by the laws; and I should have been spared the painful task of confessing what I am now about to relate; but all my prospects had been blighted by slavery. ” Unable to experience motherhood due to the restrictions of slavery, Jacobs’ autobiography urges for a redefinition of the motherhood for women excluded from experiencing the accepted characterizations.
In one instance, Brent expresses her wish that her children die in infancy, so that they might be speared the cruelties of life as slaves (Jacobs 96). A drastic contrast to the motherly standard held, Jacobs shows readers how the system of slavery degraded innocent children to the master’s property, like herself. Since they could be taken away at any time, Jacobs proves that the definition of motherhood is an inaccurate portrayal for the circumstances endured by female slaves. The seven-year isolation from her children drew the peak on Jacobs’ depiction of the agony slave mothers had to endure.
Primary evidence of her previsions from motherhood, Brent must make the ultimate sacrifice of leaving her children without warning, in hopes of securing their freedom. Jacobs shows that Brent’s self-endured imprisonment was the only way she could personally combat her existence as a slave. Sadly, this ultimately ended any form of motherhood she may have obtained as a slave. Agonizing, Brent is forced to watch her children be thrown into jail (Jacobs 85) and move about life without her guidance in order to acquire full security (Jacobs 97).
This final example exemplified Jacobs’ call for action toward the imbalance of power that existed between the master and his slaves. By being strategic in which details to expand on and which to be brief about, Jacobs purposely choose aspects of her life which would provide necessary details to compel her readers to take proper action toward the abolishment of such horrid acts on humanity. Noted throughout her narrative, this form of persuasion proved effective in cultivating real emotion that debunked held beliefs of the slave women and created an access to an experience which was not discussed.
Sadly, even with Jacobs’ efforts, many stereotypes of African American women remained within America’s racial divide. This called for future African American women authors to take on the similar burden, like Jacobs, and fight against their labels through literature. In “How It Feels to be Colored Me,” Hurston begins her essay by using her hometown, Eatonville, Florida, as a metaphor for the racial rift that exists in America. Noticing the lack of interaction between African American and White American communities, young Hurston examines the pretexts that caused these divisions to occur.
Using the front porch as her “stage,” (1) she began to grasp the politics that confine each ethnicity and observed why the separation had continued to manifest. As strange “White Northerners” pass through Eatonville, others in her predominantly African American town hide behind the “curtain” of Hurston’s stage. Resisting interaction with the unknown, the town stayed an “exclusively colored town” (Hurston 1). Similarly, Hurston also saw fault in the White American’s that simply “rode through town and never [sought to] lived there” (1).
Through this lack of synergy, Hurston begins by demonstrating the ethnic incompetence exhibited by both parties. Content with these ethnic distances that are evident in our nation , Hurston critics American’s comfort with our racial division. Daring readers to enhance their cultural competence, Hurston uses her young curiosity as an example for the nation. By nominating herself as the “welcome-to-our-states” Floridian (Hurston 1), Hurston confidently sought conversation with the strangers that passed through.
Announcing to the readers that “Not only did I enjoy the show, but I didn’t mind the actors knowing that I liked it,” (Hurston 1) she aimed to widen the lenses of the cultural understanding between the strangers and herself. Creating interactions that allowed each participant to express themselves through communication and behaviors, Hurston submits a possibility for debunking held biases. Although an appealingly straightforward solution to the separation exhibited in our country, young Hurston failed to recognize the privilege of her isolated community.
Within Eatonville, Hurston “belonged” to the community as well as the country (1). Placed against a Black background, she did not have to “perform” or demonstrate her culture every moment like she had done willingly with strangers. Instead, Hurston was allowed to simply be “everyone’s Zora,” or simply live (Hurston 1). Once she is placed against a “White background” when she moves to Jacksonville for school, her progressive attitude changed (Hurston 2). Striped of her name and identity, she simply transformed into a “little colored girl” (Hurston 2).
A sudden gloomy shift in the narrative, Hurston drew attention to the burden that being a “fast brown,” or always feeling different, can cause (1). No longer “warranted to rub nor run,” inherently within her new community, Hurston recognized the different set of standards upheld within each population. These set principles, however, do not lessen her call for action. Huston shifts into an empowering tone by stating: “But I am not tragically colored. There is no great sorrow dammed up in my soul, nor lurking behind my eyes. I do not mind at all.
I do not belong to the sobbing school of Negrohood who hold that nature somehow has given them a lowdown dirty deal and whose feelings are all hurt about it. Even in the helter-skelter skirmish that is my life, I have seen that the world is to the strong regardless of a little pigmentation more or less. No, I do not weep at the world–I am too busy sharpening my oyster knife” (Hurston 1-2). Whereas some African American autobiographical authors, like Jacobs, used conventions of victimhood to gain sympathy and understanding, Hurston took an assertive stance in her demand to transcend her racial oppression.
By sharply denouncing the stereotypical notion of her character, she makes an implicit statement of who she is- an intellectual who braves and deflects the pain of racism and instead shows the world an enthusiastic, life affirming personality. The purpose behind Hurston’s outburst was not to scrutinize those content with their sadness as African American’s, but to instead provide an example of living an extreme opposite lifestyle. Aware of the challenge of “[feeling] colored” one day and “[having] no race” the next, Hurston does not denounce the everyday struggle that one might have to endure (2 &3).
Mindful of her ancestral strife, slavery, as a function of her identity, she aimed to shift others’ attention towards the “thrilling” opportunities the future possessed (Hurston 2). Urging others to join her on the “nation stage” or her national effort towards eliminating racial confinements, Hurston returns to her original plea (1). She argues that if African American’s made the conscious effort of “pulling up a chair” next to their fellow American, the radicalized nation could eventual connect as one (Hurston 2).
Although some might only hear what is spoken and not understand the challenges of being African American in America, Hurston is hopeful of a time which will belong “to no race nor time,” where American finally reaches her ultimate goal of equality. ” Hurston ends the narrative as she started, with a thoughtful circular metaphor. Drawing an emphasis on the beauty of individuality, she described herself as a “brown bag of miscellany propped against a wall” in the company of “other bags of red, white and yellow” (Hurston 3). Each bag, like components of an individual, has “priceless and worthless” things to them (Hurston 3).
Race, to Hurston however, is simply a piece of colored glass. Although she recognizes it as an aspect of her, she refuses to make it the most consequential aspect of her bag. By ending with this illustration, Hurston again disproves the labels bestowed on her as an African American women and colors in her own perspective of her identity. By forcing racial dialogue and giving flesh to their existence as African American women, Harriet Jacobs’ and Zora Neale Hurston’s techniques display true accounts of their lives without fear of alienating themselves by their audience’s revulsion.
Each narrative is successful in debunking the stereotypes that were casted on African American women and thus accomplished its purpose of giving voice to the unvoiced. As examples for African American women autobiographical authors that came after them or have yet to come, they exemplified the courage that is necessary to stand up to the norm. Defying the social construct of race and standards of our nation’s social status, Harriet and Hurston each create moving pieces which resound clearly in the hearts and minds of many, generations after they were published. | https://freebooksummary.com/autobiographies-of-harriet-jacobs-and-zora-neal-hurston-essay |
1.INTRODUCTION.
In its oral and written forms, literature has constantly served as one of the major instruments in mirroring reality and society. Literature remains a consistent tool in the representation, comprehension and interpretation of fields of human endeavour such as religion, class struggle, politics, human situations, social conflicts and Gender relations. No wonder then, gender relations, especially feminism has laid hold on literature as a veritable machinery for gender activism Men discovered the gold mine in literature quite early and for ages tapped its resources to carve a niche for the male gender in politics, culture and religion. At the same time the male gender used the resources of literature and criticism to invent prejudices, stereotypes and superstitious beliefs and heaped them on the female gender. While women laboured under this burden for ages, men were busy upstaging them in every field of life. Few instances have however existed where certain female figures due to their exalted royal, military, economics and cultic backgrounds have through individual efforts raised their heads above water in their respective societies and eras. Literature has equally recorded cases where powerful women in various races have astutely and subtly cornered for themselves rights and priviledges which ordinary women and even ordinary men could never dream of. Such positions were like personal identity cards which neither outlived them nor were enjoyed by other women during and after their lifetime. These examples are today literature, in history and literary achieves. They remained a tiny minority. The above injustice was not to last any longer (Charlotte1993:84):
Feminism began as a general social and political movement and came to include literary theorists and critics as the movement continued… literary feminists began to see both in books and in the larger social context that produces and consumes books, the need for a critique of a culture they called patriarchal…
As a result of the courageous objection to male biases in literature and criticism, the latter part of our century saw a militant move by feminist critics to position women as protagonists or at least as major characters in literature; as writers of poetry, drama, novels and as readers and consumers of literature. Hitherto, feminist literary critics always see in male works a figment of male chauvinistic imagination about women, an impression that is totally contrary to real women in a real world. Simon de Beauvoir, a French writer published a book titled The Second Sex in 1949. She discovered that men are always exalted while women are consistently downgraded in Literature and myth. All positive values and qualities are attributed to men while women are apportioned the negative and secondary values and qualities. Similarly feminist critics analysed a selection of male writings and gave kudos to Shakespeare and Chaucer for creating strong and admirable female characters. Kate Millet, on the contrary, in her 1970 publication titled Sexual Politics attacked male writers like Henry Miller, D. H. Lawrence and Norman Mailer for their mysogyny and triumphalism in favour of the male gender. Yet female writers like Virginia Woolf in a 1924 essay titled “A room of one’s own” frowns at the paucity of ‘rooms’ for women writing in the Canon. A readily explanation was proffered by Elaine Showalter who coined the term gynocritics, as a veritable effort by feminist critics to stand in solidarity with writers of feminist literature who had been unjustly evaluated and interpreted. Showalter aims at proving that the female writer, reader and critic have come of age as far as literary experience is concerned. In this regard she published The New Feminist Criticism: Essays on Women, literature and Theory in 1985. French feminists like Luce Irigray and Julia Kristeva, on their part insisted on language that is gender neutral.
2. WOMEN IN AFRICAN LITERATURE
In African Literature and criticism, womanisim is documenting and uplifting women’s activism and experiences. The African feminist prioritizes his project thus: He emancipates the African women by first documenting her positive and negative experiences under the African and foreign patriarchal cultures. On the positive angle, the African women have played unique and active roles in the African society as queen, warrior, priestess, mother, wife, skills and crafts person, herbalist and sorcerer. The African women have had negative experiences too. Some of these negative experiences that have impacted her full and wholistic development were: ancient and modern polygamy; child and forced marriage; levirate, widowhood; female genital mutilation and mother-in-law injustices and violence. The African female writer also includes in her documentation and emancipatory activism such negative experiences as male economic, psychological, political, and socio-cultural violence against women. This documentary project covers the past lived and the present living experience of women.
Normally life in the society is such that no person gets his or her right without a fight. Hence African feminists had to be militant and combatant as we could see in Sembene Ousmane: Les bouts de bois de Dieu; Guelwaar; Buchi Emecheta The Joys of Motherhood; and Aminata Sow Fall’s L’ex pere de la nation.
Furthermore, the African feminist sought to create a space in literary criticism and fiction for writings and creation that would be strictly speaking African Women. There was need, namely for African womanisits to make such an entry into literature which hitherto had been the exclusive preserve of the masculinist. Having thus gained entry into African literary and critical creation, the African feminist is highlighting and propagating women writing and experience so as to correct all forms of male stereotypes and prejudices that have hitherto being directed against women.
African feminism does not only dwell on the stigma and name-calling of the past and the present; and especially on the injustices and victimization suffered by women under patriarchal cultures. One of her major tasks is to study and criticize all fields of human endeavour, as well as to do a thorough self assessment and soul-searching of her own existence so as to ensure dynamism and relevance in the world of literal and critical thinking(Adebayo,1996:9):
African feminists must highlight the need for new meanings, new practices and interpretations to enhance a dynamic African feminist discourse.
3. WOMEN IN ANGLOPHONE AFRICAN LITERATURE
Flora Nwapa was a trailblazer when she published the epoch making novel, Efuru in 1966; she was the pioneer Nigerian woman writer to apportion positive and symbolic roles to female characters. Nwapa created a female character that is a responsible, serious minded woman merchant. Efuru, as she is called is a role model; a woman of substance and high society lady that every mother would pray to have as a daughter. Efuru is a self-made woman who distinguished herself as a model of a mother, a wife and a pious devotee of Uhamiri, the local deity. Infact a female character in the novel addresses her as (Nwapa, 1966:57)) “a woman among women.”
Nwapa’s female characterization is in stark contrast to Jagua Nana, a 1961 publication of Ekwensi in which the female character was a harlot. She is also in contrast to Ayi Kwei Armah’s Estelle who colluded and collaborated with her husband Koomson in corrupt practices in L’ Age d’or n’est pas pour demain (1976). Efuru also contrasts with Leah, illicit liquor dealer in Peter Abraham’s Rouge est le sang des Noirs (1960). Most of the male writings of the era starting from Wole Soyinka’s The Interpreters of 1965 to Elechi Amadi’s The Concubine of 1966 had powerful male protagonists, and lowly esteemed female characters. As if to prove that no body ever gets his or her right without a fight, Nwapa in her two other subsequent publications: One is Enough (1981) and Women are Different (1986) introduced some militancy and a no-nonsense attitude into her characterization. The issue at stake as far as the feminist nature of the novel is concerned, are the female characters’ reaction to certain obnoxious cultural practices like forced and arranged marriages, polygamy, male matrimonial infidelity and male use-and-dump attitude towards their spouses. Thus in One is Enough, Amaka calls it quit in her marriage with Obiora, Dora in Women are Different proves that a woman can still forge ahead in life even when abandoned by her husband. When her husband retraced his steps back to her, she accepted him but with the condition that he will now play the secondary role in her matrimonial life.
Flora Nwapa insists that women writers must create works of fiction that mirror the realities of female experiences in the African society(Nwapa, 1984:14):
The Nigerian male writers fail to elevate women to their rightful plane. They overlook the safeguards with which custom surrounds her: the weight of feminine opinion, the independence of her economic position, the power she wields by the mere fact that she holds the pestle and the cooking pots. They fail to see all these things because they are men and are influenced by the colonial administration’s Victorian type prejudices against women. | https://m.hausarbeiten.de/document/177167 |
By Deirdre Lynch, Sara Weber, and Jaden Forteau
Definitions:
Class is a word that has been given many different definitions over time and has multiple connotations attached to it. In the Oxford English Dictionary, the definition for class was originally defined as, “An inclusive or general taxonomic category into which species of living organism are grouped” (OED). This definition goes along with the idea of categorizing or identifying an item such as a plant or an animal based on similar characteristics. This definition is commonly used in biology. Another definition for class is, “To place in a class; to assign or regard as belonging to a particular category” (OED). Nowadays when people think of the word “class,” it is typically associated with an individual’s social or economic status. A more commonly used definition is “A system of ordering society whereby people are divided into strata of this type; the pattern of social division created by such a system; a person’s position in society as defined by this” (OED).
Etymology:
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the word class comes from multiple origins but the main origin was from France. In French, it is pronounced classe. The OED states that class in France is the “division of the Roman people on the basis of property” (OED).
Literary Importance:
The term “class” helps readers understand literary texts in a more complex way. Knowing what class structure is, can help a reader better categorize characters within a book. Authors demonstrate class structure by showing the contrast between social and economic statuses. A thorough understanding of class structure at the time that the book takes place, can give the reader a better insight into the characters’ lives by showing how their status affects their daily routine. By evaluating class structure, readers may also be able to understand why a character is treated the way they are, and why they treat other character’s the way they do. Knowing the meaning of class will help readers better interpret interactions between characters when deciphering conversations. In most cases, wealth is equivalent to power, therefore class can further explain why a character has a certain amount of authority and control. Understanding the definition of class can also help readers recognize certain tensions between one or multiple races within a book. Having an understanding of the term class helps readers better distinguish inequality between characters. Opportunities and rewards of a person are greatly affected by their class position. Therefore, class helps us notice the difference in education, opportunities, power, and even health. The characters in A Raisin in the Sun live in a cramped house in the south side of Chicago. Their position in society affects each character’s life in a different way. Beneatha was a more progressive thinker than the average minority woman in the 1950’s. She studied in hopes of becoming a doctor, but it was difficult due to her family’s lack of finances. Her brother Walter dreamed of opening a liquor store, but because of his family’s low income, he was stuck working as a chauffeur to a rich- white man. He often takes his frustrations about life out on his wife. Walter’s wife, Ruth is also affected by their family’s poor financial situation. She struggles to obtain any time for herself being a mother, a housewife and cleaning other family’s houses. Ruth even had to consider aborting her unborn baby because she was aware that her family could not financially afford it.
Keyword in Action:
Throughout the story A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry, the idea of class is displayed in many interesting ways. Since the Younger family is African American, their class status is heavily defined by this trait. Unfortunately, due to the long-standing racial stereotypes that have been implemented in America, African Americans have been known to be the inferior race. While all of the data to confirm these statements have been proven false, these ideas are still held by some. The idea of race relates heavily to this story since the life of the Younger family is impacted by their low-class status.
One aspect of life that is affected by the class of the Younger family is their jobs and career goals. One example of this is when Beneatha strives to become a doctor, and people underestimate her because of her low status. Beneatha works hard to earn her status as a smart, capable girl, and her progress is inhibited by people who don’t believe in her. Her own brother has trouble believing that she can be an effective doctor and encourages her to be a nurse. He says, “[w]ho the hell told you you had to be a doctor? If you so crazy ’bout messing ’round with sick people- then go be a nurse like other women- or just get married and be quiet” (38). This argument likely would not have come about if their class status was higher. If the Younger family was rich, Beneatha would be able to choose whatever career she wanted and receive no backlash for it. Since the family is lower class, though, it is expected that she sticks to the status quo.
Another way in which class is relevant to the story A Raisin in the Sun is that higher class people try to distance themselves from people of color. Since the Youngers are crammed into a small household, they dream of living in a more spacious home. They end up with the financial means to move, and Mama puts a down payment on a house in a white neighborhood. Mr. Lindner, a member of the welcoming committee tries to encourage the Youngers not to move into his community. Lindner does not say this explicitly, however, it is clear that he does not want them in his community because he believes that their presence will damage his communities’ image. This is evident when he says “…the overwhelming majority of our people out there feel that people get along better, take more of a common interest in the life of the community when they share a common background” (118). He tried to make them believe that his comment was not derogatory, however, it is clear that this is not the case. It is clear that their ‘unshared background’ is their race. This discrimination obviously isn’t fair but is ever so present in the lives of the Younger family in A Raisin in the Sun. The general assumption that the Younger family and African American families alike are somehow inferior to white families is damaging and false. The upper-class citizens, in turn, discriminate against lower-class citizens, who happen to be African American. The Younger family and all other African American families, therefore, face constant discrimination and have to deal with being constantly looked down upon and underestimated. The effects of discrimination are far-ranging, and the idea of class proves this. Certain class distinctions make it extremely clear that white people (typically upper class) have the upper hand over African Americans (typically lower class).
The meaning of the word ‘class’ is different for each person and society. For this reason, analyzing class will be different depending on the culture that defines it, but it is important to read texts with this concept in mind. Hansberry points out class disparity through her characters, specifically Lindner, who contrasts greatly from the Younger family. She seeks to bring awareness to class differences and show how struggles related to class are damaging.
Works Cited
Image derived from Pixabay, by Andrey_Popov
Hansberry, Lorraine. A Raisin in the Sun. Robert Nemiroff, 1994.
The Oxford English Dictionary. Oxford University Press, 2004. | http://lit2.classroomcommons.org/ |
This post was developed via a partnership with BetterHelp.
When it comes to developing your characters, you want to make sure they’re as genuine as possible. Whether this is through their dialogue, actions, or description, staying true to your vision is important. However, it’s also important to ensure that if you’re writing characters with physical and mental conditions, you’re also portraying them realistically. Relying on stereotypes and stigmas can be harmful to your readers with similar conditions. In addition, if you’re a writer that’s trying to develop a character with a condition that you also live with, it’s necessary to develop a full picture from others that have the condition since everyone’s experiences can vary. As the author, it’s a great practice to conduct research and dive into the depths of a condition in order to write as authentically as possible.
Understanding ADHD
Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, more commonly known as ADHD, is a neurodevelopmental disorder that affects about 10% of children in the United States. Each case affects a person differently and can be influenced by genetics, their environment, and other mental health conditions. The most common symptoms are restless or hyperactive behavior, difficulty concentrating, and disruptive or impulsive behavior. However, doctors have stressed that just because a child may be hyperactive and energetic, this doesn’t necessarily mean they have ADHD; preemptively putting a label on a child can lead to difficulty in growth and even problematic situations at home, in school, and in their social life.
When writing a character that has ADHD, it’s important to research both common and lesser-known symptoms, treatments, and realities of individuals that have the condition. Even if you, the author, have or know someone with ADHD, each situation is different and there are a number of ways a person may act because of the condition. As such, you need to explore your character’s personality, reactions, and reasoning abilities and consider how ADHD can influence these decisions and their reality.
Avoid Tropes
Leaning into stigmas and stereotypes can not only come off as poor writing but it may also contribute to the negativity or limitations surrounding a condition you’re writing about. Although the conversation surrounding ADHD in children and adults has become more widely accepted in recent years, there are still a lot of inaccurate portrayals of the condition in the media. In popular young adult series, like Rick Riordan’s Percy Jackson, ADHD is portrayed as a gift that doesn’t need to be regulated and almost villainizes treatment and medication. However, creating a narrative that seeking beneficial treatment and finding coping mechanisms for the challenging aspects of a mental health condition upholds harmful stigmas.
You can conduct research to find the best way to portray your character with ADHD. Consult friends, family members, and mental health care professionals to learn more about common experiences, side effects, and negative stereotypes to build up a realistic individual in your story. Consider what kind of difficulties they may go through while also looking at how ADHD can contribute to their strengths. Many traits can be both a challenge and a benefit for these individuals. For example, hyper fixating on a topic can help them to focus on preparing for an upcoming competition, but it will also lead them to neglect other important tasks or people around them. Find the balance that fits with your plot and the needs of the story.
Your Writing Capabilities
Building a character is already a challenging task for many writers. The additional mental or physical conditions you may try to touch on can contribute to this challenge as you learn how this can affect the story and the relationship this character has with others. However, on the surface, you can treat this trait like most of the rest of your character’s personality. If this individual has mental health conditions that influence their reactions and decisions, do your research to better understand what those reactions would be. While it’s important to keep in mind that negative stereotypes could be harmful to your audience, this doesn’t mean you should disregard common symptoms and shared experiences.
Consider how you would write a character from another culture: you need to do research, potentially talk to others in the culture, and create realistic situations where the character’s decisions may be impacted. On the other hand, you don’t want to overplay any tropes or create unrealistic expectations. In a similar sense, your character’s mental health conditions should be treated similarly. As an author, you have a responsibility to portray these conditions accurately and honestly. Write from what you’ve learned, take in any feedback, and build your character with your best writing ability.
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The Horror Tree is a resource for horror authors which was created in 2011. The main goal when starting the site was to include all of the latest horror anthologies and publishers that are taking paying submissions. A resource useful for both new and experienced publishers alike looking for an outlet for their written material! | https://horrortree.com/how-to-write-a-character-with-adhd-in-your-fiction/ |
Lee & Low Books in partnership with Re-Imagining Migration strives for all students to see the richness, relevancy, and impact of migration on our collective history, not just a current event happening today or to only “some” students. We achieve this by enriching our understanding of human migration, leveraging educators as pivotal agents of change, and empowering young people as civic agents—the life force of vibrant democratic societies. In this infographic, we seek to convey migration is a shared experience we all have.
The importance of curating text sets reflecting the three components of Re-Imagining’s Learning Arc—Moving Stories, Understanding Migration and Turning to Action:
• Create a space for students to bring their personal experiences
• Develop deeper student understanding that migration is both local and global, continual, and multi-faceted
• Highlight a range of migration experiences featuring diverse characters, communities, and historical figures
• Provide an array of perspectives from authors and illustrators from diverse backgrounds
• Facilitate student learning to better access the subject matter using a variety of reading levels and background schema while participating in grade-level content goals, discussions and extension opportunities.
• Foster meaningful opportunities to explore the universal attributes of migration along with opportunities to compare and contrast unique experiences
Questions to consider in creating a migration text set:
• Do you have a mix of formats and genres? Fiction and nonfiction? Poetry, narrative, and expository texts?
• Do you have stories and experiences written at multiple reading levels?
• In addition to the range of characters, historical figures, and communities featured, who are the authors and illustrators? What is their expertise in telling these stories?
• Is there a range of time periods, including both contemporary as well as historical migration events?
• Are your local community migration journeys and histories reflected alongside U.S. and global trends?
• Does your text set teach about the contributions migration and migrants have had to the United States?
• Does your text set include any stories that have harmful stereotypes, inaccurate or outdated information, or generalizations about a group of people?
• Do you have a range of migrant experiences and stories within a community?
Re-imagining Migration’s mission is to advance the education and well-being of immigrant-origin youth, decrease bias and hatred against young people of diverse origins, and help rising generations develop the critical understanding and empathy necessary to build and sustain welcoming and inclusive communities. Educating young people to respect, work, and live with differences is essential to the future of our democracy. Visit reimaginingmigration.org to learn more.
Lee & Low Books is the largest children’s book publisher in the United States specializing in diversity and has been a leader in the movement for diversity in children’s publishing for 30 years. Learn more at leeandlow.com. | https://reimaginingmigration.org/using-childrens-literature-to-teach-the-learning-arc-framework/ |
Moloto, G.R.B.
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Abstract
After the first democratic elections in 1994 in South Africa, various changes took place in terms of socio-economic, educational, and urbanisation status. South African organisation's had to replace discriminatory policies with new policies to integrate all people and to embrace diversity. These posed more challenges for organisations. Higher education institutions are an example of such a diverse working environment which is changing rapidly. These changes resulted in more diverse management teams and a more culturally diverse workforce who posed various dangers, such as an increasing lack of tolerance, misunderstandings, frustrations and reinforcing stereotypes. There have been many researchers that have focused on stereotypes; however, studies on stereotypes within South Africa are limited more especially within higher education institutions. The purpose of this research project was, therefore, to explore what individuals within a South African higher education institution understand regarding stereotyping, the types of stereotypes that exist amongst them and their experience of these stereotypes. The general objective of this study is to explore the experience of stereotypes among the non-academic staff within a higher education institution. Qualitative research from a phenomenological approach was used. Semi-structured interviews were used to collect data. A total of 30 support staff members were interviewed. A combination of both quota and convenience sampling was used. Interviews were tape recorded. Content analysis was used to analyse and interpret data. The results indicated that al I participants understood the concept 'stereotype.' The main existing stereotypes include age, culture, gender, occupational, qualification and racial stereotypes. These are the stereotypes that they have of others and those that they experience themselves. There is also an indication that stereotypes have different effects on the stereotyped which are cognitive, emotional and behavioural effects. Many of the participants have an opinion that stereotypes originate from one's past experiences, primary and secondary exposure and one's subjective perceptions. Recommendations for future research and practice were made.
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Main Title: Growing up African in Australia / edited by Maxine Beneba Clarke with Ahmed Yussuf and Magan Magan.
Author: Clarke, Maxine Beneba, editor.
Imprint: Carlton, Vic. : Black Inc., 2019.
Collation: 280 pages : paperback ; 21 cm.
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Although my students were unaware of it, in a sense what they were questioning from the standpoint of literary criticism is not only the theory of postmodernism with its emphasis on race, class and gender, but the theory of naturalism as well: the idea that one’s social and physical environments can drastically affect one’s nature and potential for surviving and succeeding in this world.
In this article, I will explore Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye from a naturalistic perspective; however, while doing so I will propose that because Morrison’s novels are distinctly black and examine distinctly black issues, we must expand or deconstruct the traditional theory of naturalism to deal adequately with the African American experience: a theory I refer to as “black naturalism. ” But before I do this I think it is important to discuss why it is worth our while to “dig up” naturalism once again to explore not only earlier black novels but contemporary works as well.
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In Max’s stirring defense of Bigger Thomas in Richard Wright’s Native Son, he warns us to “remember that men can starve from a lack of self-realization as much as they can from a lack of bread! And they can murder for it, too! ” (366). As the riots in Los Angeles and in cities across the country indicate, men and women are still forced to struggle for self-realization and one’s environment remains a key factor in influencing and limiting an indiVidual’s potentials and aspirations.
Is the cycle of poverty, hopelessness, and violence in South Central today significantly different from the ghetto streets of Harlem Ann Petry described in The Street? Throughout her naturalistic novel 116th Sheet is a living, breathing, menacing force that attempts to reduce Min to a whispering shadow and to twist Jones into a crazed wolf who has lived in basements too long; for Petty, filthy tenement-lined streets such as these are more than symbols of oppression, inequality and racism–they are the instruments themselves.
Does this mean that by focusing on the influences of environment in literature we are labeling our main characters helpless victims? Absolutely not. In The Street Lutie Johnson fights the ghetto with a determination that can only be called heroic; her tragedy is that she loses her battle against her surroundings, but her triumph consists of her willingness to break the boundaries that both white and black society had created for African American women in the 1940s.
In Toni Cade Bambara’s “The Lesson,” though Silvia is deeply affected by Miss Moore’s lesson of “where we are is who we are,” she remains undaunted and vows “ain’t nobody gonna beat me at nuthin” (94,96). During an interview of Alice Childress and Toni Morrison conducted by Black Creation magazine, Childress claims “that all black writers, whether they intended to or not have been writing about not being free. Always–from the beginning of America right up to now” (Walker and Weathers 92).
The theory of naturalism is also about the primal struggle for freedom– freedom to develop and realize all of the possibilities of our souls and intellects within a societal framework. One cannot think of African Americans without considering society’s insidious racist attempts to retain black men and women as cheap sources of labor, whether enslaved or ostensibly “free. ” A universal characteristic of Morrison’s published novels has been her depiction of male and female protagonists failing or succeeding on the difficult journey to freedom through self-awareness.
Of course, the struggle to realize one’s identity has surfaced repeatedly in literature; however, Morrison’s steadfast concentration on the importance of the past indicates that for her, self-realization for African Americans can only be achieved through an active acknowledgement of one’s cultural past. Only by understanding and accepting the past can African Americans achieve a psychological wholeness in the present and strengthen their power as a race in the future.
In Specifying, Susan Willis captures very well the importance of Morrison’s themes and the highly charged atmosphere of her novels: There is a sense of urgency in Morrison’s writing, produced by the realization that a great deal is at stake. The novels may focus on individual characters like Milkman and Jadine, but the salvation of individuals is not the point. Rather, these individuals struggling to reclaim or redefine themselves, are portrayed as epiphenomenal to community and culture, and it is the strength and continuity of the black cultural heritage as a whole that is at stake and being tested. 93-94) What is “at stake” in Morrison’s novels and in black fiction in general is a consistent emphasis on the need to resist forces stemming from society which may serve to destroy “continuity of the black cultural heritage” by a conscious embracing of the past combined with a concurrent quest for identity. When analyzing this pattern of creative reSistance of outside forces and rebuilding of the self in Morrison’s novels, one can perceive a distinct echo of naturalism. The word “echo” is significant because Morrison’s novels are not strictly naturalistic.
While Morrison’s works do exhibit naturalistic tendencies, she presents them in a new way, illustrating different challenges specific to minorities and offering alternate ways of dealing with these challenges. Morrison’s protagonists face a world that is more complex, oppressive, and destructive than either Theodore Dreiser’s Carrie or John Steinbeck’s Tom Joad because Morrison’s protagonists must battle against intraracism and interracism as well as poverty and sexism. In Fingering the Jagged Grain: Tradition and Form in Recent Black Fiction, Keith E.
Byerman claims that historically African American writers have not adopted an existing European or American literary form without significantly changing it to correspond to the black experience: From Phillis Wheatley’s early verses through the moralistic style of the slave narratives and Wright’s naturalism to Ellison’s symbolic and experimental novel, black writers have consistently turned European and white American forms and techniques to their own purposes, just as blacks in general have changed the religious and social institutions of the dominant culture to meet their special needs. 41) Furthermore, this “adapting of nonblack forms to black materials” is not always a conscious or even a voluntary act, but an inevitable one rising from the differing life experiences of African Americans due not only to the existence of racism throughout the history of this country, but to African American cultural heritage, folklore, and mores (Byerman 41).
In his comprehensive text, The Afro-American Novel and Its Tradition, Bernard Bell argues that dating back to W. E. B. DuBois them has been a history of African American fiction that can be identified as naturalistic. Bell also clearly supports an ethnic deconstruction of the traditional theory when he claims that when naturalism appears in black fiction it has been “refracted through the double-consciousness and double vision of black American novelists” (81).
However, although Bell does use the term “black naturalism” once when describing the naturalism of the 1940s, he does not appear to propose a new genre with this rifle. Moreover, my definition of naturalism in African American fiction is more liberal than the naturalism Bell describes and includes literature that could also be characterized as having strong pastoral romantic, mythic or folkloric elements.
In the following analysis of The Bluest Eye, I will attempt to illustrate that the naturalism in African American fiction has been “adapted” and altered to such a significant extent to justify a new literary genre that includes the following themes: the importance of cultural heritage or what Bell calls “ancestralism,” the problem of assimilation, the conflict between self and community, the psychological and economical barriers created by racism and the resulting quest for wholeness that is essential for overcoming these obstacles.
Before exploring black naturalism in Toni Morrison’s novel, it would perhaps be appropriate to briefly review the existing theory of naturalism in general. As many critics of naturalism, including Charles Walcutt, have noted, naturalism is an elusive genre, difficult to define. In his dissertation, Paul Baker Civello states that while naturalism has experienced significant transformations in its modern and postmodern forms, the root causes of the emergence of naturalism remain consistent: naturalism] arises from the collapse of man’s conception of an order in the material world–an order that had formerly imbued that world with meaning. As a result, a rift opens between the self and the material world, now perceived as one of meaningless, indifferent force. Naturalism depicts this rift, and points toward a resolution of it. (2)
As Civello and others have noted, for early American naturalists such as Norris, Crane and Drieser, the dissolution of “man’s conception of order” was a reaction to Darwin’s theory of evolution and the questions it raised concerning the existence of an ordered universe created by a benevolent God. This new perception of the world as “indifferent” and amoral created a psychological conflict between the self and nature, dramatized by Vandover’s eventual insanity in Norris’s naturalistic novel Vandover and the Brute.
Intellectuals of the late nineteenth century could no longer view nature as a reflection of one’s spiritual and rational being, could no longer feel secure in an inherent biological, and therefore moral, superiority to the other creatures inhabiting earth, thus creating the “rift” Civello refers to between man and an impersonal nature of indiscriminate force. For Civello, later naturalists like Hemingway also felt isolated from the environment, but the cause of the rift was World War i rather than Darwinism. Like Civello, Donald Pizer also focuses on how naturalism has evolved as society has changed and grown.
Yet, despite its transformations, Pizer claims that some naturalistic themes from the 1890s to the 1950s remain essentially the same: (1) the idea of the individual thwarted by natural or societal forces, (2) the emergence of the “common man” as hero, (3) the benefits of community as protection against repressive societal influences, and (4) the ability to gain knowledge about oneself and one’s world. Generally, perhaps the most well-known tenet of naturalism is its focus on the waste of an individual’s potential due to “conditioning forces” from the environment.
At last the struggles of common men and women who are propelled into a life of poverty were seen as not merely unfortunate, but as a tragedy. Another familiar theme of naturalism concerns the problem Of knowledge. Although the Aristotelian tragic hero may fail to understand himself or his condition during his descent, he does in the end ascertain who he is and what has caused his fall; in contrast, early naturalistic fiction indicates that writers came to doubt that knowledge of oneself and one’s reality was even possible (Pizer 6-7).
According to Pizer, in the 1930s the concept of wasted human potential evolved into a focus on the relationship between the mores of society and the individual. The perception of individuals being thwarted and oppressed by an elite group also included its opposite-that is, that a group, united together to protect their collective interests, can prevail. Naturalistic iction in the 1930s such as Stein-beck’s The Grapes of Wrath included, then, a transformation from an inherent protection of oneself and one’s family to an increased awareness of a responsibility to others, demonstrated when Rose of Sharon shares her mother’s milk with a starving stranger (15). In the early twentieth century, characters in naturalistic fiction are not only prevented from realizing their capabilities, they are also frequently “wrenched by their desires or by other uncontrollable circumstances from their grooved but satisfying paths into the chaos of life ‘outside”‘ (7).
As naturalism evolved, writers also came to regard the issue of knowledge of the self differently, believing that knowledge of oneself and one’s world was difficult but not impossible. In the 1940s and 1950s there arose a distinct distrust of society-formed groups– whether it be the army, the family, or the citizen committee. Largely in response to World War II, many traditional naturalistic authors believed that although the common man or woman is still thwarted by forces beyond control, the only protection or validation he or she can find lies not in the community but in the individual.
If knowledge was at all possible, it could only be found through individual experience, though it may be self-destructive in nature (87). It seems, then, that naturalism evolved from an exclusive reliance on community to an equally exclusive reliance on the self. It is in this breach between these two extremes that the theory and its evolution prove inadequate in dealing with black fiction. Black naturalism in Morrison’s novels explores the challenges African Americans experience as they contend with the conflicting responsibilities to the self and the community that arise to a great extent due to racism.
In order tO gain a better understanding of the complex psychological struggles minorities experience as they attempt to resist influences from a dominant society, it might prove helpful to consider Elaine Showalter’s discussion of the three phases that subcultures go through in their search for independence and cultural identity. In “The Female Tradition,” Showalter describes the first phase a subculture or minority experiences as an extended period of “imitation of the prevailing modes of the dominant tradition, and internalization of its standards of art and its views on social roles” 1108). As a subculture values the unique characteristics of its identity and gains a better sense of its power, it progresses collectively into a second phase that includes a “protest against these standards and values, and advocacy of minority rights,” while she describes a third phase as a period of “self-discovery, a turning inward freed from some of the dependency of opposition, a search for identity” (1108). Although Showalter is discussing female “literary subcultures” in her article, I think we can profitably apply her phases of development to subcultures in general.
Her analysis is perhaps especially helpful for those of us who are members of the dominant society and do not have a direct experience with the psychological pressures inherent in being a minority. It is no coincidence, then, that all of Morrison’s novels present characters striving with these same issues: the danger of indiscriminate internalization of white Western mores, the need for advocacy of African American values, and the importance of self-discovery.
The first two stages Showalter describes elucidate the psychological barriers African Americans must travel through before they can acknowledge the past and consequently achieve self-identity. Thus a character like Paul D in Morrison’s Beloved must unlock the steel box of memories in his chest before he is able to reap the benefits of self-love. For all minorities, the journey to self-realization is a journey of survival for the individual and for the race.
When analyzing Morrison’s characters, therefore, it is important to remember that along with combatting prejudice and injustice stemming from society, they are also overcoming inner struggles that are unique to a member of a minority. And because Morrison suggests a healing, vital process to freedom and self-awareness, her novels go beyond protest literature and well into the realms of art and black naturalism. Morrison incorporates the naturalistic theme of the “waste of individual potential” due to environmental circumstances in many of her novels and most emphatically in the character of Pecola Breedlove in The Bluest Eye.
As many critics have noted, Pecola is victimized by a society that conditions her to believe that she is ugly and therefore worthless, because she doesn’t epitomize white Western culture’s idea of beauty. In her book Black Women Novelists: The Development of a Tradition, 1892-1976, Barbara Christian seems to support a naturalistic interpretation with her claim that “Pecola’s destiny is ultimately determined by the myth of beauty and goodness one culture has foisted on another” (153,emphasis added). In both fiction and poetry in Western culture, outward beauty has often been an indication of inner virtue.
Pecola believes that if her eyes were blue she would be pretty, virtuous, and loved: friends would play with her at recess, teachers would smile at Pecola the same way they smile at Maureen Peel, and even her parents might stop fighting because they would not want to “do bad things in front of those pretty eyes” (TBE 40). For Pecola, beauty equals happiness, and it is difficult to fault a young girl for the misperception; certainly both white and black communities in her world seem to support the idea.
Maureen Peel, “a high yellow dream child,” is treated with respect and awe by students and teachers alike not only because of her economical superiority, but because of her light skin, her brown hair, her green eyes, her “whiteness” (TBE 52). For African Americans there is a direct relationship between economic gain and light skin: a black individual’s chances of achieving both social and economic advantages is in direct correlation to his/her ability to correspond more closely to the images of beauty and common ideologies of the dominant society.
Morrison indicates how damaging careless adoption of Western values can be for African Americans in two memorable incidents. The first incident occurs when neighborhood boys dance “a macabre ballet” around Pecola, berating her for the darkness of her skin, singing “Black e too. Black e mo” (TBE 55). In describing the episode, Claudia remarks that “it was the contempt for their own blackness that gave the first insult its teeth” (TBE 55).
In Pecola’s clash with the group of boys, Morrison is demonstrating “how these ideas can invert the natural order of an entire culture,” creating young men who feel an awful contempt for the color of their skin and, by implication, their culture (Christian 152-53, emphasis added). By subscribing to a false white standard of beauty, African Americans assist the repressive efforts of the majority culture and bury their identities, following an unhealthy path of self-hatred rather than self-love.
When the young black boys chant “Yadaddsleepsnekked” they chide Pecola for not being “civilized” according to Western standards, again indicating an unnatural inversion of values and an unwillingness to take pride in one’s own culture in the black community. As Claudia listens to the boys, she recalls accidently glimpsing her own daddy naked one night as he passed her bedroom: “we had seen our own father naked and didn’t care to be reminded of it and feel the shame brought on by the absence of shame” (TBE 59, emphasis added).
Therefore, unlike some critics, I do not view the fact that Pecola saw Cholly nude as a foreshadowing of his later molestation. As Claudia and her sister lie with wide-open eyes in the dark after seeing their father, his nakedness remains in the room as a soothing “friendly-like” presence. Furthermore, Morrison herself indicates that even while the boys were harassing Pecola “their own father[s] had similarly relaxed habits” around the house in ostracizing Pecola for looking black and having a black family with black mores, the boys censure their own cultural identities.
Pecola is an easy victim, responding with tears rather than insults because, like her mother, she has completely assimilated the values the majority culture presents in billboards, advertisements, and motion pictures. In studying Pecola from a psychological perspective, one can say that Pecola and much of her community are trapped in Showalter’s first phase of growth for a subculture–“imitation of the prevailing modes of the dominant tradition, and internalization of its standards of art and its views on social roles” (1108,emphasis added).
Another incident Morrison provides to illustrate the debilitating effects of the infiltration of Western ideas on African Americans is the scene in which Pecola is expelled from the neat, orderly, and sterile house of Geraldine. By straightening their hair, clothespinning their noses and suppressing “the dreadful funkiness of passion” (TBE 64), these brown women from Mobile and Meridian have groomed away their identifies with the hot comb of self-hatred. Although Junior tells his mother that Pecola killed the cat, Geraldine’s strong reaction against Pecola goes far deeper than her cat’s death.
Geraldine calls Pecola a “nasty little black bitch” because Pecola reeks with the funkiness and the poverty Geraldine has so stridently avoided. As Geraldine stares at Pecola over the silky black back of her dead cat, she notes Pecola’s soiled clothes, muddy shoes, slipping socks, and loosely plaited hair, despising the little girl for being poor and too black: “She had seen this little girl all of her life . . . . They had stared at her with great uncomprehending eyes. Eyes that questioned nothing and asked everything. Unblinking and unabashed, they stared up at her. . . And this one had settled in her house” (TBE 75). As critics such as Otten and Willis have noted, young women like Geraldine who forever strive to expunge their blackness and “creep singly up into the major folds” (TBE 18) of mainstream white society continue the corruption of the white community by spawning a brown race that revers white standards indiscriminately, denying their ancestral heritage and denying their passionate natures, believing the myth broadcast by white society that black skin represents inferiority and bestiality.
In her novel, Morrison also demonstrates the forces in white society that eat away at Pecola’s self-esteem and sense of self-worth with her encounter with Mr. Yacobowski. Pecola visits Mr. Yacobowski’s store eagerly willing to spend her pennies on a handful of Mary Jane candies. Although Pecola is a paying customer, Mr. Yacobowski’s glazed eyes betray a “total absence of human recognition” while his hand gingerly takes the pennies from the little girl’s fist, careful not to brush her black skin (TBE 43).
When Pecola leaves the candy store, she once again sees herself as ugly, and meaningless as a weed straining through a crack in the sidewalk. It is interesting to note that Gwendolyn Brooks’s autobiographical character, Maud Martha, also envisions herself as a plain dandelion due to her too-dark skin: “it was hard to believe that a thing of only ordinary allurements–if the allurements of any flower could be said to be ordinary–was as easy to love as a thing of heartcatching beauty” (qtd. in Washington 389).
In Maud Martha’s world, the “thing of heartcatching beauty” is represented by her sister Helen, a light-skinned girl. As other critics have noted, Pecola’s next gesture of eating the Mary Janes indicates her strong desire to lose her black identity in a transporting ecstasy of chewy caramel delight: Each pale yellow wrapper has a picture on it. A picture of little Mary Jane . . . . Smiling white face. Blond hair in gentle disarray, blue eyes looking at her out of a world of clean comfort. The eyes are petulant, mischievous.
To Pecola they are simply pretty. . . . To eat the candy is somehow to eat the eyes, eat Mary Jane. Love Mary Jane. Be Mary Jane. (TBE 43) Therefore, in black naturalistic fiction, minority characters begin their struggle with me outside forces of society with the additional handicaps Showalter’s stages of progression indicate. Although characters like Tom Joad were often compelled to tight malicious stereotypes such as “hick” and “Okie,” they were never denied person-hood, never overpowered by the vacuum of acknowledgement that Pecola experiences with Mr.
Yacobowski or that Richard Wright experiences as a bellboy in a Southern hotel or as a worker who is forced to tight another “Black Boy” for the amusement of white managers. Tragically, both black and white communities unwittingly join forces to extinguish Pecola Breedlove’s fledgling sense of self-worth, driving this little girl to her ultimate destination: the garbage heaps on the outskirts of town.
In The Bluest Eye there is a palpable condemnation for African Americans who sacrifice vulnerable members of their community to attain the benefits of assimilation into white society. In Down from the Mountaintop, Melissa Walker discusses the tragic waste of people like Pecola Breedlove and the communities who fail them: Claudia acknowledges that she and others like her who have managed to rise above their origins use the Pecolas of the world to bolster their own sense of belonging in the mainstream . . . The culprits in the crimes against Pecola, then, are not just the social conditions that destroyed first her parents and then Pecola herself, but those within the black community who use the less fortunate to facilitate their own success in a racist society. (58) Thus the white majority culture is both a direct and indirect sup-pressor, withholding money, power and prestige to turn blacks against blacks, creating an inverted and aberrant community, whose little boys and girls sing songs of self-hatred: “Black e mo!
Black e mo! ” Not only is Pecola prevented from developing her nature and growing to her fullest potential, she is also wrested from existence “into the chaos of life” first when she is “put outdoors” and forced to live with Claudia and Frieda, and second when her father, Cholly Breedlove, rapes her. In the opening pages of the novel, Claudia describes the significance and horror of Pecola’s plight: “Outdoors, we knew, was the real terror in life . . . . There is a difference between being put out and being put outdoors.
If you are put out, you go somewhere else; if you are outdoors, there is no place to go . . . . Outdoors was the end of something, an irrevocable, physical fact” (TBE 18). In The Bluest Eye Morrison does not exonerate Cholly Breedlove from committing his family to the outdoors or violating his daughter. Instead she presents some possible explanations of circumstances stemming from his environment that may have contributed to his actions and his nature.
First, as previously stated, both black and white society have become aberrant; as long as one culture is allowed to dominate and exploit another, there will be unnatural acts such as Sethe killing her “already crawling” baby in Beloved and Cholly showing his confused love in the incestuous act of rape. When Cholly sees his daughter standing in the kitchen cleaning a frying pan, “her head to one side as though crouching from a permanent and unrelieved blow,” he is filled with pity, rage and helplessness (TBE 127).
Cholly feels pity because his daughter should be enjoying the freedom and innocence of childhood and cannot, largely due to racism; he feels rage because he unconsciously senses that economic disadvantages (a given in most African American experience at this time) and a life in a rundown storefront amongst battling parents have contributed to the “permanent and unrelieved blow” exhibited in her demeanor; he feels helpless because as an illiterate black man too long estranged from is family and his responsibilities, he does not know how to assuage Pecola’s broken, “crouching” spirit. In a drunken, confused state, Cholly gropes for something to give his daughter to demonstrate his love and tenderness and return to himself a sense of self-respect. Therefore, like Bigger Thomas and many of the “grotesques” in Anderson’s Winesburg, Ohio, Cholly remains mute, helpless, and in turmoil, unable to communicate his changing feelings Of tenderness and hatred.
In part, then, Cholly rapes Pecola to demonstrate his love: “He wanted to fuck her tenderly” (TBE 128). But Cholly also does it because like many early naturalistic protagonists, he is driven by an inner force almost against his desires, a force he does not fully comprehend in his drunken, muddled brain to do this “wild and forbidden thing” that “excited him” (128).
Two circumstances in Cholly’s youth succeed in severing him from a connection with the rest of human nature and human morality: his mother’s desertion prompted by strained economic conditions and the exploitation and humiliation he experienced at the hands of the two white hunters. The inner forces governing Cholly’s behavior with his daughter are born from this dangerous disconnection and the corresponding rage and helplessness it has produced in Cholly Breedlove.
When Pauline finds Pecola lying on the kitchen floor with her dingy underwear still hovering about her ankles, she beats Pecola, almost killing her. Thus Cholly’s deranged act of love produces yet another terrifying, brutal blow in Pecola’s young life, finally compelling her into madness. It is worth noting that unlike naturalistic tragic figures, when Pecola is thrown “into the chaos of life ‘outside,”‘ she does not fall from “midway”; her life is not on a “grooved but satisfying” path.
Living in a grubby storefront, taunted and alienated by her classmates and either beaten or ignored by her parents, Pecola is a tragic figure who begins life at the bottom the moment her mother, brainwashed by the white movie industry, decides her daughter is irretrievably ugly: Pauline Breedlove “was never able, after her education in the movies, to look at a face and not assign it some category in the scale of absolute beauty, and the scale was one she absorbed in full from the silver screen” (TBE 97).
Sitting in the local cinema day after day, Pauline Breedlove dreams of looking like Jean Harlow, parting her hair on the side and pulling a curly lock over her forehead. When Pauline looses her front tooth, she realizes how terribly impossible and foolish her dream was. Pauline begins to hate herself, unconsciously believing the messages paraded on the silver screen–that only beautiful women like Jean Harlow and Norma Shearer deserve love and happiness. And when her daughter is born, regardless of Pecola’s pretty head of hair and soft wet eyes, she sees Pecola as ugly too.
Not only is Pauline’s awful sense of self-worth passed on to her child, her impossible dream of blond blue-eyed beauty is passed on as well. Samuels and Hudson-Weems claim that readers must not overlook Pecola’s own responsibility for her abdication of freedom and descent into madness. The authors compare Pecola’s passive reactions to situations of repression (such as the cruel attacks on Pecola’s dark skin color by Maureen Peel and the neighborhood black boys) with Claudia, who welcomes an occasion to express her anger and scream insults.
Samuels and Hudson-Weems argue that even children “must consider the direction of their lives” (22). The authors are correct when they claim that unlike Pecola, Claudia “is determined to overcome any definition of self that is externally ascribed” from the white or black community (22). However, can one ignore the roots of Claudia’s survival? Claudia was raised in a house where “love, thick and dark as Alaga syrup” coated her childhood (TBE 14). Claudia has never experienced being put “outdoors” or, that we know of, watched violent fights between her mother and father.
Claudia does not live in a squalid storefront and her mother is not absent for much of the day, working as a maid. Claudia has been equipped with the shield of self-love to combat negative influences from black and white society–Pecola has not. Therefore, because she has developed in a less debilitating environment than Pecola Breedlove, an environment that encouraged Claudia to feel pride for herself, while still a young girl, Claudia has been able to move beyond Showalter’s stage one into a protest against the mores of the dominant society.
And the adult Claudia we hear throughout the novel has progressed beyond stage two to the quest for identity indicated in stage three. When Claudia destroys her white doll with its glassy blue eyes, she demonstrates pride in her identity and the ability to understand, to some degree, the repressive values pervading her black community. Samuels and Hudson-Weems are correct, however, in asserting that Pecola participates in her own destruction; Pecola is passive, folding into herself because she lacks the strength that love of oneself and one’s identity provide to “stand erect and spit the misery out on the streets” as Claudia does (61).
Yet it remains difficult to fault Pecola for a destructive lack of self-awareness and self-love. Pecola lives in a brutal world of rejection, deprived of even parental affection. When Pecola accidently topples a pan of blueberry pie she is forced to suffer as berry juice scalds her legs while her mother dispels the tears of the little white girl delicately dressed in pink and yellow: “In one gallop she was on Pecola, and with the back of her hand knocked her to the floor. Pecola slid in the pie juice, one leg folding under her” (TBE 86).
The relationship between mother and daughter is so distant that Pecola invariably thinks of her mother as “Mrs. Breedlove,” while the little white girl affectionately refers to Pauline Breedlove as “Polly. ” Pecola behaves like a victim because she has been victimized on three debilitating fronts from the moment of her birth: by the majority white society, by the black community, and later by herself. Consequently, this cringing, retreating, alienated little girl never attains knowledge of herself or comprehends the complex forces that manipulate her reverence for blond-haired blue-eyed Shirley Temple figures.
Pecola’s final step into madness described by Claudia indicates the extent of Morrison’s tragedy: “A little black girl yearns for the blue eyes of a little white girl, and the horror at the heart of her yearning is exceeded only by the evil of fulfillment” (TBE 158). In desperation, then, Pecola creates a friend out of her imagination who will love her and assure her that she has the bluest eyes in all the world, bluer than the blue sky, bluer than “Alice-and-Jerry Story-book” eyes. With the demise of Pecola Breedlove, Morrison issues a direct and clear warning of the mportance of self-love for African Americans. Many critics have noted Claudia’s reflection on the inability of some seeds to grow and bear fruit in the soft of her community: “The soft is bad for certain kinds of flowers. Certain seeds it will not nurture, certain fruit it will not bear, and when the land kills of its own volition, we acquiesce and say the victim had no right to live” (TBE 160). What too many critics inevitably fail to print is Claudia’s next sentence: “We are wrong, of course, but it doesn’t matter. In her novel Morrison is claiming that the soft–or the societal environment should not fail in nurturing flowers like Pecola Breedlove. The seed of Pecola was not planted too deeply–Pecola’s soul was denied nourishment. Affection was never showered on Pecola’s forlorn, yearning soul; therefore, the fruit of self-love was never realized. Without the strength of love for one’s cultural identity, vulnerable members of minorities are in real danger of being starved by both black and white environments.
Black naturalism encompasses this demand of the societal environment to nurture rather than starve African Americans, allowing them to flower to their fullest potentials. Unfortunately, Morrison’s message is still much needed for today’s generation of African Americans. The preference among black children for white, blond, blue-eyed dolls is still all too prevalent; according to a study conducted by Hopson and Hopson of black preschoolers, 76 percent of the children selected a black doll as “bad,” and 60 to 78 percent still chose a white doll over a black one.
It seems, then, that little has changed since 1941 and Pecola’s dreadful visit to Soaphead Church for the blessing of blue eyes: many African Americans still suffer from a dangerously low sense of self-esteem originating from their internalization of the prejudices of white culture. According to a survey conducted by the Metropolitan Chicago Information Center, “African Americans are more likely than whites to hold negative opinions of their fellow blacks’ innate capabilities” (Mabry’ and Rogers 33).
Morrison’s novel reflects this dangerous internalization of racist values and the cycle of self-hatred passed on from parents to children it produces. By calling our attention to this self-perpetuating cycle in her first novel, Morrison is trying to eliminate the devastation of dandelions like Pecola Breedlove. Consequently, one significant tenet of black naturalism that does not exist in traditional naturalism includes this prevalent ringing call of warning concerning the dangers of internalization and the need for balance between self and society.
Not only does this tenet function as a diagnosis of society’s problems, it also serves as both a challenge and a stimulus for psychological and political change. Having explored both the direct and indirect societal forces that serve to thwart characters like Pecola Breedlove, we are left with a few questions: what exactly is black naturalism, how is it significantly different from the existing theory, and how do earlier black naturalistic novels such as The Street and Native Son differ from the black naturalism we see in Morrison’s novels?
First, I think it is worth noting that writers of black naturalistic fiction were not responding to the same “root causes” Civello describes in his dissertation. Early African American naturalistic writers such as DuBois were more than likely not reacting to the rise of Darwinism in the nineteenth century that so rocked the white American man’s idea of an ordered universe. Although the Christian religion was highly important in many black households in the late nineteenth century, the crisis that influenced black novelists of this period was the idea of slavery and the continued oppression of the black race during Reconstruction.
I think the injustices of white supremacy and racism served to alienate African Americans from their conceptual ideas of an ordered material world far more drastically than the theory of evolution and its affect on the Christian doctrine of creation. Moreover, while both African American and white characters may suffer psychologically in naturalistic fiction, the causes of their conditions are very different.
As Civello notes, in Frank Norris’s Vandover and the Brute, having learned of his biological affinity with the animal kingdom and being unable to rely on the Bible for guidance, Vandover cannot reconcile his spiritual and moral ideals with his physical instinct, thus creating a psychological split between his physical and rational self that results in madness. However, as I have illustrated previously, in black naturalistic fiction, the source of psychological conflict for African Americans is interracism and intraracism. Therefore, although characters like Vandover and Pecola Breedlove both become insane, the foundations that otivate their falls are unrelated. Furthermore, black novelists from the Harlem Renaissance were not responding to the devastating effects of World War I in the same ways as their white contemporaries. When blacks joined the fight to save democracy, many hoped that the freedom they were fighting for in Europe would become realized in the United States. Instead, in the 1920s there was a resurgence of Klan activity, lynching, and according to annual reports from the attorney general, peonage still existed “to a shocking extent” (Aptheker 193).
Black soldiers returned to a country that sought to de-emphasize the heroic roles African Americans played in Europe and “deprive them of gains in jobs and housing made during the war” (Bell 93). Therefore, because black naturalistic writers were responding to a very different “wasteland” devoid of racial justice, they created a significantly different literary form. It is also worth noting that in African American fiction many black characters display a significantly different perception of nature than is exhibited in the traditional theory of naturalism.
As Morrison indicates in her novels, nature is not merely an oppressive, indifferent force that seeks “to undermine [one’s] dignity and against which [one] therefore had to struggle” (Civello 13). In Morrison’s novels nature serves as both a reflector of humanity and as an indicator of future happiness and despair. Dead birds falling from the sky in Sula not only announce Sula’s arrival but seem to indicate the approaching of hard times and the existence of disorder in “The Bottom. , In addition, the intolerance of Pecola’s community is reflected in the intolerance of the soil for growing marigolds that year.
Black novelists perceive nature as neither benevolent and ordered, as viewed by the Romantics, nor as callous or objective as perceived by white naturalistic novelists like Jack London, because their perceptions arise from a different cultural background containing African myths, legends, spirituals, blues and tales. A second important difference between black naturalism and the traditional theory concerns the issue of knowledge of the self and the nature of reality. In naturalistic fiction, the idea of knowledge was at first perceived as impossible and later perceived as possible but difficult to achieve.
In black naturalism, however, knowledge is not only possible, it is essential for the physical and cultural survival of the race. For African Americans, self-knowledge and a strong sense of self-identity is the only protection against the various forms of both intraracism and interracism that still pervade our society. Unlike characters in traditional naturalism, in black naturalistic fiction this important sense of identity can only be achieved by embracing the past, as demonstrated by characters like Tar Baby’s Jadine Childs and Song of Solomon’s Milkman Dead.
Until characters can travel beyond the first two stages of Showalter’s study of subcultures-imitation and protest of the dominant society’s mores–to a quest for identity, like Pecola Breedlove, they remain psychologically trapped and whipped by their societal environment. We have, therefore, a consistent pattern of the importance of the past for understanding the present and redefining the future not only in Morrison’s novels, but in modern black fiction and poetry in general.
The importance of embracing one’s cultural heritage does not appear in traditional naturalism mainly because it is not essential for members of a dominant society to make an effort to embrace an identity or a past: first, because quite often their collective past is not filled with a sanctioned, long-term pattern of persecution; and second, because society has not made a concerted effort to appropriate or annihilate their cultures and collective histories.
This necessary embracing of the past in black naturalism presents an interesting question: Can black novels that fail to offer this solution be considered as members of the black naturalism genre? When analyzing Native Son Bell states that although Wright provided a great service in bringing the harsh light of naturalism to the problems facing blacks in the 1930s, he fails to indicate the importance of “black folk culture as a way of maintaining or changing arrangements of status, power, and identity in a hostile environment” (165).
According to Bell, many black readers including James Baldwin “apparently knew that white oppression, even during slavery, was never absolute in its control over the intragroup lives of black Americans, who, from the slave quarters to the urban ghettos, have carried with them a system of values and rituals that has enabled them to sustain their humanity” (165).
Therefore, do earlier naturalistic novels like Native Son and The Street fit into this new genre I have outlined? I think we can say that these novels do qualify as part of black naturalism but with the stipulation that they exhibit characters (and perhaps authors) who are trapped in Showalter’s second stage of protest against the dominant society. One can also ask the same question about novels from authors like Zora Neale Hurston, Jessie Fauset and Nella Larsen.
Although Bell does not label these novels as naturalistic, he uses the rhetoric of naturalism to describe a common quest shared by novels of the New Negro: “[the quest] was for the resolution of the psychological and social dilemma of the modern black American, for an affirmation of the human spirit over the forces that threatened its integrity and development” (115,emphasis added). Furthermore, when discussing the idea of ancestralism in romantic fiction, Bell also uses the language of naturalism- writers look to the past when their souls are “under siege by destructive forces” (114).
I would argue that due to the extensive influence of societal environments on African Americans due largely to racism, although many black novels may be categorized as romantic, folkloric, or pastoral, they can also be categorized as examples of black naturalism as long as characters are striving against conditions that threaten their “integrity” while seeking to gain self-awareness as a “modern black American. “
In black naturalism we are also confronted with the problem of assimilation with characters like Helen Wright, Geraldine, and Jadine Childs, who, by denying their black ancestral culture, have risen both socially and economically in mainstream society. In introducing members of the black bourgeoisie, Morrison explores two challenges African Americans face: first, the inherent difficulty all minorities have in assimilating into a dominant society without betraying one’s race; and second, the danger of alienation from oneself and one’s past due to this betrayal.
For all minorities, a certain amount of assimilation is important: one must learn the language and the customs of an adopted society in order to function successfully within it. The difficulty occurs when individuals over-assimilate to ride the road to material success, power or societal acceptance. This is distinctly a minority issue and cannot be found in traditional naturalism. And unlike other minorities, blacks often experience a greater desire to assimilate because of a stronger sense of alienation instilled in them by white society due to the color line.
In an interview with Judith Paterson, Maya Angelou sounds remarkably like the fictional, young, courageous Sylvia from “The Lesson” when she states, “I will not allow anybody to minimize my life, not anybody, not a living soul–nobody, no lover, no mother, no son, no boss, no President, nobody” (119). Judging from her many accomplishments indicated in her autobiographical novels, Angelou seems to have provided ample proof to support her statement. Yet, as she affirms in an interview with Bill Moyers, struggling for one’s freedom is a “difficult” and “perpetual” effort (19).
One cannot rise above the forces that seek to “minimize” our lives–whether it be our lover or our President–unless one makes a conscious effort to understand and acknowledge them. For all races and for all individuals, it is critical to fully comprehend how society influences our values and beliefs–only after fully understanding the influences (both positive and negative) that touch and shape our lives can we strive to combat them and grow to our fullest potential. Works Cited Aptheker, Herbert. Afro-American History: The Modern Era. Secaucus: Citadel, 1971. Bambara, Toni Cade.
Gorilla, My Love. New York: Random House, 1972. Bell, Bernard. The Afro-American Novel and Its Tradition. Amherst: Massachusetts UP, 1987. Brooks, Gwendolyn. “The Courtship and Motherhood of Maud Martha” from Maud Martha (1953). Invented Lives: Narratives of Black Women 1860-1960. Ed. Mary Helen Washington. New York: Doubleday, 1987. 406-28. Byerman, Keith E. Fingering the Jagged Grain: Tradition and Form in Recent Black Fiction. Athens: U of Georgia P, 1985. Christian, Barbara. Black Women Novelists: The Development of a Tradition, 1892-1976. Westport: Greenwood, 1980.
Civello, Paul Baker. “American Literary Naturalism and Its Modern and Postmodern Transformations: Frank Norris, Ernest Hemingway, and Don DeLillo. , Diss. U of California, Los Angeles, 1991. Mabry, Marcus, and Patrick Rogers. “Bias Begins at Home. ” Newsweek 5 Aug. 1991: 33. Morrison, Toni. Beloved. New York: Penguin, 1987. (underbar). The Bluest Eye. New York: Pocket Books, 1970. (underbar). “Rootedhess: The Ancestor as Foundation. ” Black Women Writers 1950-1980: A Critical Evaluation. Ed. Mari Evans. New York: Doubleday, 1983. Moyers, Bill. “A Conversation with Maya Angelou. Conversations with Maya Angelou. Ed. Jeffrey M. Elliot. Jackson: Mississippi U P, 1989. Otten, Terry. The Crime of Innocence in the Fiction of Toni Morrison. Columbia: U of Missouri P, 1989. Patterson, Judith. “Interview: Maya Angelou. ” Conversations with Maya Angelou. Ed. Jeffrey M. Elliot. Jackson: U of Mississippi P, 1989. Pizer, Donald. Twentieth-Century American Literary Naturalism: An Interpretation. Carbondale: Southern Illinois, 1982. Samuels, Wilfred D. and Clenora Hudson-Weems. Toni Morrison. Boston: Twayne, 1990. Showalter, Elaine. “The Female Tradition. The Critical Tradition: Classic Texts and Contemporary Trends. Ed. David H. Richter. New York: St. Martin’s, 1989. Walker, Jim, and Diane Weathers, eds. “Conversations with Alice Childress and Toni Morrison. ” Black Creation (1974-75): 90-92. Walker, Melissa. Down from the Mountaintop. New Haven: Yale U P, 1991. Washington, Mary Helen, ed. Invented Lives: Narratives of Black Women: 1860-1960. New York: Anchor, 1987. Willis, Susan. Specifying: Black Women Writing the American Experience. Madison: U of wisconsin P, 1987. Wright, Richard. Native Son. New York: Harper and Row, 1940. | https://anyassignment.com/literature/black-naturalism-and-toni-morrison-the-journey-away-from-self-love-in-the-bluest-eye-assignment-45580/ |
David Downing, Ph.D.
Second Advisor
Mike Sell, Ph.D.
Third Advisor
Todd Thompson, Ph.D.
Abstract
The 1950s to the 1980s were a critical period for the twentieth century African American experience in both social and literary terms. This dissertation examines the impact of Black Nationalism and the Black Arts Movement on the development of African American masculinity as well as the African American woman’s depiction of that masculinity in the middle to late twentieth century. Using African American masculinity and African American feminist studies as my framework, I examine the emasculated male characters in three literary works by Black women: A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry; Third Life of Grange Copeland by Alice Walker; and Linden Hills by Gloria Naylor. Considerable scholarship has been dedicated to the issues of womanhood addressed by these authors; however, there remains much to be said about the plight of African American men. Although the works of these women writers were not directly involved in the Black Nationalist and Black Arts Movements of the 1950s to the 1980s, the historical influences on their depictions of masculinity are definitely significant in the male characters that these authors portray. Some critics argue that these particular texts illustrate the archetypal male character because the content champions the causes of African American women and because these authors need to have a voice for the issues of their own doubly burdened race and sex. However, I suggest that these women were also presenting concepts for redefining masculinity. Hence, in this dissertation I scrutinize the three characteristics of this recurring male character who is trapped by his economic circumstances, subjugated to the pressures and standards of white society, and disdainful and misogynistic toward women, especially African American women. I demonstrate how these writers imagine the possibilities for emancipation of the male characters, from their emasculated state.
Recommended Citation
Lockhart, Lana N., "Emasculation and Emancipation: African American Masculinity in African American Women's Literature, 1955-1985" (2015). Theses and Dissertations (All). 405. | https://knowledge.library.iup.edu/etd/405/ |
Linear Quadratic Systems Worksheets
What are Linear Quadratic Equations? Mathematics is full of useful concepts that we get to apply even in our daily life. Though we might not know, these concepts really help in our daily lives. To understand the concept of the Linear Quadratic equation, let's understand its definition first. A linear-quadratic system is a system of equations involving one linear, one quadratic, which may be of a straight line or a parabola, and one equation of a circle. Have you ever seen an overhead bridge in your life? If not, then explore the streets because it is one of the perfect real-world examples of graphs of linear and quadratic functions. A bridge that moves across smoothly from one location to another represents a linear function. A Linear function is typically in the form of y = mx + b where m refers to the slope or rate of change, and b is the y-intercept, together these form a straight-line graph as the variable x has no exponent. Linear functions are like the flat bridge. A Quadratic function is typically represented as y = ax2 + bx + c. The Function will have a second power to its x variable, and it sometimes makes a parabola - a symmetrically curved graph.
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Basic Lesson
Demonstrates how to solve linear quadratic equations. Substitute the value of y in quadratic equation. Substitute the values of x in linear equation.View worksheet
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Intermediate Lesson
Explores how to mass substitute in linear quadratic systems.View worksheet
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Independent Practice 1
Contains 20 Linear Quadratic Systems problems that you must solve algebraically. The answers can be found below.View worksheet
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Independent Practice 2
Features another 20 Linear Quadratic Systems problems.View worksheet
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Homework Worksheet
Linear Quadratic Systems problems for students to work on at home. Example problems are provided and explained.View worksheet
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Topic Quiz
10 Linear Quadratic Systems problems. A math scoring matrix is included.View worksheet
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Homework and Quiz Answer Key
Answers for the homework and quiz.View worksheet
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Lesson and Practice Answer Key
Answers for both lessons and both practice sheets.View worksheet
What's Up With Algebra?
Encourages abstract thinking & the ability to form generalizations Gives practice in symbolic representation - and analyze relationships symbolically Fosters reasoning - to make conjectures and gather information to prove or disprove these conjectures. | https://www.mathworksheetscenter.com/mathskills/algebra/linearquadraticsystems/ |
Only 25 percent of people with mental illness feel that others are caring and compassionate towards them. This perceived lack of kindness towards people with mental health conditions is informed by the centuries of oppression people with mental illness have faced at the hands of those without mental health conditions, institutionalization, damaging medical procedures, ill treatment and isolation. However, by examining your own language, actions and biases, you have the power to spread empathy to people with mental health challenges and become a caring and supportive ally, which will help change perceptions of mental health conditions and decrease the stigma surrounding mental illness. Here are 4 simple ways to become a strong, compassionate ally to the mental health community.
- Listen when someone discloses their mental illness and show empathy.
For many people, disclosure is one of the most challenging aspects of living with mental illness. In our society, mental health conditions are still widely considered unfit for discussion. This attitude can easily provoke fear in those who want or need to disclose their mental health status, but you can help alleviate the trepidation surrounding disclosure by showing empathy. If someone chooses to open up to you about their mental health, understand that it is likely difficult for them and know that one of the best things you can do is listen and respond with care.
Be aware of others’ emotions when they are disclosing (Do they seem nervous? Emotional? Hesitant?) and try to put yourself in their position, responding to them how you would want someone to respond to you. Lean into the conversation. Do not interrupt anyone while they are disclosing their mental illness and only respond to clarify how they are feeling. Your words and actions during disclosure will allow others to freely discuss their mental health at an incredibly vulnerable time, which will establish you as a safe confidant, and in doing so, will begin to reduce the stigma surrounding mental illness.
2. Educate yourself about the history of the mental health stigma.
The stigma surrounding mental illness is rooted in a long, sordid history of oppression, but understanding the history behind the current attitude towards mental health conditions will help you recognize why many people living with mental illness feel silenced in our society. Knowing the history of mental illness in our society will also reinforce the importance of eliminating the mental health stigma. For centuries, those with mental illness were routinely subjected to being gaped at by the general public in “freak shows,” institutionalized under unlivable conditions, or outcast by their families and left to fend for themselves on the streets. With the rise of the frontal lobotomy in the 1950’s as a potential “cure” for various mental health conditions, many people living with mental illness were forced to undergo this “treatment,” which, by today’s standards, violated medical ethics. Consequently, those who underwent lobotomies experienced dulled emotions and behavioral changes, which significantly reduced their quality of life.
Society’s attempt to cover up the history of oppression people with mental illness have faced heavily contributions to the oppression people still face in society today. By educating yourself on the deeply-ingrained prejudices surrounding mental illness, you will become inspired to change the long-standing narrative of oppression for people with mental illness.
3. Change the language you use to describe mental illness.
Language is powerful. The language you choose to describe both people, with mental illness and unpleasant occurrences, in everyday life can change deeply-rooted perceptions of those with mental health conditions. Certain words, like “crazy” and “insane,” harm the mentally ill population because they have devolved into terms used to denigrate those with mental illness and reinforce the deleterious stereotypes that contribute to the mental health stigma. Choosing replacement words for the stigmatizing language in your everyday vocabulary (For the words “crazy” and “insane,” “wild” and “ridiculous” are effective alternatives) is a small but powerful step towards reducing the stigma and promoting equality in our society.
In addition, refrain from using mental illnesses to derogatorily describe everyday inconveniences or other people. Mental illness and the stigma surrounding it is serious, but carelessly “name-dropping” specific illnesses in conversation trivializes a long-stigmatized group of health conditions. Your tidy friend is not “OCD.” The rapidly-fluctuating weather is not “so bipolar.” That slender girl across the street is probably not “anorexic.”And that never-ending traffic likely does not truly make you want to “kill” yourself.These phrases, as well as others like them, delegitimize legitimate aspects of mental illness with which many people struggle daily.
4. Know what your friends with mental health conditions need from you in times of crisis and respect their preferences.
Helping a friend with mental illness in a time of crisis can be challenging, but it is a powerful way to not only show that you care about their well-being, but to also demonstrate that you are an ally to their community.
If you are unsure of how to help a friend with a mental health condition, wait for a calm moment to ask if there is anything you can do to help them when they are having difficulty with aspects of their illness. Understand that this is a raw, vulnerable conversation for your friend with mental health struggles, and be patient and understanding if they seem hesitant to discuss their mental illness. If your friend seems receptive to your support, listen to how they prefer you help in times of heightened emotion or crisis and respect their preferences by following through with their wishes in difficult moments. Since no two people with mental illness, even those with the same type of mental health condition, are alike, this conversation is particularly important, as it will allow you to individualize your responses to your each of your friends with illness so that they will all feel safe and supported during challenging times. Understanding how people with mental health challenges feel in moments of crisis and knowing how you can respond is a powerful way to not only be a supportive friend, but also a strong advocate for the mental health community as a whole.
The fact that only 25 percent of people with mental illness feel that others are compassionate towards their mental health conditions is seriously alarming. So, always remember that through your attitude, language and actions, you have the power to become a caring ally to the mental health community, to change perceptions of those living with mental illness, and to work towards a more compassionate future.
Previously published by Thought Catalog. | https://www.readunwritten.com/2018/02/16/4-simple-ways-ally-mental-health-community/ |
You must work on the presumption that every adult patient has the capacity to make decisions about the disclosure of their personal information. You must not assume a patient lacks capacity to make a decision solely because of their age, disability, appearance, behaviour, medical condition (including mental illness), beliefs, apparent inability to communicate, or because they make a decision you disagree with.
You must assess a patient’s capacity to make a particular decision at the time it needs to be made, recognising that fluctuations in a patient’s condition may affect their ability to understand, retain or weigh up information, or communicate their wishes.
We give detailed advice on assessing a patient’s mental capacity in our guidance Decision making and consent. Practical guidance is also given in the Adults with Incapacity (Scotland) Act 2000 and Mental Capacity Act 2005 codes of practice.14
The main provisions of the Mental Capacity Act (Northern Ireland) 2016 have not yet come into force. The common law duty to act in the best interests of a patient who lacks capacity to consent therefore continues until the Act is commenced.
Considering the disclosure
You may disclose personal information if it is of overall benefit to patient who lacks the capacity to consent. When making the decision about whether to disclose information about a patient who lacks capacity to consent, you must:
- make the care of the patient your first concern
- respect the patient’s dignity and privacy
- support and encourage the patient to be involved, as far as they want and are able, in decisions about disclosure of their personal information.
You must also consider:
- whether the patient’s lack of capacity is permanent or temporary and, if temporary, whether the decision to disclose could reasonably wait until they regain capacity
- any evidence of the patient’s previously expressed preferences
- the views of anyone the patient asks you to consult, or who has legal authority to make a decision on their behalf, or has been appointed to represent them
- the views of people close to the patient on the patient’s preferences, feelings, beliefs and values, and whether they consider the proposed disclosure to be of overall benefit to the patient
- what you and the rest of the healthcare team know about the patient’s wishes, feelings, beliefs and values.
You might need to share personal information with a patient’s relatives, friends or carers to enable you to assess the overall benefit to the patient. But that does not mean they have a general right of access to the patient’s records or to be given irrelevant information about, for example, the patient’s past healthcare.
You must share relevant information with anyone who is authorised to make health and welfare decisions on behalf of, or who is appointed to support and represent, a patient who lacks capacity to give consent. This might be a welfare attorney, a court-appointed deputy or guardian, or an independent mental capacity advocate. You should also share information with independent mental health advocates in some circumstances.15
Independent mental health advocates should also be given the information listed in section 130B of the Mental Health Act 1983. Guidance on the roles of independent mental health advocates is given in the Mental Health Act 1983 Code of Practice 2015.
If a patient who lacks capacity asks you not to disclose
If a patient asks you not to disclose personal information about their condition or treatment, and you believe they lack capacity to make that decision, you should try to persuade them to allow an appropriate person to be given relevant information about their care. In some cases, disclosing information will be required or necessary, for example under the provisions of mental health and mental capacity laws (see paragraph 47).
If the patient still does not want you to disclose information, but you consider that it would be of overall benefit to the patient and you believe they lack capacity to make that decision, you may disclose relevant information to an appropriate person or authority. In such cases, you should tell the patient before disclosing the information and, if appropriate, seek and carefully consider the views of an advocate or carer. You must document in the patient’s records your discussions and the reasons for deciding to disclose the information. | https://www.gmc-uk.org/ethical-guidance/ethical-guidance-for-doctors/confidentiality/using-and-disclosing-patient-information-for-direct-care |
World Mental Health Day 2022
October 10, 2022 is World Mental Health Day. The slogan "Make mental health and well-being a global priority for all" focuses on comprehensive reform of mental health services around the world.
According to WHO, in 2019, 1 in 8 in the world had a mental disorder. This statistic does not take into account the negative impact on mental health from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Learn more
The pandemic has significantly disrupted mental health services and widened the treatment gap many patients face.
Patient mental health concerns are becoming more and more important. Surveys can be conducted while the patient is in the pharmacy for other reasons to assess the patient's mental health.
It is equally important that pharmacy staff receive training in mental health first aid and trauma-informed care to help you.
Learn more
Another important part of supporting patient mental health is working with relevant national associations and advocacy groups.
These groups play a key role in innovation and advocacy
in
pharmacy
and help pass
important
legislation. | https://runningshoesonline.in/web-stories/world-mental-health-day-2022/ |
Emotional and Physical Injury, subtle or severe, personal or national (Brexit!) can underpin psychological and physiological damage that may go undetected for years. Our panel will discuss the nature of trauma and current treatments.
Noel McDermott Psychotherapist, Consultant and Entrepreneur personal’s experience led him to champion better care plans for people with complex needs.
Dr Jonathan Leach GP was involved in the recent revision of NICE guidelines on PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder). He is a retired British Army colonel, chair of the NHS England Armed Forces and their Families Clinical Reference Group and joint honorary secretary for the Royal College of GPs. Dr Leach will speak about diagnosing and understanding trauma in primary care, exploring the latest NICE guidance and finding the best treatment.
Dr Angela Kennedy Consultant Clinical Psychologist and trauma therapist is the lead for implementing Trauma informed Care in the Tees Esk and Wear Valleys NHS Foundation Mental Health Trust and is Mental Health Lead for the North of England Clinical Network (a branch of NHS England). Angela was one of the authors of Trauma Informed Mental Healthcare in the UK, What is it and how can we further its development. She will speak about how to recognise and help people with trauma in secondary care mental health services and talk about EMDR (eye movement desensitising and processing).
Dr Stephanie Lewis Clinical Lecturer in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, is lead author of new research published in The Lancet Psychiatry revealing how commonplace trauma and PTSD are in young people in the UK, how trauma is also associated with other mental health disorders, and how young people with trauma-related disorders often do not get the support they need. She will discuss the implications of this work for the mental health care of young people with trauma-related mental health disorders.
The Guild of Health Writers thanks Noel McDermott for his generous sponsorship of this event and would like to state that this is an independent event. In accordance with its objectives, the Guild aims to provide a balanced, non-partisan forum for discussion and does not endorse any commercial products.
The Guild of Health Writers is a national, independent, membership organisation representing many of Britain’s leading health journalists and writers. | https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/understanding-the-nature-of-trauma-tickets-59754272638?aff=ebdssbdestsearch&utm-medium=discovery&utm-campaign=social&utm-content=attendeeshare&utm-source=cp&utm-term=destsearch |
The COVID-19 pandemic may be deepening Milwaukee County's mental health crisis but providers see a glimmer of hope
Robbie Adams has lost two of his clients to overdoses since the pandemic began and many others feel abandoned.
They can't see health care workers in person, even though they have "a hunger for face-to-face, human-being-to-human-being contact," said Adams, a peer support specialist with Our Space Inc. Getting help is more complicated than ever.
"We're getting a lot of referrals from people looking for help," Adams said. Yet many of the 21 clients he sees are paralyzed by fear of COVID-19.
"This COVID-19 really destroyed relationships we had and ripped everything away from us in the blink of an eye."
When his clients see him in person, they might talk for one to three hours. Over the phone, he's lucky if he gets 15 minutes.
"A lot of the guys I work with personally hate the fact that they have to talk to their therapist through the phone," Adams said. "I noticed the phone calls weren't being picked up anymore. It's almost like everything everyone improved in, after COVID-19, came to a crashing halt."
The pandemic may be making what already was a rapidly growing mental health crisis worse in Milwaukee County. Crisis calls have been climbing for five years in the county, with 5,000 more calls recorded in 2019 compared to 2015, according to data from the Wisconsin Department of Health.
Experts fear it's only going to get worse for the most vulnerable.
COVID-19 has exacerbated stress and left people isolated
Isolation and loneliness are big factors in substance abuse, said Nagy Youssef, a clinical professor at Augusta University's Medical College of Georgia, who has studied suicide, mood and other disorders since 2003.
He said that abusing a class of sedatives called benzodiazepines and/or alcohol "can lead to depression, loneliness and financial issues."
Quarantining has made escaping domestic violence more difficult and bred feelings of distrust, he said. And the symptoms of people with depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder can worsen as they are overwhelmed by health, financial and political concerns.
The two people who overdosed while in Adams' care illustrate the often unseen damage that coronavirus is doing to vulnerable peoples' lives.
"There was one individual that overdosed," Adams said. "Great guy, getting back on his feet, things were going well for him. Then when that shutdown happened, it all stopped. The longer it was before we could get face to face, the quicker I was losing them, and they were shutting down. Everything I worked to build was going away.
"He died alone in a house."
Adams is glad to be with one of the few agencies that decided to return to in-person visits.
"A lot of people feel forgotten because their teams aren’t there anymore," he said. " A big part of me didn't care about the COVID anymore, and I just had to see them face to face."
People who have lost their jobs, their businesses or who are under other financial stress are especially vulnerable to feeling depressed or even suicidal, Youssef said.
So are first responders — who tend to have higher rates of mental health issues.
A study published Aug. 13 found increased levels of anxiety and burnout among medical workers and that health care workers, on average, reported 30% more symptoms of depression, enough to be clinically diagnosed.
Even those who are not experiencing pressing financial or mental health issues face a constant barrage of news and social media feeds that can increase anxiety and exacerbate mental health problems, Youssef said.
"It is triggering and can be very overwhelming."
Wisconsin data shows a geographic and racial disparity
Simmone Kilgore, a Milwaukee-based trauma therapist with seven years of field experience, said the geographical disparities in the Milwaukee region are the result of disinvestment, particularly in Milwaukee County’s Black communities.
Her assertion is buttressed by data from the state health department that indicates Black residents in Milwaukee County account for roughly half of the users of mental health services, despite making up less than a third of the population.
“There's racism, poverty and not enough services to help those in need,” Kilgore said. “The numbers have gone up because violence has gone up, racism is loud, education is low (and) finances are low. Anytime you find resources reduced in areas, crime goes up, mental well-being is at play. As long as our communities are seen as not as important, that is affecting our mental well-being.”
Milwaukee’s history of segregation and its rank as one of the worst places to thrive as a Black person helps explain the disproportionate use of services by Black residents, she said.
RELATED:UWM study on the state of Black Milwaukee describes the city as 'the epitome of a 21st century racial regime'
“With that being Milwaukee's foundation and that undercurrent of racism — and with 2020 bringing the pandemic and the political climate — the normal pressures that Black folks are under every day have heightened exponentially.”
The repercussions of George Floyd's killing at the hands of Minneapolis police and subsequent protests have been exhausting for Black and brown communities, Kilgore added.
“Constantly explaining to white folks why (protests) are necessary, it's too much and it adds an added pressure and added burden to the fight.”
Sheri Johnson, the director of the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Population Health Institute and a psychologist since 1991, said the pandemic’s disproportionate effect on Black and Latino communities will likely push mental health calls from those communities even higher.
"When you consider the ways that the pandemic has disproportionately affected communities of color and frontline workers, it’s important to understand that the pandemic is another layer of stress on communities that were already experiencing a tremendous amount of stress and disadvantage,” Johnson said.
And once the eviction moratorium ends on Dec. 31, the anticipated wave of evictions — which have historically hit Black and Latino households hardest — will only increase the likelihood of trauma and the need for mental health care, especially among children, she said.
Still, the increase in calls isn’t necessarily a bad thing and could be the result of targeted campaigns to improve mental health literacy, increase awareness about trauma and reduce stigma, Johnson said.
“I do think it’s a good sign, both that people are feeling comfortable and safe enough to request and access mental health services..”
Along with having clients as part of her regular practice, Kilgore participates in the Milwaukee Office of Violence Prevention’s ReCAST Program, which assists families and neighbors after a traumatic event. She said the influx of calls she has received this year reveals a need for more clinicians of color.
“We as Black therapists in Milwaukee are receiving calls on top of calls,” she said.
And those in need are seeking “specialized help from culturally relevant, culturally competent professionals in the field.”
What you can do to help yourself
People stressed out by politics or social media often need to step away from those sources of anxiety, Youssef said.
“I think I would say the best thing ... is don’t watch the news or don’t watch so much of it," he said. "If a person can try to disengage from social media, at least if they are not doing well or anxious and depressed, I think that’s best."
Support systems are helpful. Try to connect with people via phone or video conference and seek solace in meditation, prayer and other spiritual activities, he said.
Adams, the peer support specialist from Our Space, is seeing a therapist himself and encourages others to do the same.
"Seek some type of help, don't be afraid to ask," he said. "Reach out for support and don't bottle up all of the fears."
For those displaying serious signs of depression, Youssefsaid, there are always ways to find help. "If somebody is really suicidal, call the suicide hotline, call 911 or go to the emergency room."
Black women, in particular, need to let go of a deeply cultural archetype that encourages them to sacrifice their own mental and physical well-being to be everyone’s caretaker, Kilgore said.
“Give the Black superwoman a goodbye ceremony,” she said. “It's OK. It doesn't make you any less important, supported or valued.”
And remember: Self-care starts with your very first thoughts of the day.
“When you get up in the morning, stand up to greet yourself," Kilgore said. "Stop getting out of the bed with the mindset of, ‘What do I have for people all over the world today?’ Your first duty and your first concern is to self.”
Resources
Crisis Lines
- City of Milwaukee Office of Violence Prevention number: (414) 286-8553
- Milwaukee County 24-hour crisis line: (414) 257-7222. When needed, a mobile team can meet adults and adolescents anywhere to talk and connect them to resources.
- National Suicide Prevention hotline: (800) 273-8255
- Pathfinders 24-hour line for youth in crisis: (414) 271-1560
- National Domestic Violence Hotline: (800) 799-7233
- HOPELINE: For emotional support, text "Hopeline" to 741-741
Other
- Our Space Inc.: (414) 383-8921
- Impact 211 Guided Mental Health Search
- Milwaukee County Safety Net Clinic 2019 Referral Directory
- The Asha Project resource for victims of interpersonal violence
- Prevent Suicide Greater Milwaukee resource list
- Milwaukee Health Department: Domestic Violence & Sexual Assault Resources
- Sixteenth Street Community Health Centers: Call (414) 672-1353 to set up an appointment with a mental health provider
- National Alliance on Mental Illness: COVID-19 Resource and Information Guide
- Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration resources for first-responders
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention wellness resources for first responders
- A filterable list of racially diverse and LGBTQ-responsive psychologists in Milwaukee County
Contact Talis Shelbourne at (414) 403-6651 or [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter at @talisseer and message her on Facebook at @talisseer.
How are we doing? Fill out this survey and let us know. | https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/health/2020/11/20/covid-19-pandemic-deepens-milwaukee-countys-mental-health-crisis/6077557002/ |
Still catching up on myself, this time a paper I had the pleasure of co-authoring with the excellent Veerle Nouwens, Pepijn Bergsen and Antony Froggatt. Part of a longer project we had been working on together which sought to explore the Transatlantic relationship towards China and ended up looking in some detail at the various problems that exist.
China and the transatlantic relationship
Obstacles to deeper European–US cooperation
The rise of China is one of the greatest challenges for the transatlantic relationship. European countries and the US have similar concerns over China, but fundamental obstacles hinder a more joined-up approach.
Although no longer aiming for decoupling as under the Trump administration, the US under President Joe Biden still sees itself in ‘strategic competition’ with China, while the European Commission has identified China as a ‘systemic rival’. However, differences remain between Europe and US on the scale of the challenge, and also within the EU over the desired level of economic and political engagement with China and over policy responses on the national, bilateral and global levels.
This paper presents results from a two-year joint research project by Chatham House and the Royal United Services Institute on a Transatlantic Dialogue on China. The project examined the transatlantic relationship in the context of the China challenge by looking at four different policy areas – trade and investment, digital technology, climate change and the global commons.
China is among the most complex strategic challenges confronting the transatlantic partners at this moment. Great power competition (or ‘strategic competition’ as the US is now suggesting) is not of course restricted to China. But the China challenge cuts through so many issues across domains both internal and external that it is perhaps more complex than any other.1
There are additional tensions between Europe and the US, with Washington frustrated by the European Union (EU)’s inaction on China and at times by its quest for greater strategic autonomy – a phrase that is often interpreted as meaning autonomy from the US. Notwithstanding these frictions and the systemic rivalry between Europe and the US on one side and China on the other, each side of the Atlantic is deeply intertwined with China.
From China’s perspective, the US is the principal adversary and China often tries to detach individual European countries from a transatlantic alignment. It has encouraged notions of European strategic autonomy, recognizing their potential to damage transatlantic relations, as well as finding other ways of amplifying intra-European tensions.
This briefing paper presents results from a two-year joint research project by Chatham House and the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) on a Transatlantic Dialogue on China. The project examined the transatlantic relationship in the context of the China challenge by looking at four different policy areas – trade and investment, digital technology, climate change and the global commons.2
Although it is by no means the only player on the European side of the transatlantic relationship, the EU’s leading role in many of the policy areas studied made it the main focus of the project. Underlying this choice was the acceptance that, on China, non-EU European powers (including the UK) tend towards policies that either complement the EU’s approach or align closely with the US. Where there were specific divergences or tensions (for example, around the AUKUS defence and security partnership), these were addressed in the analysis.
This paper not only brings perspectives on different but related policy challenges, it highlights several commonalities running across these areas that characterize the overall challenge for the transatlantic relationship. Given the weight and significance of China, Europe and the US, it is critical to understand how they intersect in these domains at this moment of fluidity in international relations.
The purpose of this paper is to provide analysis and conclusions from the research into these four areas within the context of European relations with China, but also with regard to how these fit into the wider transatlantic picture. The hope is that it will contribute to a better understanding of the challenges faced by the transatlantic partners.
Although the challenges in the four policy areas tend to differ, they all exist within the same context – one in which China is often seen as the West’s major adversary. This is still the case despite recent events in Ukraine, which have refocused Western attention on Russia. This sense of competition with China has been growing for some time, starting during the presidency of Barack Obama but accelerating under the administration of Donald Trump, with China (and, to a certain degree, Russia) becoming the central concern of national security policy under his presidency. In March 2019 a joint communication from the European Commission on EU–China relations identified China as a ‘systemic rival’, followed two years later by the UK’s Integrated Review, which referred to China as a ‘systemic competitor’.3
This sharpening of the discourse around China reflects two views in the West. First, the shedding of the notion that China might move towards Western norms as it becomes more prosperous and economically liberal. Rather, China under Xi Jinping is now seen as an increasingly disruptive and assertive power in international affairs, while the space for political discourse within China is closing. Second, the sense that China increasingly sees the world in a purely competitive light, focusing on becoming the dominant power in its region and eventually further afield. Chinese political visions like Made in China 2025, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) or the China Dream all articulate a notion of Chinese supremacy and centrality in the global system, or, at the very least, a sense of China as a strong and independent power. Even Western voices that articulate a more nuanced view on Chinese power projection see a strong sense of competition underpinning Beijing’s thinking.
The current US administration of President Joe Biden has retained a broadly antagonistic approach to China in almost all policy areas, while placing a greater emphasis on working together with allies than its predecessor. EU–China relations have deteriorated at the same time. An example of this has been the failure to move forward the ratification of the so-called Comprehensive Agreement on Investment between the EU and China, signed in late 2020 and seen initially as a snub by the EU towards the incoming Biden administration. Mutual imposition of sanctions has stalled the agreement’s ratification by the European Parliament. European powers had already expressed concern about human rights abuses in Xinjiang and restrictions on political freedoms in Hong Kong, leading to strong support for US sanctions against China. Beijing reacted with counter-sanctions, including some targeting members of the European Parliament and academics based in Europe. Policy on all sides – including in China – is, if not explicitly pushing towards a complex and costly decoupling, shifting towards greater economic self-reliance. Bifurcation in technology (and other) standards will further exacerbate the development of separate international blocs.
China is also increasingly seen as an aggressive military power. China’s military development has accelerated as it tries to live up to the demand by President Xi that the People’s Liberation Army be able to fight and win wars. This is not necessarily a statement of aggression, but a clear articulation of a need to improve capabilities. At the same time, confrontations with India, incursions into Taiwan’s air defence identification zone (ADIZ), a growing external military presence, increasingly aggressive action at sea and dual capabilities in outer space all point to a China that seeks to present itself as a significant global military power. The US has long confronted Beijing militarily, but European powers are now increasingly eager to deploy their seafaring capabilities in Asian waters. This stance is a demonstration of both support for allies in the region (including the US) and of a growing willingness to confront China.
This is the wider geopolitical and geo-economic context in which Europe, the US and China currently operate, setting up a complicated triangular relationship between the three powers. Geopolitical trends are pushing Europe and the US closer together, in large part due to a growing disconnect and divergence of worldviews with China. Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 has further complicated the situation, with likely ramifications for all the policy areas considered in this paper. The EU and the US responded rapidly and largely in unison through coordinated sanctions on Russia and broadly similar approaches. Meanwhile, China has so far remained equivocal and, at times, has appeared to support Russia.4
However, there are areas in which cooperation is not only possible but essential. Climate change is recognized as one of the greatest challenges facing humanity. Without joint action and cooperation, it will be impossible to avoid the potentially catastrophic warming of the planet. Similarly, global pandemics will be hard to manage in a decoupled world, and a divided global economy is likely to be a less prosperous one overall.
Transatlantic divergence and convergence
In this wider context, there are numerous structural issues which create tensions across the Atlantic and complicate efforts to develop a coherent perspective on China. At the same time, there are several areas of clear convergence – most obviously the long-standing close security links (exemplified by NATO), and the deep economic interlinkage. But there are also divergences, often driven by internal policy disputes within Europe and the US. There is an overarching assumption that Europe and the US – as close liberal and democratic partners in contrast with autocratic China – should have the same strategic and geopolitical ambitions, and should seek close cooperation to that end. However, transatlantic divergence and convergence on China are visible across the four policy areas examined in this paper. The nature of great power or strategic competition has meant that Beijing and Washington’s view of one another has had a greater impact on their policy direction than transatlantic coordination. In Europe, the China challenge remains further down the agenda than in the US, and responses are often hindered by a lack of agreement within the EU.
Significant differences in perspective remain between Europe and the US, and also within Europe, when it comes to economic policymaking in response to the rise of China. The variations in economic exposure to China (see Figure 1, which shows European countries’ goods trade with China before COVID-19-related disruption) go some way to explaining these differences, particularly among EU member states. While all EU countries import significant quantities of goods from China, some member states have more at stake than others in terms of exports and investments. Germany is the bloc’s largest and most powerful member state, and also the most economically interwoven with China, both in absolute and relative terms. This complicates the EU decision-making process. Furthermore, interest in courting inward investment from China varies strongly between EU member states. While most Western European member states have become increasingly sceptical of Chinese investment – as this is seen to be driven in part by China’s desire to gain access to critical technologies – some Eastern European member states have continued to court inward investment from China, often with disappointing results.5
Figure 1. European countries’ goods trade with China, 2019
Some of the resulting dynamics have been seen recently in the spat between Lithuania and China over Lithuania’s recognition of the Taiwanese representation in Vilnius.6 China retaliated with economic measures, and threatened others doing business with Lithuania. Although the EU did file a case against China at the World Trade Organization (WTO), the initial response from the German business lobby was to put pressure on Lithuania to reconsider its actions.
There are also clear differences within countries. Those EU member states that are most deeply integrated with the Chinese economy, like Germany, remain hesitant to take a more confrontational approach.7 While the US approach generally has been confrontational, including under President Biden, the American financial sector is one of the main examples of an industry actually increasing its exposure to China.8 The market opportunity in China remains large enough to create divisions between those in Europe and the US seeking to profit from it and those looking to push back for either economic or political reasons. Often this is seemingly strategically driven by Chinese policy, as the Chinese government in recent years both opened its financial sector for US firms and reduced joint-venture requirements in the automotive sector; the latter with the intent of attracting German carmakers to invest even more in China.9
In the realm of economic policy, and the economic challenge posed by China, the differences between the transatlantic partners are in the perceived scale of that challenge but also in how Europe sees itself in relation to both China and the US. Although the EU has begun talking about China as a ‘systemic rival’ as relations with China have moved up the agenda, it has mainly responded with a series of relatively small policy interventions, aimed at reducing or removing distortions to the level playing field in its single market. These measures have included, for example, investment screening mechanisms, rules on public procurement, a stronger focus on industrial policy and pursuing concessions from China on reciprocal market access. In contrast, for the US, the rivalry with China has become almost a defining feature of its policymaking. Although economic decoupling has become a less overt objective under Biden, policy has not changed to any significant degree compared with the Trump administration.
Differing attitudes on both sides of the Atlantic towards the future of the global economic governance system form another major obstacle to a more coordinated transatlantic response to the economic challenge from a rising China. While the EU has sought to sustain the global multilateral trading system, the US has put it under pressure by undermining the WTO’s dispute settlement system.10 A similar split has been visible over how to engage with China through multilateral financial institutions and the extent to which both the EU and the US have been willing to engage with new, often China-led institutions such as the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). The BRI has also proved contentious, with some European countries – mainly in Central and Eastern Europe – actively engaged with the initiative. In contrast, the US has sought to engage European partners in its own competing initiatives, such as the soon to be rebranded Build Back Better World (B3W) Partnership.11
Transatlantic cooperation in many of these areas is as difficult to achieve as a broader European strategy. This is because European thinking is often defined as aiming to achieve economic sovereignty not just in relation to China, but also the US. In many ways, this stance is not dissimilar to US policies aimed at bolstering ‘America First’, but within Europe internal competition between member states adds a further layer of complexity.
Beyond being significantly closer to each other in terms of values, Europe and the US are also more deeply economically interlinked than China is with either party. Although both the US and the EU import significant amounts of goods from China, other measures of economic interconnection show a much stronger transatlantic bond. For instance, despite a significant increase in Chinese investment in Europe during the past decade, the amount of inward investment in the continent from China is still dwarfed by that from the US (see Figure 2).
Figure 2. Sources of foreign direct investment stock in Europe, 2019
Companies and private sector representatives in both the US and EU have increasingly voiced frustration with Chinese economic practices such as forced technology transfers, intellectual property protections, unfair competition from Chinese state-owned firms and unreciprocated market access. However, the lure of the Chinese market, and even of cooperation with Chinese firms, remains strong enough for them to keep their criticism modest.
There are also similarities to be found in terms of policies enacted on both sides of the Atlantic. Policies enacted by the EU as part of its so-called toolbox, such as investment-screening, an anti-coercion instrument and export controls, are comparable to efforts in the US. These provide potential for transatlantic cooperation, through information-sharing or shared action. For example, one of the working groups within the EU-US Trade and Technology Council is on export controls.12 While this also suggests some cooperation on industrial policy – particularly with regard to the challenge from China in areas such as artificial intelligence (AI) and electric vehicles – there remains more competition in this area than cooperation. This is highlighted by the fierce competition between European and US firms to attract semiconductor manufacturing capacity in the wake of the global shortages in this sector since the COVID-19 pandemic.
The increasing realization of the scale of the China challenge in Europe and the much closer and historic interlinking of transatlantic economies, together with a decrease in transatlantic tensions under the new US administration, have led to more cooperation between the EU and US. This is, for example, apparent in the newly created EU–US Trade and Technology Council (TTC), an attempt to develop a structure for transatlantic coordination in the key area of technology. While the aim of the TTC is far wider than solely policy towards China, it speaks of encouraging ‘compatible standards and regulations based on our shared democratic values’. The TTC plans joint work and cooperation on norms in a series of important technological areas (such as AI). It should be noted that, despite all this work, the remit of the TTC is largely limited to coordination. A return to something like the failed negotiations on the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) – an attempted EU–US trade agreement in 2016 – remains highly unlikely.
The importance of the China challenge is also visible in the EU’s overt attempt to compete with the BRI through its Global Gateway plan.13 As with the US-led B3W initiative, it remains to be seen whether Global Gateway will be substantial enough to have any real economic or geopolitical impact, as no new resources have been made available for it. Closer cooperation between the EU and the US has also yet to lead to any significant shared efforts to boost the influence and effectiveness of multilateral economic and financial institutions; the US is often behind the increasing ineffectiveness of those institutions and presents a stumbling block to reforms that the EU would prefer to pursue, for instance in case of the WTO.14
There is a general agreement on both sides of the Atlantic about the importance of digital technology, as highlighted by the creation of the TTC. It remains to be seen to what degree the TTC achieves its goals, but its existence – as well as the desire to focus on technology and the continued veiled references to China and Chinese investment in its published materials15 – all highlight the desire of the EU and the US to at least focus discussions on the topic. It is also clear that, via purchases of Western technology firms and other overt or covert methods, China is strengthening its own capabilities – something that European powers are becoming increasingly aware of and are expressing concern about. There are, however, numerous fissures between the EU and US which suggest that the TTC will face challenges in trying to develop a coherent transatlantic approach towards China in the digital and technological domain.
The first issue is the way in which broader geopolitical tensions and relations affect internal European politics. Broadly speaking, Central and Eastern European countries view the relationship with the US as essential and as the key bulwark against Russian aggression – a fear that has become more acute in recent years and particularly amid the Russia–Ukraine conflict. This means that those countries are keen to pursue policies closer to those of Washington than to the views of either Brussels or larger member states. This divergence was most apparent during the Trump presidency, when Central and Eastern European countries were among the most supportive of the push from the US administration to remove Chinese technology from European digital infrastructure. This view was in contrast to that from Western European capitals such as Berlin, London or Paris, where there was a desire to constrain rather than to block Chinese technology. Larger member states have sought a balanced relationship with Beijing partly due to their economic interests, which echo through the digital and technology spaces, and partly to different geopolitical views.
Figure 3. Chinese technology projects in the EU, EFTA and UK
While France and Germany view the transatlantic security alliance as crucial to their security and prosperity, there is also a strong desire in those countries to emphasize European (or, rather, national) strategic autonomy from the US. At the same time, the view in Central and Eastern Europe is not universal, with some countries like Hungary placing a premium on the relationship with Beijing – a stance which, to some extent, is guided by the significant Chinese digital and technological investment in Hungary.16 This investment is also visible in the larger EU member states, which have welcomed Chinese participation in research and development as well as other key digital and technological domains (see Figure 3, which shows the number of individual Chinese technology projects in each European country). These countries are keen to retain such investments – in some cases because companies might go out of business if Chinese investment was not forthcoming and also because Western governments do not necessarily see a value in underwriting those companies. This desire to maintain inward investment flows creates a natural point of influence for China within Europe, but also counteracts attempts in Europe to present a more aggressive front against China on technology in particular.
Within the transatlantic alliance too, there is an inherent tension caused by competition and cooperation. Western governments may currently favour cooperation to confront the challenge posed by China, but this is not always the case among private companies, and each side of the Atlantic is likely to favour its own businesses. Ideas for joint US and European support for Western companies that can become ‘champions’ in technologies currently dominated by Chinese firms do not appear to have been taken forward.
Companies themselves do not always have the same interests as their host governments and tend to be more agnostic in their political views. Their desire to access large markets like China means they may be more inclined to seek engagement. Vast parts of tech supply chains are linked to China, while Western tech companies sell considerable volumes of goods in the Chinese market. This makes the technology space an inherently difficult one for Europe and the US to control and hinders any joint effort to force companies to comply with an anti-China stance.
This tension between private and public sector interests runs through the entire digital and technology space. Within China to some degree it is more coherent, though often the West underestimates the tensions within the Chinese system – most recently evidenced by the clampdown on social media and tech companies within China.17 This development reflects a desire by the Chinese government to bring the sector under tighter state control, in part due to many of the same concerns around data protection that exist elsewhere, but also out of concern over the immensely powerful structures being built in the Chinese private sector, which the state fears could supplant it in key sectors of the economy. At the same time, in the West, liberal market policies make it difficult for governments to develop industrial policies that do not undermine the free-market logic underpinning the European and American economies. Given the increasing centrality of technology in daily life around the world, this dynamic will be a difficult one to manage anywhere.
At the same time, the decision to focus transatlantic cooperation in a vehicle such as the TTC reflects both the importance for the area for future growth and its role in the competition with China. Within the technology domain, the public sector largely acts as a regulator, and is crucial in determining the rules within which companies operate. This impacts everything from development and ethics to income, economic viability, employment and tax burdens. Given the size and power of the transatlantic economy in this regard, coordination affords the EU and US considerable influence in determining international technological norms.
The public sector can also play a significant role in investing in the research and development that underpins the discoveries helping to develop the digital world – though, in this area, the public sector is most usefully able to play a supportive role. Once technologies have started to achieve a certain maturity, it becomes harder for the public sector to be involved as this can be seen as distorting the market. At earlier stages of development, government can provide the investment and support that can help ideas be tested and in some cases fail. Identifying which technologies to support, and how long to continue to support them, becomes a difficult balance for government, especially when market viability in certain key technologies may only be achievable through subsidy – for example, when a much cheaper Chinese technology is widely available.
Finally, there are also normative and conceptual disputes between Europe and the US in the area of digital technology; for example, on the subjects of data privacy and regulation of online discourse. In Europe, there is a greater willingness to seek to impose restrictions, while in the US a more libertarian approach is favoured. At the same time, European approaches to personal data protection have gone much further than the US – exemplified by the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which entered into force in May 2018 and which places much greater emphasis on data managers to ensure citizens’ control of personal data. This directly contradicts the business model of numerous online firms, including that of large US social media platforms, and has caused a degree of transatlantic friction. In contrast, China has created its own legislation mirroring large parts of GDPR.
However, in terms of the openness of online discourse, and even in areas like protection of citizens’ data, Europe and the US are closer in perspective than either of those two partners are to China. In terms of developing the future infrastructure and standards of the global digital economy, Europe and the US also share more with each other than either does with China. This extends into the global institutions that shape our technological world, where there is a growing effort by both Europe and the US to coordinate efforts to counterbalance Chinese attempts to dominate and establish norms that reflect their own interests.
China, the EU and the US are the world’s three largest emitters of greenhouse gases and therefore are fundamental to global efforts at achieving a stable climate. In the US, climate change is a party-political issue, with Democrats largely favouring both national and international action – for example, Democratic President Obama signed the 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change18 – and the Republicans less committed – Obama’s Republican successor, Trump, withdrew the US from the Paris Agreement in 2020.19 To further demonstrate the partisan nature of climate change, one of the first acts by President Biden – a Democrat – after taking office in January 2021 was to rejoin the agreement. Therefore, all too often, the nature of the US’s international engagement changes every four to eight years with the election of a new president. Given the US’s importance to global efforts to combat climate change, this on/off approach creates significant difficulties for the EU and other like-minded partners, as they seek to build and maintain momentum towards more ambitious policies.
However, while the US’s international climate policy is led by the president, the ability of any administration to ratify international agreements is ultimately determined by the US Senate. This tension was demonstrated in the late 1990s when the Clinton administration signed the Kyoto Protocol20 – which was a legally binding treaty as opposed to the non-binding Paris Agreement – but never submitted it to the Senate for ratification. Efforts at international cooperation therefore face further uncertainty, as not only does the US climate position depend on whether a Democrat or Republican is in the White House, but also whether the executive and legislative branches of US government are politically aligned.
Climate change is considered an important issue by the incumbent Biden administration, as demonstrated by its hosting of the Climate Leaders Summit in April 2021.21 John Kerry, the Special Presidential Envoy for Climate, has invested considerable time and effort into engaging with China, resulting in the signing of a joint declaration on enhancing climate action at the UN COP26 climate summit held in November 2021.22 While the declaration does not bind either party to new targets, it does provide a platform for further cooperation between the US and China.
China is important to global diplomacy on climate change, owing to the scale of its emissions and to its manufacturing capabilities, being the world’s largest producer of solar and wind equipment.23, 24 Furthermore, China has significant geopolitical and economic influence, particularly in developing countries and those countries that are signed up to BRI.
Individual EU member states have enacted their own climate mitigation plans, carbon-pricing and cooperation agreements with third countries. The EU has been consistently supportive of more ambitious climate action, although Central and Eastern European member states tend to be less enthusiastic. During negotiations between member states on the latest 2030 carbon reduction plans, Poland, alongside like-minded states, sought to ensure that the upcoming reform of the EU carbon market would increase financial resources dedicated to supporting the transition in Central and Eastern European member states. Despite these divisions, under the current presidency of Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission has made climate change a high priority, with increased funds and more ambitious emissions reduction targets. In the approach to COP26, the Commission raised the climate mitigation target to greenhouse gas emissions reductions of at least 55 per cent by 2030, up from 40 per cent as initially proposed in the Paris Agreement.25
Climate change is recognized as one of the most important – if not the most important – global challenges of our time. Emissions primarily from the burning of fossil fuels and land-use changes are increasing the concentration of greenhouse gases (carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxides and fluorine gases) in the Earth’s atmosphere, resulting in a higher planetary temperature. If emissions continue to rise, then the consequences of the associated increasing global temperature will be catastrophic for humanity. The most recent IPCC report said that: ‘[i]t is unequivocal that human influence has warmed the atmosphere, ocean and land’, which is ‘already affecting many weather and climate extremes in every region across the globe’.26
Greenhouse gas emissions have the same impact regardless of where they are released. Therefore, without common action, it is impossible for any country or individual to be unaffected. Given the clear and uncontested view of the causes – and, increasingly, the impacts of climate change – global and coordinated action needs to follow.
There is no doubt that unless China and the US – and, to a lesser extent, the EU – take ambitious climate action, meeting agreed targets will be extremely difficult, if not impossible. Joint actions will also both make the transition cheaper and more rapid and will remove much of the uncertainty about decarbonization. Therefore, an overarching cooperative approach to climate change is clearly not only mutually beneficial but essential. It demonstrates the necessity of a cooperative approach between China, the EU and the US, and also of common approaches between the G20 countries and with developing countries, emissions from which in many cases are rising rapidly.
The war on Ukraine and consequent economic sanctions imposed on Russia have affected global prices for fossil fuels, and have raised concerns in Europe particularly over energy security. The implications for climate change are unclear, as the EU seeks to accelerate the transition towards greater use of renewable energy and increased energy efficiency, in order to reduce its dependence on Russian-sourced coal, oil and gas. This may in turn lead to the export of more Russian fossil fuels to China. The US is also anticipating increased exports of its gas to the EU, further changing the geopolitics and financial flows of the global energy sector.
In Europe, the EU and its member states (as well as most non-EU countries) have signed up to the major global regimes governing the seas and oceans, including those covering the Southern Ocean and its seabed and outer space. However, national economic interests, as well as intra-European political disputes, have led to a fractured European response on a range of issues that extend beyond the long-standing concern over China’s human rights record. These include, among others, technological cooperation with China on outer space and arbitration on disputes in the South China Sea. On the latter, for example, Greek and Hungarian objections to an EU statement in support of a 2016 ruling by the Permanent Court of Arbitration, against China’s maritime claims in the South China Sea, were criticized as being motivated by those countries’ dependence on Chinese inward investment.27 Croatia also reportedly raised concerns over the statement, owing to its own maritime boundary disagreement with Slovenia, for which the court ruling would have set a precedent.28
As in other areas of policymaking, intra-European governance structures hamper coordination. In the example of outer space, European policies have been overwhelmingly driven by individual member states and their national space agencies. To an extent, these agencies are brought together in the European Space Agency (ESA), but this organization itself is separate from the EU. While the EU has sought to streamline its space policy via the EU Space Programme for 2021–2027 and its new EU Agency for the Space Programme in order to be able to compete with China and the US, it remains unclear how these initiatives will reduce the influence of national interests in the decision-making process.29 Indeed, while the EU seeks to establish its own space industry and strategic position, France reiterated in March 2021 that it would continue to work with China bilaterally in outer-space exploration.30 Similarly, the ESA continues to support China’s space exploration programme.31 Media reports suggest that France and the ESA were exploring opportunities to work with China and Russia on their future lunar base, although it remains uncertain whether this was indeed the case and how Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine will affect long-term interest in such cooperation.32 Potential economic opportunities in the space industry have further driven European companies to cooperate with their Chinese counterparts, despite growing concerns of European governments over Chinese dual-use capabilities and strategic objectives in outer space. The private sector provides an example of the difficulty of building deeper transatlantic cooperation, despite pre-existing comprehensive links between Europe and the US and long-standing messaging from the US over its concerns regarding European space cooperation with China, in particular the sharing of sensitive technology.33 However, the commercial opportunities to advance European space technologies and companies, and to create security supply chains to help enable strategic autonomy, also drive a sense of competition with the US.34
The economic dimension of countering China’s challenges in the global commons can also be seen in the maritime sector. For example, in 2021, German sales of engines were reported to have helped to modernize the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy fleet, despite widespread concerns in Europe and the US over both Chinese military modernization in general and China’s assertiveness at sea in waters beyond its national maritime jurisdiction.35
However, there are also more deep-rooted challenges in the differing European and US interpretation of norms, particularly with regard to outer space. While the EU recognizes outer space as a global common, recent US administrations have mainly sought to protect American national interests in this new frontier. In 2015, the Obama administration enacted the US Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act, which included Title IV on Space Resource Exploration and Utilization to defend US investments in outer space resource-extraction.36 In 2020, Trump signed an executive order stating explicitly that outer space is not viewed by the US as a global common. Furthermore, the US has embarked on its own regime for conduct in outer space through the creation of the Artemis Accords, an initiative which so far has received the support of 19 other countries, including seven European states, with France becoming the 20th state to join the accords in June 2022.37
Despite their differences over governance of the global commons, there is also a great deal of alignment between Europe and the US. This is particularly evident in the maritime domain, despite the US’s continued refusal to ratify the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) due to long-standing domestic political opposition. Concerns cited by opponents include possible infringements on US sovereignty through restrictions on its access to marine resources and legal obligations to accept the jurisdiction of an international body over disputes concerning US resources and territory.38 However, the US has consistently abided by UNCLOS as a matter of customary international law.39 It is also worth noting that not all states that have ratified UNCLOS – including European states – share the same interpretation of its various rules, and that such differences have not obstructed their relations with other countries.40
Increasing interest in the Indo-Pacific from European states, as demonstrated by recent naval missions in the South China Sea, shows a shared concern over Beijing’s attempts to rewrite the rules of maritime law in its own region. In 2019, the E3 – France, Germany and the UK – issued a joint statement expressing support for UNCLOS and the 2016 PCA Final Ruling on the South China Sea, and noting their concern over destabilizing activities that were not in line with international maritime law. This was followed in 2020 by a note verbale to the UN.41 In 2021, France, Germany and the UK separately announced that they would send warships to the South China Sea and the Indo-Pacific region in an effort to underscore the importance of international maritime law and the principle of free passage; the UK’s deployment of its Carrier Strike Group included a US ship and a Dutch ship, as well as US F-35 jets.42
Transatlantic cooperation in the governance of outer space is likewise moving forwards. A UK-led UN resolution on norms for conduct in outer space received support from both European states and the US. Cooperation is also being advanced through the ESA, plus government-to-government and commercial channels. While the Artemis Accords have not yet been fully subscribed by EU countries, the ESA and NASA have signed a bilateral memorandum of cooperation on joining ‘the first human outpost in lunar orbit’ by contributing service modules and affording ESA the opportunity to send European astronauts to the outpost.43 NATO is also considering the strategic use of space: in 2019, it adopted a new Space Policy and declared space an operational domain. In 2020, NATO established a dedicated space centre at Allied Air Command in Germany,44 and in 2021, it recognized that its members could invoke Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty over attacks to, from or within space.45
While Europe remains closer to the US than it is to China, and while European countries and the US share concerns over China’s economic and geopolitical rise, the transatlantic relationship is far from settled when it comes to developing a coherent response to the challenges posed by China. Obstacles to closer cooperation are present across all four policy areas explored in this project. Although this paper is far from exhaustive, it presents some of the most significant barriers to more effective transatlantic cooperation on China in several policy domains.
Competition between Europe and the US holds back deeper transatlantic cooperation across all policy domains considered. For instance, discussions in Europe on attaining strategic autonomy are often held not so much with China in mind, but the US. Meanwhile, US policy remains broadly one of ‘America First’. This rivalry continues to drive competition in trade and technology, with impacts on normative behaviour in the global commons.
Furthermore, the fractured nature of internal policymaking in the governance structures in both Brussels and Washington remains a hurdle across all of the policy domains studied. While the narrative of the past years has been a growing political consensus in numerous Western countries with regards to China, the reality is that many institutions and sectors in those countries retain different interests – whether they are in the private sector, public sector or are non-governmental in nature. For example, US tech companies continue to depend heavily on Chinese contractors and suppliers, while German automotive firms remain reliant on demand from the Chinese market. On both sides of the Atlantic, influential constituencies believe in a more moderate approach to China, would prefer engagement over confrontation, want economics to be prioritized over human rights or can see the benefits of continued engagement in such areas as environmental protection and resource scarcity.
Paralysis in policymaking is a long-standing complaint about the European and US governing structures. This does indeed place the transatlantic alliance at a disadvantage when facing China’s more top-down decision-making process. While varying perspectives can be found in the Chinese system, the central command structure is more focused and has become stronger during Xi Jinping’s presidency. For example, while European and US authorities struggle to regulate their digital sectors, there has been a dramatic regulatory clampdown on technology companies in China recently. Beijing clearly has greater capacity to bring companies to heel, compared with Western governments. Even if US and European authorities were able to agree a course of action, it is not clear that their private sectors would necessarily follow.
It is worth observing that the transatlantic partnership was able to rapidly mobilize and respond to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, suggesting that it is not impossible for Western countries to overcome internal disagreements to impose strong and punitive sanctions on an adversary. But it is not clear that China would undertake such a bellicose action as Russia’s to prompt a similar response. It is equally true that Russia’s links with the global economy are not the same as China’s. While there is still deep interdependence between Europe and Russia in certain sectors (for example, in energy), the direction in Europe at the moment is to break this dependence. Nevertheless, the key lesson here is that, in the face of extreme action, Europe and the US can mobilize rapidly, and are willing to accept damage to their own interests in advance of a common goal against an adversarial power.
Across the four policy areas, there is a significant difference in adherence to the existing global multilateral order between the transatlantic partners, as both the US and China have undermined this at certain times. This has led the EU to seek a mediating or leadership role in the policy areas of trade, digital and tech, climate change and global governance. European powers regard themselves as both beneficiaries and champions of the international order and its institutions. They also see the EU as an independent strategic actor and would rather move towards greater autonomy from the US than increase dependence. This sentiment might be stronger under some US administrations than others. But the main lesson for Europe from the Trump presidency was that the US might not always be a reliable actor and partner in international affairs. Even under the Biden presidency, the AUKUS partnership and the chaotic withdrawal of US forces from Afghanistan against European wishes appear to have confirmed the sense among certain EU countries that they lack influence over decision-making in Washington.
It is further important to consider third-party countries in all policy areas – both in Asia and elsewhere. These powers have considerable agency over the issues considered in this paper, and have their own perspectives on the China challenge. For example, Taiwan is crucial to the production of semiconductors, while Japanese and South Korean firms are at the cutting edge of many new technologies. Meanwhile, much of the developing world continues to rely on Chinese suppliers of goods due to their relatively low prices and rapid delivery – which Western companies struggle (or do not want) to compete with.
A solely transatlantic response to China will therefore leave gaps, which will make it impossible to achieve desired outcomes. Cooperation with third countries is already happening in some areas as the transatlantic partners engage more deeply with security issues in the Indo-Pacific region. But even in this case, they do not always take the wider region into account, except China and a small number of large players like India and Japan.
The current lack of trust within the international system makes good-faith engagement difficult. But it is imperative to include China in the global conversation if these problems are to be overcome. China is a now a major part of the global system and this is unlikely to change fundamentally in the medium-term.
Whether the issue is establishing rules on international technology standards, mitigating the next pandemic or governing the global commons, some level of engagement with China will be necessary. On climate change in particular, no comprehensive solution is possible without China. It may prove difficult for Western policymakers to achieve such engagement. But finding a balance between engagement, competing views within the transatlantic alliance and an increasingly assertive China will be the West’s most significant challenge for the next decade or more. | https://raffaellopantucci.com/tag/transatlantic-china/ |
As a small state in an unstable neighbourhood, Georgia faces significant external challenges to its ongoing democratisation and Europeanisation projects. The environment in its immediate neighbourhood has become increasingly unfavourable with a rise in illiberalism across the wider Caucasus, reflecting broader global trends. In recent months both the President of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, have won their fourth terms of office, whilst in Turkey, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan continues to consolidate his already strong grip on power. Armenia has provided a small ray of democratic hope after Serzh Sargsyan was forced to resign as the newly installed prime minister in Armenia (after two consecutive terms as president), following the #RejectSerzh movement and widespread popular protests.
These illiberal trends, combined with the region’s complex geopolitics, threaten to undermine Georgia’s domestic democratic consolidation and thwart its European ambitions. This necessitates a delicate balancing act, reflected in the dynamics at play in its foreign policy: on the one hand, a pragmatic approach is very much in evidence, demonstrated by its growing trilateral cooperation with Azerbaijan and Turkey, and attempts to re-engage Russia. On the other hand, this pragmatism is balanced by a continued emphasis on the country’s Europeanisation, including a commitment to democratic values and the pursuit of closer ties with European organisations such as the EU and NATO. This enduring tension in foreign policy between pragmatism, which emphasises material interests, power and the pursuit of the national interest, and idealism poses a challenge for many states as they attempt to balance their declared ideals with other areas of policy such as economic statecraft and security policies. The authoritarian environment in Georgia’s immediate neighbourhood makes the pursuit of such a balance even more challenging. This paper explores the growing trilateral cooperation between Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey against the backdrop of Georgian efforts to construct a new regional identity for itself. | http://gip.ge/rock-hard-place-georgias-regional-balancing-act/ |
Turkey and the Gulf states once again f-ind themselves sha-ring similar concerns as Europe deals with one of its worst security crises of recent times, which could have repercussions far be-yond its eastern borders.
It is a given that the escalating tensions in Eastern Europe not only affect the countries directly involved, but might also have consequences for nations in other regions.
The current political and security concerns pose both opportunities and challenges for Turkey and the Gulf countries as they attempt to tread a fine line between the major powers and their rivalries.
The new geopolitical environment dominated by the tensions between the West and Russia pushes both Turkey and the Gulf states to delicately and diplomatically balance their relationships with both sides and calibrate their policies accordingly.
To protect their stakes, and even their spheres of influence, both Turkey and the Gulf nations must carefully use diplomacy and dialogue as a means to deescalate the tensions between the major powers, at a time when the Middle East has seen a period of relative calm thanks to the recent climate of reconciliation. Turkey and the Gulf states have carefully considered the changing signals from Washington and the transformation of the international context, and are thus revisiting their policies toward each other and compartmentalizing their relationships amid the geopolitical tensions.
When Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu visited Bahrain this week he emphasized the areas of cooperation between Turkey and Gulf nations. In a further sign of a new era in Turkish-Gulf relations, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan stated that he will visit the UAE in mid-February and that he intends to visit Saudi Arabia as well.
The current geopolitical context resembles the post-2003 regional landscape, in which Turkey and the Gulf states utilized diverse tools and policies to counter the common threats they faced due to the shifts in the balance of power in the region between both major and regional powers.
Converging interests and mutual concerns are now the driving force that is motivating Turkish-Gulf reconciliation amid escalating tensions around their neighborhood. The crisis in Eastern Europe has raised concerns that it might further aggravate the ongoing instability around the world, particularly in the Middle East.
“Turkey and the Gulf st-ates have carefully conside-red the changing signals fr-om Washington and the tra-nsformation of the internat-ional context, and are thus revisiting their policies to-ward each other.” Sinem Cengiz. This crisis, which is causing divisions within the international community, comes at a time when there is an urgent need for international cooperation to tackle global problems.
The tension between Russia and the West over Ukraine has dominated the global foreign policy agenda for weeks. Experts are trying to understand how this crisis might affect other regions, and how countries in those regions might respond or play a role in the crisis.
Given the importance of Ukraine and the clash of interests it represents, the latest crisis there will undoubtedly have fallout in the Middle East, including in Syria, which is common ground for Turkish-Gulf cooperation. The nature and scope of this fallout will be determined in part by the direction the crisis takes.
It would not be wrong to also consider the nuclear negotiations with Iran, an arena in which both Russia and the US are deeply involved, as another area for which the current crisis might have implications. The energy sector is another area in which the concerns of Turkey and the Gulf states converge.
David Pollock of the Washington Institute has suggested that the direct connections between the Middle East and the crisis in Eastern Europe are, upon closer examination, relatively few and far between, paraphrasing Rudyard Kipling’s words by saying: “Europe’s East and the Middle East: Never the twain shall meet.”
Turkey and the Gulf states have built close relationships with both the US and Russia in many areas and so they try to avoid becoming involved in any tensions between these major powers. They have long balanced their interests between West and East and settled on pragmatism as an influential way to continue the cooperation.
It therefore goes without saying that Turkey and the Gulf states are dismayed by the escalating tensions between Russia and the West, and have issued statements calling for diplomatic solutions to the Ukrainian crisis.
Turkey and the Gulf st-ates have almost always be-en surrounded by conflicts in their immediate neighborhood. In recent times t-hese have included the Gulf War in the early 1990s and the conflicts in Syria, Yem-en and Palestine. They still face conflicts that are yet to be resolved in their immediate vicinity, not least the one in the Eastern Europe. As the relationships betwe-en the world’s great po-wers and energy consumers change according to their contradictory interests, the challenge for Turkey and the Gulf states of deciding how to navigate geopolitics becomes highly important.
The post Bonds between Turkey and Gulf states strengthen appeared first on The Frontier Post. | https://khyberpass.org/bonds-between-turkey-and-gulf-states-strengthen/ |
Turning the EU’s “geopolitical awakening into a more permanent strategic posture” – this is how the EU’s High Representative Josep Borrell announces the “Strategic Compass”.
The European Union has adopted its “Strategic Compass for Security and Defence” (SC). The document is result of a long process of consultation ad decision-making. The Council of the European Union has established an according task force in in June 2020. A classified Threat Analysis was concluded in November 2020, identifying the “threats and challenges” the EU will face in the next 5 to 10 years.
Member states led a strategy debate during the first half of 2021, followed by a workshop developing a draft text of SC. The European Council and all of its member states approved the final text on March 21, 2022.
The result claims to be a guiding text for the European Union’s perception of global politics and thus deserves a close look. The recent eruption of conflict in Ukraine is all over the Strategic Compass. But more than changing the odds, it serves as an illustration for an already given perception and positioning.
End of hegemony
The European Union concedes the end of the hegemony, which had been established after the Cold War. Several aspects lead Strategic Compass to this conclusion.
The document reminds that after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, a vision of “effective multilateralism” was prevailing (Strategic Compass – SC, p. 7). In this context, Western countries were able to pursue their interests via international organizations such as the United Nations, using these to globalize their actions including military interventions, change of borders or dissolution of states. Western interventions in Yugoslavia, Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya were all – to a different degree – were accompanied by supporting UN resolutions and missions.
This system is substituted by a “return to power politics”, says the Strategic Compass (SC – 7). This is of course an evaluation of others: Western countries have since the end of the Cold War well referred to “historical rights” when claiming that states such as Yugoslavia and Syria were established on “artificial grounds” or with artificial boundaries; have established “zones of influence” when the European Union introduced membership accession procedures, deeply intervening into Eastern European countries’ domestic affairs; and have “weaponized soft power” when “development assistance” or recently Covid-19 vaccines were delivered based on political and economic conditionality.
But today, the European Union detects a return to power politics when other actors refer to historical rights, establish zones of influence and weaponize soft power. Their politics is thus presented as “promoting a strict sovereignist approach”. The main actors of reference here are Russia, China and Turkey. But implicitly, the Strategic Compass also has tendencies such as the “Global Britain” after BREXIT, the Trump administration with its emphasis on nationalism instead of multilateralism or the rising nationalist tendencies of politicians such as Le Pen in mind.
The end of globalization
The liberal theory of international relations and its mıst recent child, the theory of globalization had claimed that economic interdependence between countries would lead to global peace. That was one of the basic arguments to open up national borders both in terms of economic policy concerning capital flows as well as in regards to supranational integration and promoted migration.
The European Union’s Strategic Compass now detects that “After three decades of strong economic interdependence which was supposed to decrease tensions” power politics return again (SC, 5). Interdependence today is “increasingly conflictual” says the compass.
This is not just a theory-related acknowledgment. It includes that consciously created economic dependencies do not serve the desired political outcomes on the adversaries any more, as the failure of sanctions regimes in Cuba, Iran, Venezuela and recently Russia well display.
This statement also refers to the growing global economic crisis, where a lack of growth leads to increasing null-sum-equations: The conflicts arise from the interdependence itself.
“Contested multipolar world”
The European Union concludes the existence of a “contested multipolar world” (SC, 8), another confirmation of the end of unipolar hegemony. The EU is “surrounded by instability and a war on its borders” (SC,8). “Armed aggression, illegal annexation, fragile states, revisionist powers and authoritarian regimes” surround the EU, states the compass (SC, 8) as well as terrorism violent extremism, hybrid conflicts, irregular migration are some of the challenges.
The European Union clearly prepares for great power competition and will not at all take a step back from “defending our interests and values”. “Our security is at stake, at home or overseas. We need to redouble our efforts to implement an integrated approach to security, conflicts and crises”, says the compass (SC, 12)
The EU’s primary adversaries are Russia, China and Turkey.
Adversary: Russia
For the High Representative of the EU, Josep Borell the Ukraine crisis has provided that “History is accelerating once again”. What has accelerated in his words is the EU’s actions, which have “broken several taboos along the way” by imposing sanctions, financing delivery of military equipment to a country under attack “for the first time ever”, and building an international coalition.
Russia’s military operation in Ukraine is considered as “undermining European and global security” and the rules-based international order. In other words, a direct challenge to what is left from the Western-centered international system.
But the conflict with Russia is not limited to Ukraine. Russia’s activities in Libya, Syria, Central African Republic and Mali are also evaluated by the Strategic Compass as “a long-term direct threat for European security”, which will be responded to “resolutely” (SC, 7).
The prize of the 21st century: China
For the Strategic Compass, the People’s Republic of China is the main prize. It “tends to limit access to its markets and seeks to promote globally its own standards”, criticizes the compass (SC, 8) and demands a greater share of Chinese wealth.
China’s integration into the world “will mark the rest of this century”, says the European Union, and announces in an unprecedented way its imperialistic demand that this shall happen in a way that does “not contradict our interests”.
China’s military development and involvement in “regional tensions” is noted as “impacting regional and global security”.
Turkey: provoking and acting unilaterally
The third adversary is Turkey, which is made responsible for tensions in the Eastern Mediterranean due to “provocations and unilateral actions against EU member states” (SC, 9).
Turkey is called to “advance on a path of cooperation, sustained de-escalation and to address EU concerns”, but the country is not named as a partner in the summaries of the compass (SC, 42).
Main scope of activity: Europe’s neighborhood
The Strategic Compass detects “a new strategic landscape”, and in spite of some statements concerning China and the Indo-Pacific, it is mainly focused on Europe’s wider neighborhood. This turns the European Union into more a regional than global power.
The Western Balkans in terms of security and stability, the eastern neighborhood from Moldavia over Ukraine to Georgia, the southern neighborhood with a focus on Syria, Libya and the Sahel as well as the Eastern Mediterranean are the regions which the Strategic Compass focuses on. This is reflected in both the textual attention given to them as well as the military means which are announced by the decision and which will be discussed in the next article.
Reinforcing the Transatlantic Alliance
With Russia, Turkey and China as adversaries, and the European neighborhood as regional focusi the European Union reinforces the Transatlantic Alliance with the United States and NATO as main pillar in its strategic outlook. This can even be interpreted as getting behind the US as far as the race for China and the Indo-Pacific is concerned.
The partnership with NATO is called “essential for our Euro-Atlantic security” (SC, 39), and the “strategic autonomy”, which the compass shall “enhance”, is “complementary to NATO”, with both going “hand in hand” (SC, 13). Though, as will be shown in the next part, some frictions appear in military planning.
Still, the EU demand more joint EU-NATO high-level meetings to improve political dialogue, “shared situational awareness”, increased parallel and coordinated exercises and military mobility between the two organizations.
The partnership with the United States is considered “of strategic importance” and shall be deepened, declares the Strategic Compass (SC, 42). This is followed by an emphasis on cooperation with Norway and Canada (SC, 46), while the EU declares “to remain open to engage with the United Kingdom” (SC, 46).
In Africa, cooperation shall be advances with the African Union, the ECOWAS and the Sahel G5, while no specific country is mentioned in terms of bilateral engagement.
Europe’s limitation of regional scope is best reflected in Latin America: No Latin American multinational organization is mentioned at all as cooperation partner, and as bilateral partners, only Colombia and Chile get a mentioning from a whole continent (SC, 43).
In summary, the European Union acknowledges the rise of a multipolar world and focuses on its immediate neighborhood as far as security and defense is concerned, while announcing to reinforce the transatlantic alliance globally.
In the next article, we will explore the military and security vision of the European Union as expressed and decided upon in the Strategic Compass. | https://uwidata.com/24581-european-union-acknowledges-contested-multipolar-world/ |
Let me begin by extending my heartiest congratulations to the National Defence College on its completing 60 years. This is indeed a momentous occasion and a proud moment for all participants, faculty members as well as alumni of this illustrious institution. In the last 60 years, the NDC has truly emerged as a center of learning and excellence. It has played a major role in shaping the minds of leaders in the armed forces as well as in the civil services. It is heartening to note that the alumni of this college have held very high ranking positions in the armed forces and the civil services not just in India but in several countries across the world.
2. I am of the view that inter-linkages between diplomacy, security and strategy, academia and policy are fundamental to shaping our world view and overall external engagements. Regular exchanges among all the above mentioned key stakeholders are an important part of that exercise. The National Defence College provides a useful platform for these exchanges.
3. The topic for today – “Leveraging Strategic Autonomy in a Turbulent World” – is an extremely important one in the present context. The concept of “strategic autonomy” is a function of the prevalent structure of the international order making it a more relative concept as opposed to an absolute one. In today’s multipolar world, all countries are, at some point or the other, susceptible to external pressures.
4. The international global order as we see today is a sum total of tectonic shifts. The two World Wars, the Cold War phase, post-Cold War era, the breakup of the erstwhile Soviet Union, the emergence of new countries in Eastern & Central Europe, the rise of Asian economic giants, Brexit, and other such watershed events have shaped the contours of the global order.
5. As a result, the world around India changed fundamentally in the last few decades. It is also evident that the structural change that shaped the global order was predominantly a result of the shift in the economic balance of power. In addition, new and emerging issues threats from terrorism, cyber security, climate change and pandemics called for India to adjust its policies to the new realities. Our strategic autonomy thus necessitated the association between an autonomous foreign policy and security decision making capability and the preservation of material assets, both technical and economic.
6. In this changing environment, our focus has been to further our national interests while also contributing to the global good. We have retained flexibility and decisional autonomy in pursuit of the first objective. We have deepened cooperation with our traditional partners. At the same time, we have widened our outreach and forged new partnerships. The second aspect of our global engagement has seen India emerge as a responsible and constructive actor on the world stage. India is an active participant in the global conversations on climate change, terrorism, connectivity and maritime security. As a responsible global power, India has co-founded institutions such as the International Solar Alliance and the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure to bring about greater cooperation in renewable energy and disaster preparedness and relief.
7. In recent years, India’s role in our extended neighbourhood has been that of a “net security provider”. Net security does not have to be seen in the context of hard security. We have been at the forefront of extending humanitarian assistance in natural disasters such as earthquakes, cyclones and floods to name a few. In the wake of the COVID crisis our repatriation flights brought back not only our citizens but also citizens of other countries. Net security also means cooperation with our neighbours in the Indo-Pacific region on maritime security, including anti-piracy, maritime surveillance, responding to maritime pollution etc..
8. We have developed our unique way of sharing developmental experience with partner countries. This has projected Indian capacities and conveyed our strategic intention – to be a force for good – in multiple geographies around the globe.
9. The Covid-19 pandemic is the most catastrophic event after the 2nd World War. It is therefore inevitable that we will experience a different world in the post-pandemic era. We are in the midst of trying to cope with the new reality of going virtual in our day to day life. At the international level, it has uncovered the vulnerabilities of nations and showed us the real manifestation of the practice of international relations. While there is a strong intent to cooperate, the need to retain strategic autonomy is even greater. The last few months thus have been an attempt to first, deal with the domestic situation; and second, look for ways to cooperate.
10. We had a proactive domestic response in dealing with the pandemic and its challenges. We substantially expanded our capacity in the healthcare sector and also channeled our public resources to this critical sector for the development of hospitals, emergency rooms, provision of equipment and supplies and training of healthcare professionals. In addition, our Prime Minister enunciated a forwards looking economic approach under the rubric of Aatmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyaan (self-reliance) with announcement of stimulus packages of nearly USD 270 billion. Structural reforms and relief measures under the Abhiyaan cover small farmers, migrant workers and labourers, agriculture, the MSME sector, small businesses, start-ups, industrial infrastructure, health care and education to name a few. In today’s world, building at least some domestic capacities for critical supplies – and contributing to a diversification of global supply chains – is also a manifestation of leveraging strategic autonomy.
11. India has played a leading role in initiating and encouraging global conversations on evolving a coordinated response to the pandemic. Further, living up to the teaching of “Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam” (the whole world is one family), India played an instrumental role in enhancing global health security by ensuring supply of essential medicines even while meeting its own domestic requirements. We provided medical supplies, in the form of essential drugs, test kits, protection gear etc. to over 150 countries, and are extending medical assistance under grants-in-aid to over 80 countries; we sent rapid response medical teams to help Maldives, Kuwait, Mauritius and Comoros deal with the pandemic; and we dispatched naval assets to deliver COVID related assistance to Maldives, Mauritius, Madagascar, Comoros and Seychelles. We have also successfully brought back over 1.8 million Indian nationals stranded abroad due to COVID-19 pandemic under the Vande Bharat Mission.
12. The global economic fall out of the pandemic will continue to remain a challenge for us in times to come. As we saw during the 2008 global recession, economic setbacks of this magnitude require a carefully deliberated approach. The breakdown of the global supply chains has, perhaps for the first time, led us to think and explore alternative possibilities. India’s view has been to look at this challenge not as a constraint but as an opportunity for our economy as well as for rebalancing in the international system.
13. In this situation of crisis, India has sustained the momentum with respect to its global engagements. We have recognized our strengths to work towards deepening our economic cooperation while keeping our strategic autonomy intact. We recognize the value of profitable economic convergence and the need to diversify as the need of the hour.
14. A positive reflection of this approach was evident during the recently concluded Virtual Summits held at PM level with Australia, Denmark, EU and Sri Lanka. Further, the second Australia-India-Japan-United States consultations on regional and global issues of common interest brought like-minded countries together to coordinate responses to the various challenges that the pandemic has brought to the fore. This is only a small part of India’s outreach efforts. We have extensively used the virtual mode to sustain communication with our friends and partners.
15. India assumes membership of the UN Security Council next year. We remain committed to upholding a rules-based international order, underpinned by the rule of law, transparency, freedom of navigation in the international seas, respect for territorial integrity and sovereignty and peaceful resolution of disputes. Our objective remains advancing the security and the economic interests of all countries.
16. The UN Security Council dynamics have changed considerably over the last decade. As a rule abiding democracy and positive contributor to the security of the global commons, India aims to bring innovative and inclusive solutions to foster development. Reformed multilateralism is going to be a top priority for us.
17. India has been a supporter of a fair and inclusive WTO, World Bank, IMF and a significant player in the digital taxation negotiations. While there is a new plurilateral space that has opened up for engagement, it is clear that we need to carefully analyze our approach keeping in mind the merits and values of strong bilateral engagements.
18. I would like to once again thank the National Defence College for giving me this opportunity to participate in the diamond jubilee seminar. I convey my best wishes once again to all participants and alumni of the college for a very bright future. I am sure that under the leadership of the Commandant Air Marshal D. Choudhury the college will continue to flourish and attain new heights. | https://foreignaffairs.co.nz/2020/11/06/mil-osi-asia-pac-foreign-secretarys-address-on-leveraging-strategic-autonomy-in-a-turbulent-world-at-the-diamond-jubilee-seminar-of-the-national-defence-college/ |
- Abstract: The challenges of the era of interdependence will constitute the greatest foreign policy test of the 21st century. The war over globalization and interdependence is at an end. Only the battles are yet to be fought. Those who cower behind walls of fear and fail to accept responsibility do so at their own peril, and will not turn containment into engagement, or mutual assured destruction into mutual assured prosperity. The approach of the new millennium finds us at the intersection of three epochal events: in politics, the end of the Cold War; in economics, the emergence of a global economy; and in technology, the rise of the Information Age. The intersection of economics, strategic issues, and political concerns is creating the glue which will bind together an updated U.S. foreign policy. Vast opportunities lie before us, and more than a few pitfalls. We face fewer serious military threats but an increasing number of competitors. The rise of competition, the need to create new opportunities, and the confluence of major economic and political changes create a need to intensely focus on U.S. priorities and goals. Despite this urgency, we have yet to fully articulate a foreign policy that matches the era in which we now live, especially the appropriate role of international economics. We need to direct our focus toward the lessons we have learned over the past five years. Seekers of universal truths or simple catch phrases should prepare in advance for disappointment. U.S. leadership in both the public and private sectors must accept the challenges represented by these enormous changes. Our willingness to take responsibility, clearly define our goals, and recognize our limitations but pursue U.S. leadership at every opportunity will dictate the success or failure of promoting a stronger United States and a less dangerous world. The goals and objectives are clear: U.S. leadership must pursue peace, stability, economic progress, basic human rights, and sustainable development. In order to address these goals we need to create foreign-policy tools and institutions that are pragmatic, practical, and resilient reflecting the speed with which events, opportunities, and challenges now confront us as a nation. There is no question that global economics has fundamentally changed the nature of foreign policy. Today, economics and foreign policy are no longer separable, and economic security and national security have become synonymous. We live in an interdependent, globalized world. No longer are we self-contained, nor is it in our interest to be so. We can no longer take for granted our global economic dominance and turn our back on foreign markets. It is self-defeating in the short run and impossible in the long run to ignore the problems which occur across the border or across the world, and we cannot overlook our responsibility as the world's remaining superpower. Driven by technological change, freed of Cold War conflicts and connected by economic and strategic interests, the era of interdependence demands negotiation, engagement, and leadership. Interdependence dictates that our foreign policy and economic future are increasingly connected to international trade. Interdependence dictates that terrorism, weapons proliferation, environmental concerns, the drug trade, and economic opportunity are now cross-border issues. These issues profoundly affect the everyday lives of people around the globe. Cross-border issues directly influence policies, laws, and regulations of the countries in question, raising issues such as the rule of and respect for law, regulation and deregulation, privatization, and other concerns heretofore thought to be strictly internal. This new era requires a redefinition of global leadership. Being the only remaining superpower does not simply mean that we are the strongest military power, nor does it mean only that we are the most economically competitive nation on earth. Both of those statements are true, of course. But holding the position of the world's only remaining superpower in the era of interdependence means that we have the opportunity to take advantage of the vast economic potential which is being created around the globe to the benefit of all Americans, and we have a corresponding obligation to rally other nations to pursue common long-term interests, such as strategic and political stability, economic progress, and sustainable development. There are other examples which support the notion of new multidimensional international relations. Brazil has dramatically increased its international standing and influence using its potential economic strategic position. During the Cold War and prior to the dramatic growth of economic power and industrialization, Brazil's strategic position would have been defined and dictated by its ability or inability to have an influence over strategic and political issues especially those concerning East-West relations. But today, and in the foreseeable future, not only do countries increase their influence based on economic potential and achievement, but economic considerations and relationships tend to bring entities together which in other circumstances could not or would not cooperate. The recent Middle East Economic Conferences and the participation of China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong in the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) are obvious examples.
- Topic: Foreign Policy, Cold War, Diplomacy, Political Economy
- Political Geography: United States, China, America, Taiwan, Asia, Brazil, Democratic Republic of the Congo
- Author: Stephen S. Cohen, Michael Borrus
- Publication Date: 11-1997
- Content Type: Working Paper
- Institution: Berkeley Roundtable on the International Economy
- Abstract: At the October 29, 1997, summit meeting between President Jiang Zemin of the People's Republic of China ("China") and President Bill Clinton of the United States, President Jiang announced his government's commitment to join the Information Technology Agreement ("ITA") and thereby eliminate China's tariffs on semiconductors, computers and other information technology products. President Jiang also agreed that, in the context of the negotiations concerning China's accession to the World Trade Organization ("WTO"), China would make further substantial tariff reductions.
- Topic: Science and Technology
- Political Geography: United States, China, Asia
- Author: Dieter Ernst
- Publication Date: 01-1997
- Content Type: Working Paper
- Institution: Berkeley Roundtable on the International Economy
- Abstract: The "China fever" that has raged through the Japanese industry over the last few years, has drastically changed the locational patterns of Japanese investment within East Asia. The share of China in the investment of Japanese electronics firms abroad has increased by leaps and bounds: from the measly 0.6% of 1990 ( the year after the Tianmen massacre), it has now reached almost 7%, catching up fast with the 7.7% share of ASEAN.
- Topic: Industrial Policy, International Trade and Finance
- Political Geography: Japan, China, Israel, East Asia, Asia
- Author: Xiangli Sun
- Publication Date: 06-1997
- Content Type: Working Paper
- Institution: Center for International Security and Cooperation
- Abstract: This paper focuses on the impact of a comprehensive test ban on China's nuclear program and security policy. After a general review of China's nuclear doctrine and development, the study analyzes the relationship between China's nuclear strategy and its desire for testing, and explores the reasons China decided to join the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. By comparing the maturity of the nuclear programs of the nuclear states and the degree of their preparations for a cessation of nuclear tests, this paper concludes that a comprehensive test ban would place greater constraints on China's nuclear program than on those of the others. Efforts such as a deeper reduction of the nuclear arsenals of the principal nuclear powers, a no-first-use commitment by all nuclear states, and the adherence to the ABM treaty by its signatories would be critical to reducing China's concerns. The progress of international arms control negotiations in the above directions would further encourage China to make even greater contributions in the field of global arms control in the post–comprehensive test ban era.
- Topic: Security, Arms Control and Proliferation, International Cooperation, Nuclear Weapons
- Political Geography: China, Asia
- Author: Brian L. Job, Frank Langdon
- Publication Date: 10-1997
- Content Type: Working Paper
- Institution: Kellogg Institute for International Studies
- Abstract: This paper deals with the history, formation, and objectives of APEC. It describes the tensions between the Anglo-Saxon and the East Asian APEC members and the clashes of interests between the large and small and developed and less developed nations, which show how precarious the formation of APEC was. Within the short term APEC does not seem destined to become an overarching regional, political, security, and economic institution. Indeed, certain forces within the region, such as increased arms acquisitions in some states, friction arising over trade disputes, protectionism, and investment flows, and tension between China and Taiwan, could hinder the objectives of the organization. It remains possible that the very process of finding common ground through APEC may contribute more to fostering community and to ensuring security in the region than the proposals actually agreed upon by all member nations.
- Topic: Economics, International Organization
- Political Geography: China, Europe
- Author: Rick Hermann
- Publication Date: 02-1997
- Content Type: Working Paper
- Institution: The Mershon Center
- Abstract: My first cut at the hierarchy of driving forces ranks Israeli-Palestinian bilateral factors as the most important and regional and global factors as secondary. Competition between global powers (USA, Russia, China) is currently not intense. None of them see the bilateral Israeli-Palestinian conflict as instrumentally critical to their broader strategic competition with each other. None see their security as centrally tied to this conflict, and, consequently, while interested not even the United States will commit enough resources at this point to overturn the forces driving the bilateral bargain. Competition among regional states is substantial, but the conflicts that do not involve Israel do not involve states powerful enough to project their competition into the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. For example, Iranian v. Turkish, or Iranian v. Saudi Arabian, or Syrian v. Iraq, or India v. Pakistan might tangentially connect to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, mostly in the realm of rhetoric and symbol manipulation. None of these states, however, are strong enough to see the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as an instrumental regional manifestation of their broader strategic conflict. The primary determinants of the Israeli-Palestinian negotiation process in the short-term are the conflicting ambitions and calculations made by Israelis and Palestinians. Forces at the global and regional level will affect these bargaining calculations, (affecting both relative coercive leverage and positive reassurance) but they will not impose additional sources of conflict. My examination of global and regional forces, will follow my construction of the primary bilateral dynamic. I do not think global and regional factors will upset the short-term prediction I will make for the bilateral Palestinian-Israeli relationship. They may play a big role in shaping longer-term predictions.
- Political Geography: Russia, China, Iraq, Middle East, Israel, Syria
- Author: K.C. Fung, Lawrence Lau
- Publication Date: 04-1996
- Content Type: Working Paper
- Institution: Asia-Pacific Research Center
- Abstract: There are huge discrepancies between the official Chinese and U.S. estimates of the bilateral trade balance. The discrepancies are caused by different treatments accorded to re-exports through Hong Kong, re-export markups, and trade in services. Deficit-shifting between China, on the one hand, and Hong Kong and Taiwan, on the other, due to direct investment in China from Taiwan and Hong Kong, is partly responsible for the growth in the China United States bilateral trade deficit.
- Topic: International Political Economy, International Trade and Finance
- Political Geography: United States, China, Taiwan, Asia, Hong Kong
- Author: Donald Emmerson, Henry Rowen, Michel Oksenberg, Daniel Okimoto, James Raphael, Thomas Rohlen, Michael H. Armacost
- Publication Date: 01-1996
- Content Type: Working Paper
- Institution: Asia-Pacific Research Center
- Abstract: Since the end of the Cold War, the power and prestige of the United States in East Asia have suffered a worrisome degree of erosion. The erosion is, in part, the by-product of long-run secular trends, such as structural shifts in the balance of power caused by the pacesetting growth of East Asian economies. But the decline has been aggravated by shortcomings in U.S. policy toward East Asia, particularly the lack of a coherent strategy and a clear-cut set of policy priorities for the post-Cold War environment. If these shortcomings are not corrected, the United States runs the risk of being marginalized in East Asia--precisely at a time when our stakes in the region are as essential as those in any area of the world. What is needed, above all, is a sound, consistent, and publicly articulated strategy, one which holds forth the prospect of serving as the basis for a sustainable, nonpartisan domestic consensus. The elements of an emerging national consensus can be identified as follows:
- Topic: International Relations, Security, Foreign Policy, Economics
- Political Geography: United States, China, Israel, East Asia, Asia
- Author: Michael May, Michael Stankiewicz, Edward Fei, Celeste Johnson, Tatsujiro Suzuki
- Publication Date: 08-1996
- Content Type: Working Paper
- Institution: Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation, University of California
- Abstract: Since 1993, the Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation (IGCC), a state-wide policy research institute of the University of California, has coordinated a series of high-level, track two consultations among security experts and officials from China, Japan, North and South Korea, Russia, and the United States. Known as the Northeast Asia Cooperation Dialogue (NEACD), this forum has sought to reduce mistrust within the North Pacific region, and to avert conflicts among the major powers in Asia through ongoing, multilateral dialogues about current security issues. The informality of the process allows the participants to air their concerns and brainstorm about new approaches to building cooperation and reducing the risk of conflict in Northeast Asia.
- Topic: Conflict Prevention, International Cooperation, United Nations
- Political Geography: Russia, United States, China, Asia, Korea, Northeast Asia
- Author: Ralph A. Cossa
- Publication Date: 08-1996
- Content Type: Working Paper
- Institution: Institute for National Strategic Studies
- Abstract: The political, economic, and security environment of the Asia-Pacific region in the 21st century will be shaped in very large part by the interrelationships among the United States, Japan, China, and Russia. To the extent these four nations can cooperate, a generally benign environment can develop in which the challenges sure to develop in the region can be managed. Conversely, tensions and conflict among the four will have a profoundly destabilizing impact regionally, if not globally. | http://www.ciaonet.org/catalog?f%5Blocation%5D%5B%5D=China&f%5Bpublication%5D%5B%5D=&page=238&search_field=all_fields |
Building resilience into biotech supply chains: 'COVID-19 will not be the last major crisis of the 21st century'
Writing in the ‘Beyond Borders: EY biotechnology report 2022’, EY analysts note the pandemic has prompted greater government involvement in supply chains – and it expects to see this involvement deepen in the future. Drug production – and the associated supply chains – could see a move away from complex global networks to more localized ones.
So what will this look like in practice? Future models are still evolving – and biotech companies and governments need to communicate to come up with the most resilient ones, say the analysts.
Increased focus on supply chain security
Despite great concern, the biotech industry ‘largely met’ the challenges posed to the supply chain over the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, in contrast to other industries which experienced significant disruptions.
“While there were reported shortages of certain raw materials and consumables among biotechs (such as the sterile filters used in biological drug manufacturing), very few products have been unavailable during the crisis,” notes the report. “In fact, within the US, issues have been reported for less than 1.5% of the more than 20,000 FDA-registered prescription drugs in 2020 and 2021.”
However, the pandemic did increase the focus on the security of the supply chain, as well as drawing more attention from policymakers.
“A yearlong review of US public health supply chains, published in February 2022, reaffirms the Biden administration’s ongoing efforts to encourage domestic production and innovation, develop redundancies and ensure that diversification within drug supply chains continues.
“The EU has made similar moves, with its Pharmaceutical Strategy for Europe adopted at the end of 2020 aiming to “develop the EU open strategic autonomy and ensure robust supply chains.”
In an effort to effectively monitor its supply chains, the EU has imposed temporary vaccine export restrictions to secure supplies of vital medicines, assessed stockpiles and built regional capacity via its Health Emergency Preparedness and Response Authority (HERA).
“These moves toward greater governmental involvement in supply chains are likely to continue.”
From local to global and back again
The last few decades has seen an increasingly globalized shift of biopharmaceutical supply chains. Driven by anxieties over the security of national drug supplies, however, a reversal may be under way: with increased localization of supply chains and a greater emphasis on regional or national self-reliance.
“Other macro factors fueling this shift include the changing globalization model wherein global trade agreements are declining in relevance in favor of increased regionalized trade and bilateral agreements. The pandemic may have accelerated this trend, but as the armed attack in Eastern Europe in 2022 emphasizes, COVID-19 will not be the last major crisis of the 21st century.
"Future global shocks are likely to heighten geopolitical tensions further; whether they come in the form of future pandemic outbreaks or cyber attacks (or even cyber war), the impacts of climate change or yet unforeseen crises will impact global stability. In response, we are likely to see greater concern from policymakers about enabling supply chain resilience within their regions.”
From initiatives to mandates: Potential government involvement
Biotech companies are already taking certain measures to build resilience into their supply chains: such as implementing multi-sourcing, leveraged local contract development and manufacturing companies (CDMOs) and establishing cross-registered manufacturing sites.
Furthermore, EY suggests companies may begin collaborating more closely with nation-states to build strategic inventories or initiate public-private partnerships.
Policymakers also may actively seek to force greater localization of supply chains through measures such as R&D credits and incentives; export quotas; procurement mandates; or limitations on market access for companies without a local footprint. More radically, governments could seek to impose localization of some or all stages of the biopharma supply chain.
“The degree of logistical challenges and investment needed to make this concept a reality would depend on the scope of the effort. It would be relatively simple for a biopharma to localize secondary product packaging.
“By contrast, localizing active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) manufacturing would be a major challenge, both in terms of the scale of capital investment and the levels of technical and quality competency required.
“What would governments gain from localization? A localized supply chain would have a significant capability to respond to local conditions. However, it would entail building and maintaining infrastructure, services and talent at local sites. Separating operations from established centers of excellence in quality, process engineering, regulatory and IT operations might negatively affect supply chain reliability. There may be political benefits from localization — for example, in the creation of jobs for a local workforce — but it is unclear if these incentives would justify the effort and expenditure.”
One solution, therefore, might be a move towards hybrid models: creating a much more interactive set-up than previously seen and involving stakeholders from across the spectrum.
“Many approaches to building resiliency have been suggested, from hub-and-spoke manufacturing models to joint manufacturing or joint warehousing operations between companies, establishment of a joint procurement clearinghouse or the use of digital technology to build greater end-to-end transparency across the supply chain. Success in combining these approaches will depend on the costs and opportunities they generate for governments and companies.
“The biotech industry, policymakers and other stakeholder partners will therefore need to establish a dialogue for mutual education. In collaboration, they can adapt supply chain models to deliver the results prioritized by each partner in the future.”
The report can be found in full here. | https://www.outsourcing-pharma.com/Article/2022/07/08/building-resilience-into-biotech-supply-chains |
What is required is a global conversation to address an age-old challenge: the balancing act of modifying or dismantling existing dogma and presupposition.
These efforts must be pragmatic, holistic and sustainable.
The major issues at play and ways to resolve the tensions and differences among the countries involved.
Beijing is now seeking to turn the tide in its favor through fresh narratives centering on China’s goodwill in providing public goods for international cooperation.
A look at how the Belt and Road has put China in a more influential and favorable position than its critics would allow.
The pitfalls of a US Indo-Pacific strategy
Future leaders are likely to build a more modern Australian identity and outlook that engages patiently with, rather than fears, Asia.
The Indian “strategy of hurt” and how New Delhi managed to achieve what appears to be a strategic, diplomatic and economic success.
Asia's economies cannot sustain high growth forever, social tensions are increasing and ageing government leaders lack the capacity to cope with critical challenges.
How and why do such complex contagions spread?
The authors of two reports by the Expert Group of the International Military Council on Climate and Security in Washington, DC, highlight their key findings.
Given the challenge of finding the right drugs to treat malaria and the impact of climate change on its spread, scholars explore the malaria-cancer connection.
The economic downturn has prompted large-scale layoffs and deportations, and the unprecedented wave of returnees will have dramatic implications for national development.
The pandemic has accelerated innovation efforts and increased the willingness to conduct higher-risk experimentation. What are some potential lessons for Asia?
Yoshikazu Kato of the Asia Global Institute offers an eight-point analysis of the character, thinking, intentions and behavior of China's leader, Xi Jinping.
Examining the relationship between EU and US regulatory initiatives on Asia-Pacific IPR – and their apparent unnecessary duplication.
While their main emphasis will be on domestic regeneration, the Biden team will be prepared to work with allies to rebuild international economic cooperation.
Challenges include competing interests, friction generated by US-China rivalry, and the abiding importance states place on asserting national interests over common goals. | https://www.asiaglobalonline.hku.hk/all-articles |
JAKARTA — Nearly two decades after Indonesia’s military was squeezed out of civilian affairs with the downfall of strongman leader Suharto, President Joko Widodo is drawing the army more closely into his wars on drugs, terrorism, and corruption.
Palace and military officials say Widodo’s move is partly designed to counterbalance senior police officers who have crossed swords with him and who, critics say, are trying to undermine the agency leading the campaign against graft.
The police acknowledges “problems” in its relationship with the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK), but says it is working with the agency to tackle graft.
The prospect of a greater role for the military in civilian matters does not presage a return to the authoritarianism of army General Suharto, when it oversaw government policy as well as providing national security, the officials said.
Indeed, military chief Moeldoko has sought to quell such concerns.
“As long as the military is needed by the country to safeguard the national development carried out by ministries, then go ahead,” Moeldoko, who retires in July, told reporters this month. “But nobody should try to drag the military into politics.”
Nevertheless, critics of Widodo’s move fear it sets a dangerous precedent in a country where the military has a long tradition of involvement in politics and which directly elected a president for the first time only 11 years ago.
“While symbolic engagement with the military is important to get things done and to send a signal of stability, we’re treading a dangerous line here,” said Tobias Basuki, political analyst at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, a local think-tank.
“In the long term it will create a new Goliath within Indonesian politics if the military doesn’t steer clear of civilian life.”
A senior government official with direct knowledge of the matter told Reuters that Widodo, the first president from outside the country’s political elite or armed forces, has struggled to assert himself over the police force and its political patrons, who include senior figures in his own party.
He trusts the military more than the police, the official said, and sees it as a potentially counterbalancing force.
The army’s expansion into civilian affairs began last month, with the first major counter-terrorism operation since the response to a spate of hotel bombings in Jakarta in 2009. Anti-terrorism efforts are traditionally the domain of the police.
Approved by Widodo, who came to power in October, the military launched the six-month exercise to crack down on militants with suspected links to Islamic State.
Then, this month, the armed forces signed a memorandum of understanding to help the country’s main anti-narcotics agency with its war on drugs, a top priority for Widodo.
Government officials said they are now considering legislative changes that would allow serving military officers to work in state ministries and agencies.
The ministries of transportation and fisheries, which handle projects and industries steeped in corruption, have asked that military personnel join their staff.
“If these requests are to be fulfilled, they should not violate any law,” Cabinet Secretary Andi Widjajanto told reporters recently.
The KPK has taken the unprecedented step of seeking the military’s assistance after being severely weakened by a tit-for-tat dispute with the police.
General Moeldoko said he already had two officers in mind to join the KPK after they retired from service in a few months.
The agency, popular with ordinary citizens for going after Indonesia’s moneyed elites, hopes the military’s inclusion will protect it from police intervention.
KPK officials were not immediately available for comment.
Since the KPK declared a prominent police general a corruption suspect in January, the police has launched a series of investigations against the agency that have led to the suspension of two of its commissioners.
The KPK has since dropped its case against police general Budi Gunawan, who was subsequently named deputy police chief.
The police do not see the expansion of the military’s powers as a threat.
“We don’t at all think the military is a threat to us or our role in society. We don’t think there is any sort of balancing going on,” said Agus Rianto, national police spokesman.
He also said the police would investigate complaints of corruption made against it, and added: “To say there is a public perception that the police is corrupt is not accurate.”
Activists say allowing the military to help fight corruption may be an effective stop-gap measure to shore up the KPK, but it threatens to leave the military immune to graft investigations itself.
The military has a history of acquiring strategic assets, especially in the resources sector. Suharto was reported to have a sprawling business empire worth $15 billion when he resigned in 1998.
“The consequence is that the military will be untouchable in corruption investigations,” said Adnan Topan Husodo of Indonesia Corruption Watch. | https://www.irrawaddy.com/news/asia/indonesias-military-creeps-back-into-civilian-affairs.html |
and culture. But major development in this field happened during the Magadha, Mauryan and the Gupta Ages.
Major Characteristics of Mauryan and Gupta Administration
Kautilya’s Arthashastra written in Sanskrit from 321 to 296 B.C., is a political treatise on ancient Indian political. Arthashastra examines statecraft and put forth the theories and principles for effective governance. Kautilya was Minister under Chandragupta Maurya and thus gives an account of State administration and the rule of the Mauryan kings.
- Arthshastra’s principles of Public Administration are as follows-
- welfare orientation
- unity of command
- division of work
- coordination
- planning, budgeting and accounting
- decentralisation
- merit-based recruitment
- paid civil service
- hierarchy
- delegation of authority
- Mauryan administration had to perform two types of functions carried out by by organized and elaborate governmental machinery. They were-
- maintenance of law and order, the security of property and person and defence against internal and external aggression
- welfare services
The Mauryan king was all-powerful and everything was done in his name. The King was assisted
by the Council of Ministers(‘Parishad’) and the ‘Sabha’ of learned men. The administrative system was a close combination of military force and bureaucratic despotism. For effective governance, the Mauryan empire was divided into a 4 to 5 Provinces under the direct control of the central government through a Viceroy. The provinces, however, had “feudal-federal type” of the organisation but also had considerable autonomy. The provinces were further divided into districts and districts into villages with officials in charge at all levels. The city also had its own government with two separate courts for civil and criminal matters.
A unique feature of Mauryan administration was that the State not only performed the role of administration but also act as an agent of social transformation. A new class of officials, called ‘dharma maha mantras’ carried out the policy of moral regeneration of the people. Ashoka, one of the great Mauryan King, had set up a Ministry of Morals in this government.
Major Characteristics of Mughal Administration
- The Mughals build up a ‘monolithic administration’, with greater centralization. The Mughal Emperor symbolized the state and was the source of all power and the fountain-head of justice.
- The bureaucracy of the administrative machinery was unstable. It was not based on merit but depended on the whims and fancies of the king. Recruitment of top-level officials was majorly done on the basis of religion, caste, kin, heredity and personal loyalty to the king.
- The primary duty of the officials was to maintain law and order against internal and external aggression and revenue collection.
- Mughal bureaucracy was essentially military in character.
- Officials were called Mansabdars and were classified into 33 grades. The grades rang from Commanders of 10 to those of 10,000 soldiers. | https://www.ignounotesforias.in/historical-context-of-indian-administration/ |
According to an annual survey, the police sector is viewed as the most corrupt sector at the national level, followed by the procurement and contracting sector, the judiciary, and the education sector, in that order.
Transparency International (TI) Pakistan revealed the results of the National Corruption Perception Survey 2022 (NCPS) on Friday, International Anti-Corruption Day. This survey is the seventh series conducted over the past 21 years. The police also ranked first in the previous year’s research.
The regional breakdown of the three “most corrupt” sectors found that in Sindh, the education sector was regarded as the most corrupt, followed by the police and tendering and contracting.
In Punjab, the police again ranked first, followed by the tendering and contracting industry and the courts.
In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the court was viewed as the most corrupt sector, followed by the procurement and contracting industry and the police, in that order.
In Balochistan, tendering and contracting took the top rank, followed by the police and the court, in that order.
Justice (retired) Zia Pervez, chairman of TI Pakistan, stated that the 2022 survey had been entrusted to its partner organizations to enhance the NCPS’s legitimacy and knowledge of public survey processes.
He hoped other government ministries would use the survey’s findings to implement reforms.
“This will assist reduce corruption and improve the lives of the general public,” he stated.
45% believe anti-corruption institutions are ineffective.
At the national level, 45 percent of respondents rated the function of anti-corruption institutions as “ineffective,” not combating corruption in the nation.
In Sindh, only 35% of Pakistanis viewed the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) as a competent anti-corruption organization. In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 61 percent believed that “none of the anti-corruption institutions” were efficient in combating corruption, followed by Balochistan (58 percent) and Punjab (54 percent) (31pc).
At the national level, Pakistanis continued to believe that public service delivery was rife with corruption. According to the report, the three most corrupt public services were contracts for roads (40%), uninterrupted access to energy (28%), and access to clean drinking water (28%). (17pc).
In Sindh, Punjab, and Balochistan, citizens ranked road maintenance as the most corrupt aspect of public service delivery. In KP, most residents (47%) viewed uninterrupted power service as the most dishonest public service delivery.
Separately, the poll identified “delayed decisions” in corruption cases (31%), the manipulation of state institutions by governments for personal gain (26%), and government incompetence as the top three causes of corruption at the national level (19pc).
At 43% and 29%, the inhabitants of Sindh and Punjab viewed “the use of state institutions for personal gain by governments” as the most significant cause of corruption in Pakistan.
At 43% and 32%, respectively, in KP and Balochistan, “delay in judgements in corruption cases” was cited as the leading cause of corruption in the country.
Moreover, according to the report, 33 percent of Pakistanis believe that corruption should be penalized by life imprisonment as a kind of deterrence.
In addition, 28% believe that all government officials, politicians, military officers, and judges should disclose their assets to the public, and 25% believe that anti-corruption courts, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NAB), and the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) should hear and decide corruption cases daily and within six months.
Citizens in Sindh feel that to combat corruption. Cases should be heard daily in NAB, FIA, and anti-corruption courts and decided within six months.
Thirty-two percent of Punjab residents and 38 percent of KP residents believe corruption should be penalized by life imprisonment.
Thirty-three percent of respondents in Balochistan believed that to combat corruption, the government should immediately require all officials, parliamentarians, military officers, and judges to reveal their assets to the public.
Local NGOs are seen as efficient during flood response.
The NCPS also focused light on the terrible floods that occurred during this year’s monsoon season by emphasizing the need for transparency and accountability in using flood-related monies.
Approximately 62% of Pakistanis saw the participation of local non-governmental organizations (NGOs) during the recent floods as successful and superior.
The percentage of people in each province who believed that local NGOs performed well during the flood response was as follows: 52 percent in Balochistan, 54 percent in Punjab, 62 percent in Sindh, and 79 percent in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
In addition, an overwhelming majority of Pakistanis, 70 percent, believed that the cash was not disbursed transparently. The province split revealed that 62 percent of citizens in Punjab, 67 percent in Sindh, 68 percent in Punjab, and 82 percent in KP held this view.
Sixty percent of national poll respondents believed that NGOs’ flood donations and assistance efforts should be made more open. Sixty-four percent were from Sindh, 60 percent from Punjab, 75 percent from KP, and 40 percent from Balochistan.
In addition, 88 percent of the national people agreed that the donations and expenditures of all NGOs should be made public on their websites. It was 86 percent in Sindh, 93 percent in Punjab, 92 percent in KP, and 90 percent in Balochistan.
Lack of clarity and information
Nationally, 77% of the population considered it difficult to get public information from public authorities following right-to-information rules.
It was 87 percent in Sindh, 83 percent in Punjab, 71 percent in KP, and 68 percent in Balochistan.
This coincided with 66 percent of national respondents who believed the government did little to address their issues. At the provincial level, 57 percent in Sindh, 70 percent in Punjab, 70 percent in KP, and 67 percent in Balochistan were unhappy with the government’s response to their complaints.
Nationally, 64 percent of Pakistanis said the country had not benefited from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) arrangement.
Fifty-eight percent of Sindh residents said Pakistan had benefited from the arrangement. However, 70% in Punjab, 67% in KP, and 76% in Balochistan disagreed.
In addition, 54 percent of Pakistanis considered that news outlets’ reporting was biased. The poll revealed 61 percent in KP, and 53 percent in Balochistan believed the contrary.
In Sindh and Punjab, 72 percent and 59 percent viewed news channel reporting as biased. | https://en.baaghitv.com/according-to-a-ti-poll-pakistans-most-corrupt-sector-is-the-police/ |
Since the Maidan Revolution removed former President Yanukovych from power in 2014, anticorruption progress in Ukraine has been uneven at best. Ukraine passed important anticorruption legislation in 2015, yet implementing it has been a challenge. Progress in some areas, including the judiciary and prosecutors’ offices, have met with significant and growing resistance. Many reformers within the government have resigned. For what it’s worth, Ukraine’s Corruption Perceptions Index score has only marginally improved. Still, there has been some progress. A significant portion of Ukraine’s budget is comprised of foreign aid, and donors—who have little patience for having their money stolen or wasted—have pressed the Ukrainian government to take the fight against corruption more seriously. The biggest anticorruption reforms have therefore been the ones on which large donors made their aid contingent.
The United States is one of the most important of these donors. The U.S. sends billions in loan guarantees, military aid, development aid, and State Department spending to Ukraine. During the Obama administration, anticorruption, and political reform more generally, was a high priority for the U.S. in its relationship with the post-Maidan Ukrainian government. Former Vice President Biden emphasized anticorruption during his five visits to Ukraine, and put personal pressure on President Poroshenko to follow through on his commitments in that area. Biden also played a role in delaying one billion dollars in loan guarantees to Ukraine due to corruption concerns—an approach the IMF has also embraced. But the anticorruption strings that the U.S. had attached to foreign aid in the past were imposed as a matter of executive discretion rather than legislative obligation.
Under the Trump administration, perhaps unsurprisingly, ensuring that Ukraine follows through on its anticorruption reforms has not been a foreign policy priority. No highly visible person in the current administration has taken on Biden’s conspicuous role in ensuring Kyiv follows through on its Minsk commitments. If President Trump isn’t willing to use U.S. leverage to continue to push for anticorruption efforts in Ukraine, the U.S. Congress can and should step in by putting anticorruption conditions on at least some American spending in Ukraine. It would be difficult for Congress to write very specific anticorruption reform conditions into law, given the dynamic and fast-paced situation. If Congress, for example, enacted a statutory provision stating that “Ukraine must have passed legislation to establish an anticorruption court by August 2018 in order to receive these funds,” that legislation would quickly become obsolete. What Congress could do instead would be to enact legislation requiring that, for each line item in the budget involving a disbursement of money to Ukraine, require the implementing agency to first make a finding that Ukraine has made progress in anticorruption reform before disbursal. This is not a novel idea; in fact, it is modeled on existing limitations on funds to Ukraine. For example, Section 7046 of the 2018 appropriations bill provides $410 million for assistance to Ukraine, but specifies that no funds may be made available to a government that violates the territorial integrity of another state. (There is an escape clause out that allows the funds to be provided if the President determines that doing so is in the interest of national security.)
Direct Congressional action of this sort would send a strong signal to the executive branch departments and agencies responsible for aid disbursement that, regardless of the amount of attention the President or Cabinet-level officials pay to Ukraine, there must be pressure on Ukraine to keep making progress on fighting corruption. Congressional action could also send a strong signal to Ukraine that there is a continuing US commitment to improving the government and protecting Ukraine, regardless of who the President is.
That said, this plan does have some drawbacks. For one thing, it would impose significant, and probably unwelcome, burdens on the State Department, Department of Defense, and other implementing agencies. Policymakers might also worry that writing any specific requirement into legislation could be manipulated to unfairly reduce Ukraine’s assistance, or simply that failing to provide necessary aid to Ukraine could undermine its stability or ability to resist incursions by Russia. Making some aid to Ukraine—such as military aid and loan guarantees—unconditional, while attaching conditions to development assistance, could mitigate these concerns. Another potential problem, in some ways the flip side of the last one, is that willful implementing agencies might find ways to circumvent the limits on providing aid, perhaps simply by declaring that Ukraine has made anticorruption progress when in fact it has not. I suspect, however, that most agencies will be reluctant to lie in reporting to Congress. (If they are not, then the problem is a lot bigger than what to do about Ukraine.)
If America allows aid into Ukraine without regard to progress in fighting corruption, this could undermine hard-won Ukrainian democracy and would betray the aspirations of Ukrainian reformers. As guest poster Cristina Nicolescu-Waggonner argued in a prior post, allowing corruption to flourish undermines democratic consolidation. In light of the Trump Administration’s uncertain position on this issue, Congress should act to ensure that Kyiv continues to push forward with real anticorruption reform. | https://globalanticorruptionblog.com/2018/06/01/congress-should-act-to-make-us-aid-to-ukraine-contingent-on-anticorruption-reform/ |
Congresswoman Norma J. Torres represents California's 35th congressional district which includes Bloomington, Chino, Fontana, Montclair, Ontario, Pomona, and Rialto. She previously served as a State Senator, Assembly Member, and as a Mayor and Council Member in the City of Pomona. Throughout her career in elected office, Norma Torres has worked to make government more responsive to the needs of Inland Empire residents.
As a State Senator, Torres played a significant role in making the Affordable Care Act work for California’s patients and consumers. She led efforts to increase access to care and improve the quality of care in underserved areas. Her law to diversify the Covered California Board so that it is better prepared to enroll the uninsured earned her statewide recognition and national attention. She also championed a law to generate more revenue for programs that train and place doctors in medically underserved communities. Understanding that our healthcare system often results in many prescription drug patients paying more for treatments than is necessary, Torres passed a consumer protection law that requires health insurance companies to be more transparent in the way they present information about prescription drugs covered by their plans.
During her time in the Legislature, Norma Torres also led efforts to provide financial assistance to millions of California families negatively impacted by the great recession. As Chair of the Committee on Housing and Community Development, she led an effort that secured $2 billion in federal funds for the “Keep Your Home California” program which helped thousands of families keep their homes during the foreclosure crisis. She also passed the Homeowner’s Bill of Rights and authored legislation to accelerate the construction of affordable housing, help delinquent homeowners refinance their second mortgages, and make it easier for returning veterans to purchase homes.
Fighting crime and making sure the public safety system is responsive to the needs of the community has been a lifelong priority for Torres. As a former 9-1-1 dispatcher, she drew on her expertise to write a law that modernized our 9-1-1 system—resulting in a system that now routes cell phone callers to their local police department, rather than a statewide hotline, during an emergency. Torres also authored legislation to help prevent metal theft, keep drivers under the influence of drugs off our roads and highways, stop peeping toms from exploiting victims, and to raise fines on criminals who tamper with online data. In response to a wave of corruption in local and state government in 2013, Torres championed anti-corruption laws that will make it easier for prosecutors to convict elected officials and individuals who receive bribes or engage in other acts of public corruption.
Since coming to Congress, Torres has worked to make sure Washington is responsive to the needs of Inland Empire residents. At the beginning of her term she launched a Job Creation Listening Tour where she met with over 200 business owners, employees, education professionals, and local economic leaders to hear straight from the community how best to foster economic growth and create jobs in the Inland Empire. Upon completion of the tour, she released a report detailing her recommendations titled “A Roadmap to Economic Resilience in the Inland Empire” and has since introduced two pieces of legislation, the Regional Infrastructure Accelerator Act and the JOBS Act, based on those recommendations.
Torres immigrated to the United States from Guatemala at age five and is a longtime resident of the Inland Empire. She resides in Pomona with her husband Louis, and their sons Robert and Matthew. A proud supporter of the US military, her third son, Christopher, is a veteran of the United States Air Force. Torres received her bachelor’s degree in Labor Studies from the National Labor College in Silver Springs, Maryland. | https://torres.house.gov/about/full-biography |
Mughal Empire Essay, Research Paper
The greatest flourishing of northern Indian culture, art, and imperial strength undoubtedly took place during the reign of the Mughal monarchs of the 16th and 17th centuries. The Mughals were Central Asian descendents of the great Mongol warriors Ghengis Khan and Timur. The Mughals seized power and held on to it by using various methods. The system of government used by the Mughals was also efficent in helping the Mughals to hold on to their power. But the Mughals didn t flourish too long, after the new ruler Auranzeb took control.
The Mughal s gained power and were able to hold on to it by Akbar s expert use of diplomacy. Akbar added new territory to the Mughal empire. Along with new territory came diverse ethnicity and problems. To prevent problems Akbar secured the allegiance of the diverse populations within his empire. At the height of his political power, Akbar ended the taxes on non-Muslims and permitted Hindus to build new temples, creating religious tolerance. He also secured Hindu support by negotiating peace treaties.
The system of government used by the Mughals was very effcient in holding on to their power. Akbar divided his empire into provinces and districts, giving local governors salaries instead of land grants. This way if the officials were dependent on the central government for income, they would probably not rebel. Akbar set up an efficient tax collecting system and made an effort to ensure that it was applied fairly. Later years however, when Akabar s son and grandson ruled they increased taxes to support military campaigns.
However, the Mughals decline set stage rapidly when Auranzeb took leadership. Religious intolerance was at it s height during Auranzeb s rule. His policy caused tension between Hindus and Muslims. Hindu rulers challenged Auranzeb, he reacted by reinstating a tax on non-muslims and destroying many Hindu temples. There was constant warfare which weakened the empire. Along with constant warfare, corruption grew. The treasury was being drained by corrupt officials. The empire had no money to support a strong military, so they required heavy taxes. Which increased problems with peasants. He tried to cut non-military expenses by dismissing artists, architects, and historians. By doing this the growth of the Mughal culture stopped. Many Indian states withdrew their support or declared their independence. Auranzeb died in 1707 leaving his decendants to rule a weakend empire.
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In the second half of the 16th century, the empire came under increasing economic pressure due to rising inflation, which was then impacting both Europe and the Middle East. Demographic pressure[further explanation needed] in Anatolia contributed to the formation of bandit gangs, which by the 1590s coalesced under local warlords to launch a series of conflicts known as the Celali rebellions. Ottoman fiscal insolvency and local rebellion together with the need to compete militarily against their imperial rivals the Habsburgs and Safavids created a severe crisis. The Ottomans thus transformed many of the institutions which had previously defined the empire, gradually disestablishing the Timar System in order to raise modern armies of musketeers, and quadrupling the size of the bureaucracy in order to facilitate more efficient collection of revenues. In Istanbul, changes in the nature of dynastic politics led to the abandonment of the Ottoman tradition of royal fratricide, and to a governmental system that relied much less upon the personal authority of the sultan. Other figures came to play larger roles in government, particularly the women of the imperial harem, for which much of this period is often referred to as the Sultanate of Women.
The changing nature of sultanic authority led to several political upheavals during the 17th century, as rulers and political factions struggled for control over the imperial government. In 1622 Sultan Osman II was overthrown in a Janissary uprising. His subsequent regicide was sanctioned by the empire's chief judicial official, demonstrating a reduced importance of the sultan in Ottoman politics. Nevertheless, the primacy of the Ottoman dynasty as a whole was never brought into question. Of seventeenth-century sultans, Mehmed IV was the longest reigning, occupying the throne for 39 years from 1648 to 1687. The empire experienced a long period of stability under his reign, spearheaded by the reform-minded Köprülü family of grand viziers. This coincided with a period of renewed conquest in Europe, conquests which culminated in the disastrous Siege of Vienna in 1683 and the fall from grace of the Köprülü family. Following the battle a coalition of Christian powers was assembled to combat the Ottomans, bringing about the fall of Ottoman Hungary and its annexation by the Habsburgs during the War of the Holy League (1683–99). The war provoked another political crisis and prompted the Ottomans to carry out additional administrative reforms. These reforms ended the problem of financial insolvency and made the transformation from a patrimonial to a bureaucratic state a permanent one.
In comparison with earlier periods of Ottoman history, the empire's territory remained relatively stable, stretching from Algeria in the west to Iraq in the east, and from Arabia in the south to Hungary in the north. The pace of expansion slowed during the second half of the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent (1520–66), as the Ottomans sought to consolidate the vast conquests carried out between 1514 and 1541,[nb 1] but did not come to an end. After making peace with Austria in 1568, the Ottomans launched the 1570–73 Ottoman-Venetian War, conquering Cyprus and most of Dalmatia. A naval campaign led to the capture of Tunis from the Spanish in 1574, and a truce was signed in 1580.
Subsequently, the Ottomans resumed warfare with the Safavids in the Ottoman–Safavid War of 1578–90, conquering Georgia, Azerbaijan, and western Iran. The war resulting in the Ottomans reached its greatest territorial expansion under Murad III. In 1593 a frontier incident led to the renewal of warfare with Habsburg Austria in the Long War (1593–1606), in which neither side was able to achieve decisive victory. The Ottomans briefly held Győr (Yanık, 1594–8), but lost control of Novigrad (1594), exposing Buda to attacks from the north. By the end of the war the Ottomans had conquered the strategic fortresses of Eger (Eğri, 1596) and Nagykanizsa (Kanije, 1600). The Safavids took advantage of Ottoman distraction in the west to reverse all of their recent gains in the east in the Ottoman–Safavid War of 1603–18. After the turmoil of Osman II's regicide, the Safavids also seized Baghdad and much of Iraq in 1623, holding it until 1638, after which the border of the 1555 Treaty of Amasya was re-established. While they were occupied with the Safavid wars, an ongoing revolt of the local Zaydi Shi'ites of Yemen finally forced the Ottomans to abandon that province in 1636. The province of Lahsa in eastern Arabia also suffered from perpetual rebellion and tribal resistance to Ottoman rule, and was abandoned in 1670.
From 1645 onward the Ottomans were preoccupied with the difficult conquest of Crete from the Republic of Venice. The island was quickly overrun, but Venetian naval superiority enabled the fortress of Candia (modern Heraklion) to resist for decades. Sustained expansion in Europe was resumed in the second half of the seventeenth century, under the aegis of the famous Köprülü grand viziers. The rebellious vassal principality of Transylvania was subdued with the conquests of Ineu (Yanova, 1658) and Oradea (Varad, 1660). War with the Habsburgs in 1663-4 led to the recovery of Novigrad and the conquest of Nové Zámky (Uyvar, 1663). The conquest of Crete was finally completed in 1669 with the fall of Candia. In that same year, the Ottomans accepted the offer of the Cossack state of Right-Bank Ukraine to become an Ottoman vassal in exchange for protection from the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and Russia. This led to war in 1672–76, as the Ottomans conquered Podolia (Kamaniçe) from the Commonwealth, and to war with Russia in 1676–81, in which Russian garrisons were evicted from Cossack lands. Ottoman rule in Europe reached its greatest extent in 1682, when anti-Habsburg Hungarian rebel leader Imre Thököly pledged allegiance to the Ottoman Empire, accepting the title "King of Middle Hungary" (Ottoman Turkish: Orta Macar). Just as the vassalization of Right-Bank Ukraine had led to the Kamaniçe campaign, so too did the vassalization of Imre Thököly lead directly to the 1683 Vienna Campaign.
After the unsuccessful siege of Vienna in 1683, the coalition forces of the Holy League began to push the Ottomans out of Hungary, with most of the country having fallen by 1688. In the Treaty of Karlowitz the Ottomans accepted this loss as well as the return of Podolia to the Commonwealth. While Crete remained in Ottoman hands, Morea was ceded to Venice along with most of Dalmatia. This was the first major instance of Ottoman territorial retreat in Europe, and it prompted the adoption of a defensive military policy along the Danube River during the eighteenth century.
|Ottoman territorial evolution during the Era of Transformation|
In addition to territory under direct imperial administration, the Ottoman Empire also possessed varying degrees of sovereignty over its many vassal states. Each vassal state's relationship with the empire was unique, but typically involved the payment of tribute, military contribution, or both. Such vassals included the Danubian Principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia, the Crimean Khanate, the Principality of Transylvania, the Republic of Ragusa, various Georgian and Caucasian principalities, and, in the second half of the seventeenth century, the Cossack state of Right-Bank Ukraine and the territory ruled by Imre Thököly, known as Middle Hungary. The Sharifs of Mecca in western Arabia were also subject to the Ottomans, but neither paid tribute nor offered military forces. At times, the empire also received tribute from Venice, Habsburg Austria, Poland–Lithuania, and Russia, which made them vassals of the Ottoman Empire in theory, if not in practice. The empire's territory also included many smaller and often geographically isolated regions where the state's authority was weak, and local groups could exercise significant degrees of autonomy or even de facto independence. Examples include the highlands of Yemen, the area of Mount Lebanon, mountainous regions of the Balkans such as Montenegro, and much of Kurdistan, where pre-Ottoman dynasties continued to rule under Ottoman authority.
Due to scarcity of records and the tendency to record the number of households rather than individuals in taxation surveys, it is very difficult to determine with accuracy the population level in the Ottoman Empire. Thus rather than definite numbers, historians are more apt to demonstrate trends in population increase and decrease from region to region. It is known that the Balkans and Anatolia, like Europe, experienced a rapid increase in population over the course of the sixteenth century, increasing by roughly 60% in the period 1520–80. This growth led to population pressure in Anatolia, as the land could no longer adequately support the peasant population. Many landless peasants took up banditry as a way to make a living, or were recruited into the armies of roving Celali rebels. Controlling the bandits' activities became a major policy issue for the Ottomans, as bandit raids only worsened the agricultural situation in Anatolia. One method of control involved their recruitment into the Ottoman army as musketeers, known as sekban and sarıca. Other methods were tried as well, such as the dispatch of an inspection team in 1659, which confiscated 80,000 illegally held firearms. Following the dramatic demographic growth of the sixteenth century, the seventeenth century population was mostly stable and in some regions even declined, again relatively consistent with general European trends.
The empire's premier city was Kostantiniyye (modern day Istanbul), with a population of upwards of 250 thousand in the middle of the sixteenth century. Other estimates place it even higher, between 500 thousand and one million inhabitants. Second in size was Cairo, with approximately 400 thousand inhabitants in the year 1660. Most other major urban centers did not even approach this size. Izmir grew from a small town into a major center of international trade, with 90 thousand inhabitants in the mid-seventeenth century, while the Syrian city of Aleppo also grew from approximately 46 thousand in 1580 to 115 thousand a century later. Bursa, the main city of northwestern Anatolia and a major center for the production of silk textiles, had a population which ranged between 20 and 40 thousand over the course of the seventeenth century. Urban expansion was not universal. In the early seventeenth century, many of the cities and towns of inner Anatolia and the Black Sea coast suffered from the raiding and banditry of the Celali rebellions and Cossack raids, such as Ankara, Tokat, and Sinop.
In Ottoman Europe this period witnessed a major shift in religious demographics. Many of the cities and towns of the Balkans and Hungary became majority Muslim, including Buda, the former capital of the Kingdom of Hungary. In the Balkan countryside the rate of conversion to Islam gradually increased until reaching a peak in the late seventeenth century, particularly affecting regions such as Albania and eastern Bulgaria.
Perhaps the most significant economic transformation of this period was the monetization of the economy and subsequent transformation of the feudal Timar System. Over the course of the sixteenth century, coinage came to play a much larger role in the Ottoman rural economy, with tax payments in cash coming to replace payments in kind. As the Ottoman population expanded, the volume of trade grew and new regional markets appeared across the empire. The Timar System, which had been designed to take advantage of the smaller scale of the economy in previous centuries, was thus rendered obsolete. Timar fiefs, which were once used to support provincial cavalry forces, were increasingly confiscated by the central government to serve other purposes, a process which has been described as "modernization."
|Amount (in akçe)||Percentage|
|Standing army salaries||217.4 million||35.5%|
|Palace expenses[nb 2]||189.2 million||31%|
|Misc. military expenses||125.5 million||20.5%|
|Naval arsenal||41.3 million||6.7%|
|Construction projects||~12 million||~2%|
|Hajj expenses||3.5 million||0.6%|
|Misc.||~23.4 million||~3.7%|
|Total expenses||612.3 million||100%|
|Income||567.6 million||-|
|Balance||−44.7 million||−7.3%|
At the end of each year the Ottoman government produced a comprehensive balance-sheet depicting its revenues and expenses, giving historians a window through which to view their finances. Ottoman government income grew from 183 million akçe in 1560 to 581 million in 1660, an increase of 217%. However, this growth did not keep pace with inflation, and consequently the Ottomans experienced budgetary deficits throughout most of the seventeenth century, by an average of 14% but with much wider margins during wartime. The province of Egypt played a major role in making up the difference. Each year, after covering local expenses, that province submitted its surplus revenue directly to Istanbul. Egypt was particularly rich, and it provided approximately 72 million akçe annually, allowing the central government to meet its financial obligations. By the end of the seventeenth century, and largely a result of reforms carried out during the War of the Holy League, the central government's income had grown to 1 billion akçe, and continued to grow at an even more dramatic pace during the following period, now far outstripping inflation.
Monetization of the economy coincided with the Price Revolution, a period of inflation affecting both Europe and the Middle East during the sixteenth century. As a result, the value of the main Ottoman silver coin (akçe) became unstable, particularly after a severe debasement in 1585. The currency's instability lasted until the middle of the seventeenth century and led some regions of the empire to import counterfeit European coins for everyday use. This situation was brought under control in the 1690s when the empire carried out far-reaching monetary reforms and issued a new silver and copper currency.
Cairo, as a major entrepôt for the Red Sea trade, benefited from the emergence of Yemeni coffee as a major trading good. By the end of the sixteenth century coffeehouses had emerged in cities and towns across the empire, and the drink became a major item of public consumption. By the end of the seventeenth century approximately 4–5,000 tons of coffee was being imported into Cairo annually, much of it exported to the rest of the empire.
Trade along the maritime routes of the Black Sea was severely disrupted from the late sixteenth century by the extensive raiding activity of the Zaporozhian Cossacks, who attacked towns along the Anatolian and Bulgarian coasts, and even established bases in the mouth of the Danube in order to plunder its shipping. Likewise, merchant vessels at sea frequently became targets for the Cossacks. After the outbreak of the Khmelnytsky Rebellion in 1648 Cossack activity reduced in intensity, but remained an issue of critical importance for the Ottoman government.
European merchants active in the Ottoman Empire are by far the most highly studied aspect of Ottoman commerce, a fact which has frequently caused their importance to be exaggerated. European merchants were by no means dominant in the empire during this period, and far from imposing their will upon the Ottomans, they were required to accommodate themselves to the terms which the Ottomans set for them. These terms were defined in a series of trade agreements known as the "capitulations" (Ottoman Turkish: ʿahdnāme),[nb 3] which granted Europeans the right to establish mercantile communities in specified Ottoman ports and to pay a lower rate of tariff on their goods. European communities were exempt from regular taxation and were given judicial autonomy with regard to personal and family issues. All commercial disputes were to be settled in the empire's Sharia courts, until the 1670s when they were granted the right to appeal major cases directly to Istanbul, where they could be argued by their resident ambassadors. Capitulations were granted first to the French (1569), then the English (1580), and finally to the Dutch (1612). The arrival of Western European traders in the Levant, dubbed the "Northern Invasion", did not result in their takeover or domination of Mediterranean commerce, but it did usher in certain changes. Venice in particular suffered from heavy competition, and its commercial presence declined significantly, particularly after 1645, when the Ottomans and Venetians went to war over Crete. The English were by far the most successful European merchants in the empire during the seventeenth century, and they benefited from friendly relations between the two states. The Ottomans exported raw silk and imported cheap woolen cloth, as well as tin necessary for the production of military armaments.
While in 1550 the Ottoman Empire was a patrimonial state in which all power was held exclusively by the sultan, by 1700 it had experienced a political transformation whereby the sultan's monopoly on power was replaced with a multi-polar system in which political power was informally shared among many different individuals and factions. This process came about gradually, and was not unopposed. Certain rulers, such as Osman II and Murad IV, sought to reverse this trend and reestablish absolute power for themselves. For his efforts, Osman II became the victim of regicide in 1622, the significance of which one historian has compared to the 1649 regicide of Charles I of England.
Significant in this process of transformation were several changes in the nature of succession to the throne. At the outset of this period, Ottoman princes took up posts in the Anatolian provincial government upon reaching the age of maturity. However, Mehmed III (r. 1595–1603) died before any of his sons came of age. Ahmed I was thus enthroned as a minor, and subsequently princes were no longer sent to the provinces to govern. While the motivation behind this change cannot be known for certain, it may have been a method of preventing the type of fratricidal civil war experienced in the last years of the reign of Suleiman I. Just as princely government was abandoned, so too did the practice of royal fratricide, which had been enforced since the time of Mehmed II, fall out of use. This seems to have been a reaction to the unusually gruesome fratricides occasioned by the enthronements of Murad III and Mehmed III, in which dozens of infants and young boys were killed. The result was that the whole imperial family collectively remained in Istanbul, and sultans allowed their brothers to live in the harem undisturbed. The ultimate consequence of this was a change in the order of succession; upon his death in 1617 Ahmed I was succeeded not by one of his sons, but by his brother Mustafa I. Henceforth the general principle of Ottoman succession would be that of seniority rather than patrilineality. However, in practice this meant that sovereignty came to be viewed as something vested in the Ottoman dynasty as a whole rather than in a particular member, making the individual sultan replaceable.
The existence of multiple adult males of the Ottoman dynasty facilitated the emergence of other centers of power within the government. Two figures of particular importance were the Şeyhülislâm, or chief of the Islamic religious hierarchy, and the Valide Sultan, or Queen Mother. These two figures were able to sanction the deposition and enthronement of sultans, the former as the empire's highest religious and judicial authority, and the latter as the matriarch of the dynasty. They thus came to wield immense power, as any governmental faction seeking to control the policy of the empire required their support. Two Valide Sultans in particular dominated the seventeenth century: Kösem Sultan, mother of Murad IV and Ibrahim I, and Turhan Hatice, mother of Mehmed IV. Several sultans during this period occupied the throne while still children, and it was in their roles as regents that the Valide Sultans could become the most powerful figures in the empire.
Another locus of power was the ever-expanding imperial army, consisting of the Janissaries and Imperial Cavalry. The size of these organizations increased dramatically in the second half of the sixteenth century, with the number of janissaries increasing from 7,886 in 1527 to 39,282 in 1609. While many of these men went on to serve in the empire's foreign wars, others were janissaries only on paper, benefiting from the status they received as members of the corps but otherwise avoiding the obligation to serve in war. Such men connected the Janissary Corps with the common people, giving them a voice in politics. Protests, mutinies, and rebellions allowed the Janissaries to express their disapproval of imperial policy, and they frequently played a role in forming political coalitions within the Ottoman government. The Janissaries thus transformed from an elite fighting force into a complex hybrid organization, part military and part sociopolitical association, maintaining an important influence over Ottoman government in spite of attempts by heavy-handed rulers to suppress them over the course of the seventeenth century.
Another major development was the proliferation of so-called "vizier and pasha households" (kapı) among the political elite of the empire. The premier household in the empire was the sultan's imperial household in Istanbul, which the elite sought to emulate. Wealthy governors assembled large retinues of servants as well as private armies, forming connections of political patronage with one another. The formation of households coincided with a general increase in the wealth and power of the empire's highest-ranking provincial officials, which proved to be a mixed blessing for the central government: while the governors used their power to centralize imperial control and assemble larger armies to combat the Ottoman Empire's enemies, they also constituted more formidable foes in times of rebellion. The most successful elite household was established by the grand vizier Köprülü Mehmed Pasha (1656–1661), who used it to dominate the empire during his tenure in office, placing loyal men from his household in positions of power and authority. Men raised in the Köprülü household continued to occupy important positions in the Ottoman government well into the early eighteenth century.
The Ottoman bureaucracy (mālīye) expanded dramatically both with regard to size and range of activity. While only 38 salaried scribes were serving in 1549, by 1593 this number had increased to 183. As the Timar System was phased out of use, tax revenues which had once been distributed locally to the empire's army of feudal cavalry were now remitted to Istanbul, either through direct collection (emānet) or through tax farming (iltizām). A larger bureaucracy was thus needed in order to cope with the empire's increasingly centralized fiscal system. Bureaucratic organization was diversified, with new branches being formed and scribal duties increasingly specialized. The high quality of the Ottoman bureaucracy was underpinned by stringent standards of scribal recruitment. By the early seventeenth century the bureaucracy was moved out of its original location in Topkapı Palace, indicating that it was becoming independent of the sultan's household. It thus became a stabilizing influence for the empire; while sultans and viziers rose and fell, the bureaucracy remained in place, providing cohesion and continuity to imperial administration.
The nature of the Ottoman military shifted dramatically during this period. From its inception the Ottoman army was dominated by cavalry forces, with cavalry outnumbering infantry in the sixteenth century on a 3:1 or 4:1 basis. As a result of the empire's rapid expansion and the stabilization of its borders in the preceding period, as well as the increasing importance of gunpowder technology to military success, the empire adapted by widening the range of its recruitment in order to raise much larger numbers of infantry troops. By the 1690s, the infantry proportion of the field army had increased to 50–60 percent, equivalent to that of the neighboring Habsburg Empire. Calculations of total strength during this period remain unreliable, but it has been estimated that the average Ottoman army consisted of a core force of approximately 65,000–70,000 men from the timariots and standing army, joined also by irregular militias and the armies of the empire's vassals, with a particularly significant contribution coming from the Crimean Khanate. In general, the Ottoman army remained at least as effective as those of its European rivals throughout this period. In contrast with older historical views, which posited a failure to keep pace with European military developments, the Ottomans in fact demonstrated a significant degree of dynamism and a continued capacity and willingness to innovate and improve their military forces. Although the empire experienced significant defeats and territorial loss in the 1683–99 War of the Holy League, this was caused not by military inferiority, but by the size and effective coordination of the Christian coalition, as well as the logistical challenges of warfare on multiple fronts.
The Ottoman standing army (ḳapukulu), also referred to as the "central army", consisted of three main divisions: the infantry, known as the Janissary corps, the cavalry (sipahi) corps, known as the Six Regiments (Altı Bölük), and the Artillery corps. Unlike the provincial army, the standing army was based in Istanbul and was subject to regular training and discipline, and was paid quarterly in cash salaries. The size of the army expanded dramatically beginning from the second half of the sixteenth century, more than doubling from 29,175 men in 1574 to 75,868 in 1609. Following this growth its numbers remained relatively stable for the rest of the century. The payment of salaries to the standing army was by far the largest single expense in the imperial budget, and this growth in size was paired with a proportional growth in expenditures. By the seventeenth century the cost of the standing army could at times absorb more than half of the empire's entire central budget. As the army grew the nature of its relationship with the government began to shift, as the janissaries and cavalry increasingly became involved in imperial politics and administration.
The Ottomans possessed a distinct superiority in logistical organization over their European rivals, who were typically forced to resort to ad hoc solutions or even outright plunder in order to keep their armies in good supply. State centralization allowed the Ottomans to maintain a sophisticated system of waystations (Ottoman Turkish: menzil) across the empire, stocked with provisions for the army along their route of march. Border fortresses contained depots which could supply the army once it arrived at the frontier. This enabled the Ottoman army to largely, though not entirely, avoid having to live off the land through plunder.
In Hungary the Ottomans were primarily concerned with ensuring the security of Buda and the Danube River, which served as a critical transport route for munitions and provisions. For this purpose they constructed several fortresses along the route of the river and surrounded Buda with a ring of protective fortresses, the most significant of which was Esztergom (Estergon), which was significantly enlarged and fortified subsequent to its capture in 1543. Buda's protective ring was completed in 1596 with the conquest of Eger (Eğri) to the northeast. Subsequent to the Peace of Zsitvatorok in 1606 the pace of Ottoman fortress construction slowed as the military threat of the Habsburgs receded.
By the mid-seventeenth century Ottoman Hungary contained approximately 130 fortresses of varying size and strength, ranging from small castles of less than a hundred men to major strongholds with garrisons in the thousands. The most heavily manned were those on the border, while interior forts often contained no more than a token garrison. During the seventeenth century, Buda's garrison ranged from a low of 2,361 in the peaceful years after Zsitvatorok to a high of 5,697 during the third quarter of the century when war with the Habsburgs again resumed. By the 1660s, the total number of men serving in Hungarian garrisons reached as high as 24,000, split between some 17,450 local troops and 6,500 janissaries. These forces were supplemented by local timariots as well as the private armies of Ottoman governors. These numbers, however, constitute wartime levels. During peacetime the garrison sizes would frequently be reduced in order to cut costs. While in the second half of the sixteenth century the Hungarian fortress network was financially self-sufficient, and the local governors were even able to remit surplus revenue to Istanbul, this had deteriorated by the seventeenth century such that the administrative border of the province of Buda needed to be extended south of the Danube in order to increase its available revenue. Nevertheless, the Ottoman financial system was in better shape than that of the Habsburgs, who continually struggled to raise the revenue needed to maintain their own defense network.
Aside from periods of open warfare (1541–68, 1593–1606, 1660–4, 1683–99), the Ottoman-Habsburg frontier in Hungary was characterized by local skirmishes and small-scale conflict known as the "little war" (German: Kleinkrieg). In the absence of the imperial army, command was entrusted to the governor of Buda, who could wield significant provincial forces in the defense of the frontier. Local military ventures could occasionally lead to escalation, as in 1592-3 when the Long War was provoked by the Ottoman governor of Bosnia's conquest of Bihać.
In contrast with their Hungarian and Safavid frontiers, the Ottomans generally did not seek to expand further north from the Black Sea, being concerned primarily with its defense and the security of its sea lanes. The Ottomans maintained a series of fortresses along the Black Sea's northern shore, in the territory of modern Ukraine. Major sites were located in Akkerman, Özü, and Azak. Also of critical importance for the northern frontier was the Ottoman vassal state of the Crimean Khanate, a major power in its own right, which frequently engaged in raiding activity against the Ottomans' northern neighbors the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and Russia. Crimean raiding created a flourishing slave trade through the port of Caffa, directly administered by the Ottomans, but also created perpetual tension between the Ottomans and their neighbors.
The security of the Ottomans' northern frontier was first threatened at the end of the sixteenth century with the emergence of the Zaporozhian Cossacks as a military and political force on the Dnieper River. Theoretically under the sovereignty of the Commonwealth, the Cossacks used riverboats to enter the Black Sea and launch raids on the Ottoman coastline, becoming marauders and slavers in a manner roughly analogous to the raids of the Crimean Tatars. The Ottomans had long since suppressed all piracy in the Black Sea, the ports of which they entirely controlled, and were thus completely unprepared for the irruption of the Cossacks. By 1614 they were targeting the northern shore of Anatolia, where major towns were sacked and burned, including Sinop, Samsun, and Trabzon. Ottoman exasperation over the Cossack problem resulted in worsening relations with the Commonwealth, and the two countries went to war in 1621 and very nearly again in 1634 and 1646. Countermeasures were developed in order to limit the damage the Cossacks could cause; by the 1620s the Ottomans had established tighter control over the mouth of the Dnieper, preventing large flotillas from passing into the sea, and naval squadrons were established to patrol for raiders.
The Commonwealth had little ability to control the activities of the Cossacks, and in 1648 Ukraine descended into chaos with the Khmelnytsky Uprising, whereby the Cossacks sought to overthrow the control of the Commonwealth and establish an independent state. War continued for nearly twenty years, leading to the intervention of Russia and Sweden, among others. In 1669 Cossack Hetman Petro Doroshenko turned to the Ottomans, offering his state of Right-Bank Ukraine as a vassal in exchange for protection from the Commonwealth and Russia. The Ottomans accepted his offer, seeing this as an opportunity to bring an end to perennial Cossack raiding and to shore up the defenses of the northern frontier. Following a Commonwealth attack on the Cossacks, the Ottomans went to war and in 1672 conquered the fortress of Kamianets-Podilskyi, known to the Ottomans as Kamaniçe. Peace was signed in 1676, whereby the Ottomans annexed the province of Podolia. The Ottomans thus acquired a strong foothold from which to increase their control over the Cossack state, and shortly thereafter established garrisons in the major towns of Ukraine, clashing with the Russians and expelling them from the traditional Cossack capital of Chyhyryn in 1678. Kamaniçe remained the bulwark of the Ottoman northern frontier throughout the War of the Holy League. With a garrison of over 6,000 men and 200 cannons, it was one of the most heavily defended fortresses in the Ottoman Empire. Despite continuous attempts by the Commonwealth to blockade and besiege the city, Kamaniçe managed to hold out throughout the war, and in accordance with the Treaty of Karlowitz was returned to the Commonwealth in 1699 without having been conquered.
Although the Ottoman army remained effective throughout this period, the same cannot be said of the navy. While dominant in the Mediterranean in 1550, the Battle of Lepanto in 1571 resulted in a significant loss of skilled manpower and experienced commanders. The Ottoman navy went on to conquer Tunis in 1574, but subsequent events shifted imperial attention away from the Mediterranean. The resumption of the Ottoman-Safavid Wars in 1578 and the death of Grand Vizier Sokollu Mehmed Pasha the following year paved the way for a truce with Habsburg Spain in 1580, bringing to an end the imperial wars in the Mediterranean which had characterized the middle of the sixteenth century. The Ottoman navy subsequently fought no maritime war until the outbreak of the Cretan War with Venice in 1645, nearly seventy years later. This period of inaction played a role in weakening the effectiveness of the Ottoman navy, such that the Venetians were able to blockade the Dardanelles and inflict several defeats upon the Ottomans, most significantly in the 1656 Battle of the Dardanelles, described as the worst Ottoman defeat since Lepanto. Although these defeats have often been ascribed to an Ottoman failure to modernize their navy through the replacement of oar-propelled galleys with sail-driven galleons, in fact the Ottoman navy contained just as many galleons as that of the Venetians. Rather than innovation or technical ability, what the Ottomans lacked was skilled mariners to crew and command their vessels, whereas the Venetians could draw upon their extensive merchant marine for manpower. In contrast with the sixteenth century, the skilled mariners of the Barbary Coast were less willing to commit themselves to the Ottoman cause. Whereas sixteenth-century Ottoman admirals frequently began their careers as corsairs in North Africa, in the middle of the seventeenth century the admiralty was merely a prestigious office to be held by various statesmen who did not necessarily have any naval experience. Despite these difficulties, the Ottomans were ultimately able to overcome the Venetians, breaking the blockade of the Dardanelles in 1657 and completing the conquest of Crete with the fall of Heraklion in 1669.
Subsequent to the Cretan War, the Ottomans sought to improve the quality of their navy, and particularly its galleons. Investments were made toward improving their technical design, such that by 1675 an English captain could write home with suggestions for altering the design of English ships on the Ottoman model. In 1682 a dedicated squadron of galleons was created, organizationally separate from the fleet's remaining galleys, and in that year alone ten new galleons were commissioned to be built. The Ottomans' next major naval conflict began in 1684, when Venice aligned with Habsburg Austria, Poland–Lithuania, and the Papacy to combat the Ottomans in the War of the Holy League. The Venetians opened a front in the Aegean Sea and Peloponnese, but failed in an attempt to reconquer Crete in 1692. From 1695 to 1701 the Ottoman navy was placed under the command of Mezemorta Hüseyin Pasha, an experienced corsair from Algiers, who defeated the Venetian fleet in battle on 9 February 1695 and demonstrated the success of the previous decades' reforms.
The Ottoman Empire of this period was home to a vibrant religious and intellectual life. The legal reforms of Şeyhülislâm Ebussuud Efendi (1545–74) stimulated Ottoman intellectuals to vigorously debate many of society's issues. Ottomans were conflicted over the religious and moral qualities of newly available consumer goods, such as coffee and tobacco, which were sometimes banned and sometimes permitted. Equally divisive was the legality of several religious practices associated with Sufism, which were most staunchly opposed by the fiercely conservative Kadızadelis, a movement which began in the early seventeenth century but traced its origins to the sixteenth century preacher Birgili Mehmed Efendi (d. 1573). Kazıdadeli ideology centered on the Islamic invocation to "enjoin good and forbid wrong," leading them to oppose practices they perceived as "innovation" (bid'ah), in a manner roughly analogous to modern Wahhabism. The Kadızadelis spread their ideology by serving as preachers in Istanbul's major mosques, and twice won the support of the imperial government, first under Murad IV and later under Mehmed IV. Despite this, the Kadızadelis were looked upon with scorn by many of Istanbul's scholars and intellectuals, who ridiculed them for their zealous conservatism. The Kadızadeli preacher Vani Mehmed Efendi acted as a personal spiritual advisor to Mehmed IV, but fell from grace and was banished from court following the unsuccessful Siege of Vienna in 1683. The Kadızadelis henceforth received no direct imperial support.
In the early seventeenth century, Ottoman intellectual life was further influenced by an influx of scholars from Iran and Kurdistan. These scholars encouraged a revival of the rational sciences through emphasis on 'verification' (Arabic: taḥqīq, as opposed to taqlīd, "imitation") of the scientific discoveries of previous generations. The result was a burst of new written works on rationalist topics, such as mathematics, logic, and dialectics, with many scholars tracing their intellectual lineage back to these Iranian and Kurdish immigrants.
This period also witnessed the flowering of the literary genre known as "Advice for Kings" (nasihatname). Literary works of this nature were written to address the struggles which the state was experiencing, and to advise the ruler on how to properly solve them. Advice writers frequently alluded to the reign of Sultan Suleiman I (1520–1566) as the ideal model which contemporary rulers should seek to emulate. Writers who portrayed the empire as being in decline from a previous golden age were often motivated to do so by class or factional interests, as they often came from or were influenced by groups who had been disenfranchised by the empire's reforms, such as the timariots, or otherwise felt personal indignation toward the state as a result of failing to achieve career advancement, indicating a clear bias in their writings. Historians had once accepted these writers' description of Ottoman decline as fact, and thus portrayed the Ottoman Empire as entering a period of decline after the death of Suleiman the Magnificent, a view which has come to be known as the Ottoman Decline Thesis. However, since the 1980s, due to a reexamination of the nasihatname literature as well as countless other facets of Ottoman civilization, historians have achieved a consensus that in fact no such decline occurred, and thus the notion of the "Decline of the Ottoman Empire" was a myth.
Ottoman historical writing underwent major changes during this period. Particularly after 1600, Ottoman writers shifted away from the Persianate style of previous generations, writing in a form of Turkish prose which was much less ornate in comparison with works produced in the sixteenth century. Ottoman historians came to see themselves as problem-solvers, using their historical knowledge to offer solutions to contemporary issues, and for this they chose to write in a straightforward, easily understood vernacular form of Turkish. Rather than writing solely to buttress the prestige of the Ottoman dynasty, Ottoman historians of the seventeenth century believed in the importance of reporting events in as honest and accurate a manner as was possible. Major historians of this period include Mustafa Âlî, Katib Çelebi, and Mustafa Naima.
Sultan Suleiman I (r. 1520–1566) was the longest-reigning sultan in Ottoman history, but the last years of his reign were characterized by uncertainty over who would be his successor. Suleiman had three sons who could hope to succeed, Mustafa, Bayezid, and Selim. While the latter two were the children of Suleiman's wife Hurrem Sultan, the first was the son of Mahidevran Sultan. Mustafa may have felt that his half-brothers possessed an unfair advantage over him, and thus worked to secure the favor of the military. Perhaps suspecting that Mustafa planned to dethrone him just as his own father had done to his grandfather, Suleiman acted first and in 1553 ordered that Mustafa be executed. The death of Hurrem Sultan in 1558 triggered open conflict between the two remaining candidates, and Selim ultimately emerged victorious. Suleiman further strengthened his son's position by arranging a marriage between Selim's daughter and the influential Sokollu Mehmed Pasha (Grand Vizier 1565–1579). Suleiman died in 1566, while besieging the fortress of Szigetvar in Hungary, bringing Selim to the throne.
Selim II was a relatively inactive ruler who was content to allow the highly competent Sokollu Mehmed to run the empire on his behalf. Sokollu carried out a far-reaching foreign policy, dispatching armies to territories as distant as Yemen in the south and Astrakhan in the north. Most significant, however, was the conquest of Cyprus in 1570 and subsequent Ottoman defeat in the Battle of Lepanto, which paved the way for a Spanish-Ottoman truce in 1580 and continual détente in the Mediterranean. This allowed the Ottomans to focus their expansion to the east against Safavid Iran, where a long and devastating war was fought from 1578 to 1590, from which the Ottomans emerged with significant, if short-lived, conquests.
Selim died in 1574 and was succeeded by his son Murad III (r. 1574–95). This ruler, like his two successors Mehmed III (r. 1595–1603) and Ahmed I (r. 1603–1617), was highly influenced by the changing scene of palace politics. Most significant was the rise in importance of the harem. Whereas Hurrem Sultan's power was based on her personal relationship with Suleiman, the imperial women of this period derived their power from the institutional structure of the harem, which placed immense power into the hands of the sultan's mother, the Valide Sultan. This was directly related to the changes taking place in the system of succession, whereby princes no longer traveled to the provinces to take up governorships, but remained in the harem in Istanbul. From the time of Murad III onward, sultans no longer slept in the male segment of Topkapı Palace, but resided in a new bedchamber within the harem. Due to the increasing role of imperial women in political life, this period is sometimes referred to as the Sultanate of Women.
The Ottoman government at the turn of the century was presented with a severe military and economic crisis. War erupted with the Austrian Habsburgs in 1593 just as Anatolia experienced the first of several Celali Rebellions, in which rural bandit gangs grouped together under provincial warlords to wreak havoc on the countryside. In 1603 Shah Abbas of the Safavids launched a new war against the Ottomans, reversing all of the gains that had made in the previous decades. Thus the Ottomans found themselves fighting on three fronts at once, at a time when the economy was still recovering from the currency debasement of 1585. To overcome this challenge, they adopted an innovative strategy of co-opting the rebel forces into the structure of the empire. The Celali armies were manned by Anatolian bandits known as sekban, former peasants who sought an alternate livelihood in the harsh economic climate of the turn of the century. When given the opportunity, these men were eager to earn pay and status by serving in the Ottoman army as mercenaries. By recruiting such men into the Ottoman army as musketeers their energies were redirected from banditry and put to use against the empire's external enemies. The Celali leaders, as well, were at times granted positions within the provincial administration in order to pacify them. This did not bring the anarchy in Anatolia to an end, but it did make it easier to manage. In 1609 the grand vizier Kuyucu Murad Pasha traversed Anatolia with an army, clearing away the Celalis wherever he found them and bringing an end to the greater part of Celali activity.
The wars with the Habsburgs and Safavids eventually devolved into stalemates. Mehmed III personally led the Ottoman army to victory over the Habsburgs in the Battle of Mezőkeresztes in 1596, and the Ottomans went on to seize the Hungarian fortresses of Eger and Nagykanizsa, but ultimately neither side was able to achieve a decisive victory and the war was brought to an end in 1606 with the Treaty of Zsitvatorok. The war with the Safavids continued to drag on until 1618.
The recruitment of sekban as musketeers was part of a larger process of military and fiscal reform which was carried out during this period. The cavalry army which had been supported by the Timar System during the sixteenth century was becoming obsolete as a result of the increasing importance of musket-wielding infantry, and the Ottomans sought to adapt to the changing times. The central army was greatly expanded, particularly the Janissary Corps, the empire's premier infantry force. The Janissaries began to experiment with new battlefield tactics, becoming one of the first armies in Europe to utilize volley fire. To pay for the newly expanded army, the Ottomans expanded the practice of tax farming, formerly used primarily in the Arab provinces. Taxation rights which were formerly given to cavalrymen were now sold to the highest bidder, a practice which was in use in much of Europe as well. Other taxes were also reformed, with the wartime tax known as avarız becoming permanent and providing for 20% of the empire's annual revenue. These reforms greatly increased the revenue available to the central government and played a major role in the empire's continued strength throughout the century. To accommodate these changes, the bureaucracy was expanded and diversified, coming to play a much larger role in the empire's administration.
Ahmed I's death in 1617 brought his brother to the throne as Mustafa I, the first instance of a sultan succeeding through seniority. However, before long it became apparent that Mustafa was not mentally sound, and he was deposed the following year in favor of Sultan Ahmed's son Osman II, then aged 13. Osman II was an exceptionally energetic ruler, and sought to restore the authority of the Ottoman sultanate over the other factional groups within the empire. This aroused the anger of both the religious establishment as well as the Janissaries and Imperial Cavalry, and relations became particularly strained after the sultan's failed Polish campaign, in which the army felt it had been mistreated. After their return to Istanbul, Osman II announced his desire to perform the pilgrimage to Mecca; in fact this was a plan to recruit a new and more loyal army in Anatolia, out of the bandit-mercenary forces which had taken part in the Celali Rebellions and the Ottomans' wars with the Habsburgs and Safavids. To prevent him from carrying out this plan, the imperial army launched a revolt on May 18, 1622, and two days later, with the approval of the Şeyhülislâm, executed Sultan Osman II. This event, the legally approved regicide of a reigning Ottoman monarch, cemented the empire's transformation from a patrimonial empire into one in which power was shared between various loci of authority.
The regicide was followed by the revolt of Abaza Mehmed Pasha, then governor of Erzurum, who vowed to take revenge upon the sultan's killers and massacred the janissaries wherever he found them. Mustafa I, who had been enthroned for the second time, was soon deposed yet again and replaced by Ahmed I's son Murad IV, still a child. Thus with a child on the throne, Istanbul under the control of a Janissary clique, and Abaza Mehmed running rampant in the east, the Safavids saw another opportunity to attack and seized control of Baghdad in January 1624, but were unable to advance to Diyarbakır. In 1628 Abaza Mehmed's revolt was suppressed by the grand vizier Husrev Pasha, whose dismissal from office in 1632 triggered a Janissary revolt. This event fueled Murad IV's desire to regain control over the state, and he henceforth began to exercise power in his own right. He carried out a reform of military land tenure in an effort to strengthen the army, encouraged peasant resettlement of abandoned fields, and enforced moral reform in Istanbul in conjunction with the religious movement of the Kadızadelis. First achieving military success in 1635 with the conquest of Yerevan, he was ultimately able to lead the empire to victory by reconquering Baghdad in 1638 and establishing a long-lasting peace with the Safavids the following year.
Murad IV died in 1640, only 29 years old. He was succeeded by his brother Ibrahim, the only remaining male member of the Ottoman dynasty. Like Mustafa I before him, Ibrahim was mentally unstable, and was initially content to leave the government in the hands of Murad IV's last grand vizier, Kemankeş Mustafa Pasha. This lasted only until 1644, when Ibrahim had him executed and replaced by a rival. The following year war between the Ottoman Empire and Venice was sparked by an incident in which Maltese pirates docked on Venetian Crete after attacking an Ottoman ship carrying pilgrims, including the Chief Black Eunuch, to Mecca. The Ottomans quickly overran most of Crete, but were unable to evict the Venetians from the fortress of Heraklion. At sea, the Venetians managed to achieve the upper hand and blockade the Dardanelles, strangling Istanbul's trade and food supply. The subsequent disorder in the capital prompted Ibrahim's deposition in 1648, which was sanctioned by the Janissaries, the şeyhülislâm, and even Kösem Sultan, his mother. Ibrahim's replacement was his seven-year-old son, who was enthroned as Mehmed IV. The new government in Istanbul thus consisted of the young ruler's grandmother and regent Kösem Sultan and her allies in the Janissary Corps, one of whom was made grand vizier. Despite continued unrest both in Istanbul and the provinces, the blockade of the Dardanelles was successfully broken the following year. Kösem's position was nevertheless under threat from Mehmed IV's mother Turhan Sultan. Upon learning of a plot by Kösem to poison Mehmed IV, Turhan's faction leapt into action and assassinated her in 1651.
Turhan Sultan was henceforth in a secure position of power, but was unable to find an effective grand vizier, leaving the empire without a coherent policy with regard to the war with Venice. The result was another revolt of the imperial troops in March 1656, which demanded the lives of several government officials, blamed for neglecting to properly pay the troops who had been struggling to conquer Crete for so long.
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Main article: Köprülü era
In 1656 the Venetians seized control over the islands of Lemnos and Tenedos, and established another blockade of the Dardanelles. This action led to panic in Istanbul and prompted a renewed political crisis. In need of a change of policy, Turhan Hatice appointed the highly experienced Köprülü Mehmed Pasha as grand vizier, who immediately set forth on a drastic process of reform. This involved the dismissal or execution of all officials deemed corrupt, and their replacement with men loyal to the vizier. While wintering in Edirne after leading a successful campaign to reconquer the islands, Köprülü extended his purge to the imperial cavalry, executing thousands of soldiers who showed any sign of disloyalty. This move prompted a serious reaction, and as Köprülü led the army in a campaign against Transylvania, many of the empire's eastern governors first refused to join him, then launched an open revolt under the leadership of Abaza Hasan Pasha, demanding from the sultan that Köprülü be executed. Mehmed IV, now no longer a minor, chose to side with his vizier and dispatched an army to defeat the rebels. Despite initial rebel victories, the revolt was suddenly brought to an end in February 1659 with the assassination of Abaza Hasan.
Köprülü Mehmed died in 1661, leaving the empire in a much better military and financial position than he had found it. He was succeeded in office by his son Fazıl Ahmed Pasha (1661–1676), the first time in history that a grand vizier passed on the office to his son. Fazıl Ahmed was himself succeeded by his adopted brother Merzifonlu Kara Mustafa Pasha (1676–1683), and it is due to this unbroken control of the Köprülü family over the office of grand vizier that this period is referred to as the Köprülü era.
Köprülü Mehmed's two successors were highly competent administrators, and the empire enjoyed a remarkable degree of stability under their tutelage. Mehmed IV was content to allow them to manage the political affairs of the empire, but was nevertheless not an inactive ruler. He played a major role in imperial symbolism and legitimation, traveling with the army on campaign before handing supreme command over to the grand vizier. Thus while not directly leading the army, he still participated in the imperial campaigns, for which he was referred to as gazi, or "holy warrior," by contemporaries. Under the Köprülüs the empire revived its expansion into Europe, conquering territory from the Habsburgs, Poland–Lithuania, and Russia, as well as bringing the war with Venice to an end with the conquest of Heraklion in 1669. The push for territorial expansion under the Köprülüs reached its apex in 1683 with the Siege of Vienna, which ended in Ottoman defeat.
The defeat at Vienna ushered in a major political shift in the empire. As punishment for his failure, Mehmed IV ordered that Merzifonlu Kara Mustafa be executed, bringing an end to the undisputed Köprülü hold over the empire. The result was a period of political confusion at a time when the Ottoman Empire's European enemies were rallying together. In 1684 the Habsburgs, Poland–Lithuania, Venice, and the Papacy forged an alliance known as the Holy League to oppose the Ottomans, launching a period of warfare which would last for sixteen years.
Conflict on multiple fronts placed great strain on the Ottoman ability to wage war. The empire was attacked simultaneously in Hungary, Podolia, and the Mediterranean region, while after 1686 their Crimean vassals, who under normal circumstances supported the Ottoman army with tens of thousands of cavalry, were continually distracted by the need to fend off Russian invasion. Istanbul's food supply was again threatened by Venetian naval activity in the Aegean, contributing to instability in the capital. In Hungary, the Habsburgs first reconquered Nové Zámky in 1684, before moving on to Buda. Despite resisting a siege in 1685, it was unable to hold out against a second the following year, and capitulated to the Habsburgs, leading to much of the country falling under Habsburg control. The Ottomans were able to rescue Osijek from capture, but were defeated in the Second Battle of Mohács in 1687. The army subsequently mutinied and marched on Istanbul, deposing Mehmed IV in favor of his brother Suleiman II. In the chaos the Habsburgs were able to make rapid inroads into Ottoman territory, seizing strongholds such as Eger and Belgrade, reaching as far south as Niš. However, in 1689 the tide turned back in the Ottomans' favor. In 1688 Louis XIV of France had launched the Nine Years' War, distracting Habsburg attention from the Ottoman front. Fazıl Mustafa Pasha, a younger son of Köprülü Mehmed, was appointed grand vizier and led the army to successfully recover both Niš and Belgrade. What followed was a long period of stalemate, with the Habsburgs having lost their bridgehead south of the Danube and the Ottomans unable to achieve any lasting success north of it. The Habsburgs concerned themselves with the conquest of the Principality of Transylvania, an Ottoman vassal state, the loss of which the Ottomans were forced to accept after the disastrous defeat of an army personally led by Sultan Mustafa II in the 1697 Battle of Zenta. This defeat prompted the Ottomans to sue for peace.
While territorial losses to the Habsburgs have at times been cited as evidence of military weakness, more recently historians have challenged this notion, arguing that Ottoman defeats were primarily a result of the sheer size of the coalition arrayed against them, and the logistical burden of fighting a war on multiple fronts. To this may be added political instability, for the empire's greatest losses took place from 1684 to 1688, when its political leadership was paralyzed first by the execution of Kara Mustafa Pasha and then the deposition of Mehmed IV. Subsequently, the Ottomans were able to stabilize their position and reverse Habsburg gains south of the Danube.
The pressure of sustained warfare had prompted the Ottomans to carry out extensive fiscal reform. The sale of tobacco was legalized and taxed, previously tax-immune waqf finances were reformed, and the janissary payrolls were examined and updated. Most significantly, in 1691 the standard unit of cizye assessment was shifted from the household to the individual, and in 1695 the sale of life-term tax farms known as malikâne was implemented, vastly increasing the empire's revenue. These measures enabled the Ottoman Empire to maintain fiscal solvency during the war, and to enjoy significant budget surpluses by the beginning of the eighteenth century.
The war was brought to an end in 1699 with the Treaty of Karlowitz. On the general principle of uti possidetis, the Ottomans agreed to permanently cede all of Hungary and Transylvania to the Habsburgs, with the exception of the Banat region. Morea was annexed by Venice, while Podolia was returned to Poland–Lithuania. Karlowitz was highly significant for both Ottoman and Eastern European history in general, for it marked the definitive end of Ottoman imperial expansion. Ottoman foreign policy in Europe during the subsequent eighteenth century was generally peaceful and defensive, focused on the maintenance of a secure network of fortresses along the Danube frontier. Sultan Mustafa II was overthrown in the 1703 Edirne incident, bringing an end to the rule of the final Ottoman warrior-sultan, cementing the empire's transformation into a bureaucratic empire.
the post-Süleymanic Ottoman polity continued to manifest a tremendous political and economic dynamism, a pervasive pragmatism, and an important level of social mobility and mobilization.
historians of the Ottoman Empire have rejected the narrative of decline in favor of one of crisis and adaptation
Ottomanist historians have produced several works in the last decades, revising the traditional understanding of this period from various angles, some of which were not even considered as topics of historical inquiry in the mid-twentieth century. Thanks to these works, the conventional narrative of Ottoman history – that in the late sixteenth century the Ottoman Empire entered a prolonged period of decline marked by steadily increasing military decay and institutional corruption – has been discarded. | https://db0nus869y26v.cloudfront.net/en/Transformation_of_the_Ottoman_Empire |
✏Solomon s Power Brokers Book Summary : Is Freemasonry nothing more than a benign and charitable men's social club as the Order insists or does it have a deeper and perhaps darker purpose? Could these men be part of the "Illuminati" - a group of intellectuals with extremely grand plans for the development of civilization? And if so, what is the grand plan that these men were so determined to bring about, and why should there be such opposition to it? Christopher Knight and Alan Butler reveal that present-day freemasons are the spiritual descendents of an ancient priesthood that was forced to act in secrecy. In the early days of Christianity, their views offended and opposed those of the orthodox Church, and later in feudal Europe, both the State and the established Church considered them heretics and sworn enemies. Yet, they could not be silenced - or defeated - and members of this priesthood have continued to this day to work in subtle and sometimes subversive ways to achieve their aims, often occupying very elevated positions within Western society, and always maintaining complete anonymity to those outside their fellowship. The extraordinary story that unfolds in "Solomon's Power Brokers" reveals that the building of the modern world was no haphazard process. There was a grand plan - and it has succeeded. The "New World Order" is already here.
📒The Rise Of The Public Authority ✍ Gail Radford
✏The Rise of the Public Authority Book Summary : In the late nineteenth century, public officials throughout the United States began to experiment with new methods of managing their local economies and meeting the infrastructure needs of a newly urban, industrial nation. Stymied by legal and financial barriers, they created a new class of quasi-public agencies called public authorities. Today these entities operate at all levels of government, and range from tiny operations like the Springfield Parking Authority in Massachusetts, which runs thirteen parking lots and garages, to mammoth enterprises like the Tennessee Valley Authority, with nearly twelve billion dollars in revenues each year. In The Rise of the Public Authority, Gail Radford recounts the history of these inscrutable agencies, examining how and why they were established, the varied forms they have taken, and how these pervasive but elusive mechanisms have molded our economy and politics over the past hundred years.
📒No Little Plans ✍ Ian Wray
✏No Little Plans Book Summary : Is planning for America anathema to the pursuit of life, liberty and happiness? Is it true, as ideologues like Friedrich Von Hayek, Milton Friedman, and Ayn Rand have claimed, that planning leads to dictatorship, that the state is wholly destructive, and that prosperity is owed entirely to the workings of a free market? To answer these questions Ian Wray’s book goes in search of an America shaped by government, plans and bureaucrats, not by businesses, bankers and shareholders. He demonstrates that government plans did not damage American wealth. On the contrary, they built it, and in the most profound ways. In three parts, the book is an intellectual roller coaster. Part I takes the reader downhill, examining the rise and fall of rational planning, and looks at the converging bands of planning critics, led on the right by the Chicago School of Economics, on the left by the rise of conservation and the ‘counterculture’, and two brilliantly iconoclastic writers – Jane Jacobs and Rachel Carson. In Part II, eight case studies take us from the trans-continental railroads through the national parks, the Federal dams and hydropower schemes, the wartime arsenal of democracy, to the postwar interstate highways, planning for New York, the moon shot and the creation of the internet. These are stories of immense government achievement. Part III looks at what might lie ahead, reflecting on a huge irony: the ideology which underpins the economic and political rise of Asia (by which America now feels so threatened) echoes the pragmatic plans and actions which once secured America’s rise to globalism.
📒Anti Corruption Tabloid Journalism In Africa ✍ Brian Chama
✏Anti Corruption Tabloid Journalism in Africa Book Summary : This book studies the role of tabloid newspapers in exposing corruption and embezzlement in Africa. It makes a timeless, original contribution to the field by examining tabloid journalism practices and anti-corruption forces that have not yet been introduced to Afrocentric journalism scholarship. Defining tabloid journalism practice as an infotainment genre, the book examines corruption exposure by tabloids in Arabic, Portuguese and French speaking countries across Africa, making it a unique addition to the field. In doing so, it also builds an understanding of the evolution of anti-corruption tabloid journalism in Africa and gains insights into the relationship between the anti-corruption actions of the state and the anti-corruption reporting by tabloid journalists focusing on major corruption scandals. Providing evidence of the successes and struggles of journalistic practice in Africa, the book concludes by providing a synthesis of the emerging patterns and divergences from the cases analysed, looking to the future of corruption in the continent and the role of tabloid journalism in uncovering and challenging it.
📒Hurricane Katrina And The Forgotten Coast Of Mississippi ✍ Susan Cutter
✏Hurricane Katrina and the Forgotten Coast of Mississippi Book Summary : Hurricane Katrina slammed into the Gulf Coast in August 2005 with devastating consequences. Almost all analyses of the disaster have been dedicated to the way the hurricane affected New Orleans. This volume examines the impact of Katrina on southern Mississippi. While communities along Mississippi's Gulf Coast shared the impact, their socioeconomic and demographic compositions varied widely, leading to different types and rates of recovery. This volume furthers our understanding of the pace of recovery and its geographic extent, and explores the role of inequalities in the recovery process and those antecedent conditions that could give rise to a "recovery divide." It will be especially appealing to researchers and advanced students of natural disasters and policy makers dealing with disaster consequences and recovery.
📒Strengthening China S And India S Trade And Investment Ties To The Middle East And North Africa ✍ Miria Pigato
✏Strengthening China s and India s Trade and Investment Ties to the Middle East and North Africa Book Summary : Statement of responsibility from cover.
✏War Culture and Society in Early Modern South Asia 1740 1849 Book Summary : This book examines military success of the British in South Asia during the eighteenth and first half of the nineteenth centuries. Placing South Asian military history in global, comparative context, it examines military innovations; armies and how they conducted themselves; navies and naval warfare; major Indian military powers, and the British, explaining why they succeeded.
✏Feminist Collections Book Summary :
📒Ruling The Later Roman Empire ✍ Christopher Kelly
✏Ruling the Later Roman Empire Book Summary : In this highly original work, Christopher Kelly paints a remarkable picture of running a superstate. He portrays a complex system of government openly regulated by networks of personal influence and the payment of money. Focusing on the Roman Empire after Constantine's conversion to Christianity, Kelly illuminates a period of increasingly centralized rule through an ever more extensive and intrusive bureaucracy. The book opens with a view of its times through the eyes of a high-ranking official in sixth-century Constantinople, John Lydus. His On the Magistracies of the Roman State, the only memoir of its kind to come down to us, gives an impassioned and revealing account of his career and the system in which he worked. Kelly draws a wealth of insight from this singular memoir and goes on to trace the operation of power and influence, exposing how these might be successfully deployed or skillfully diverted by those wishing either to avoid government regulation or to subvert it for their own ends. Ruling the Later Roman Empire presents a fascinating procession of officials, emperors, and local power brokers, winners and losers, mapping their experiences, their conflicting loyalties, their successes, and their failures. This important book elegantly recaptures the experience of both rulers and ruled under a sophisticated and highly successful system of government.
📒Thinker Faker Spinner Spy ✍ William Dinan
✏Thinker faker spinner spy Book Summary : Leading writers expose the scandalous world of corporate spin and its impact on media freedom, democracy and the health of our planet. Bringing together leading activists and writers from the United States and beyond, this book unmasks the covert and undemocratic world of corporate spin. Wherever big business is threatened or corporate advantage can be gained, spin doctors, lobbyists, think tanks and front groups are on hand to push the corporate interest, often at the wider public¹s expense. The authors challenge the notion that corporate PR is only about celebrity gossip. They show how it extends much further, and how the techniques of the PR industry are now in use across a wide range of political fields, driven by corporate interests. The authors reveal the secrets of the PR trade, including deception, the use of fake Œinstitutes¹ and think tanks, behind the scenes influence-peddling, spying and dirty tricks. Most importantly, they show the devastating impact spin has had--as the public is denied access to the truth, the results are rising inequality and environmental catastrophe. The book covers the misdeeds of some of the best-known companies including BP, Coca Cola, British Aerospace, Exxon and Monsanto. It also reveals startling new information about the covert funding of apparently independent thinks tanks and institutes in the US, EU and around the globe. Thinker, Faker, Spinner, Spy also offers a guide to resisting deceptive PR. The authors describe concrete campaigns involving the internet and new communication technology to organise, raise awareness and campaign to roll back corporate power and the influence of PR. This volume is edited by William Dinan and David Miller (University of Strathclyde and Spinwatch). Contributors include: Laura Miller (PR Watch), Gerry Sussman (Portland State University), Kert Davies (Greenpeace US), Leslie Sklair (LSE, UK), Bob Burton (PR Watch, Australia), Judith Richter (author and activist), Olivier Hoedeman (Corporate Europe Observatory, Netherlands), Andy Rowell (Spinwatch, UK), Eveline Lubbers (Spinwatch, Netherlands), James Marriott and Greg Muttitt (Platform, UK), Aeron Davis (City University, UK), and Granville Williams (Campaign for Press and Broadcasting Freedom and Huddersfield University, UK). Published by Pluto Press in association with Spinwatch (www.spinwatch.org) . William Dinan is Lecturer in Sociology in the Department of Geography and Sociology at Strathclyde University, specializing in corporate PR and lobbying. David Miller is Professor of Sociology in the Department of Geography and Sociology at the University of Strathclyde. He has previously edited Arguments Against G8 and Tell Me Lies: Propaganda and Media Distortion in the Attack on Iraq for Pluto Press. | https://www.booklibrarian.com/pdfepub/the-power-broker-pdf-download/ |
This is a new series that features books by various publishers on a given theme, along with an excerpt from each volume. The second installment involves a selection from Cornell University Press on the theme of modern Lebanon. Other publishers` books will follow on a monthly basis.
Table of Contents
Compassionate Communalism: Welfare and Sectarianism in Lebanon
By Melani Cammett
About the Book
About the Author
In the Media
Scholarly Praise
Additional Information
Where to Purchase
Excerpt
Call for Reviews
Spoils of Truce: Corruption and State-Building in Postwar Lebanon
By Reinoud Leenders
About the Book
About the Author
In the Media
Scholarly Praise
Additional Information
Where to Purchase
Excerpt
Call for Reviews
Spheres of Intervention: US Foreign Policy and the Collapse of Lebanon, 1967-1976
By James R. Stocker
About the Book
About the Author
In the Media
Scholarly Praise
Additional Information
Where to Purchase
Excerpt
Call for Reviews
Compassionate Communalism: Welfare and Sectarianism in Lebanon
By Melani Cammett
About the Book
In Lebanon, religious parties such as Hezbollah play a critical role in providing health care, food, poverty relief, and other social welfare services alongside or in the absence of government efforts. Some parties distribute goods and services broadly, even to members of other parties or other faiths, while others allocate services more narrowly to their own base. In Compassionate Communalism, Melani Cammett analyzes the political logics of sectarianism through the lens of social welfare. On the basis of years of research into the varying welfare distribution strategies of Christian, Shia Muslim, and Sunni Muslim political parties in Lebanon, Cammett shows how and why sectarian groups deploy welfare benefits for such varied goals as attracting marginal voters, solidifying intraconfessional support, mobilizing mass support, and supporting militia fighters.
Cammett then extends her arguments with novel evidence from the Sadrist movement in post-Saddam Iraq and the Bharatiya Janata Party in contemporary India, other places where religious and ethnic organizations provide welfare as part of their efforts to build political support. Nonstate welfare performs a critical function in the absence of capable state institutions, Cammett finds, but it comes at a price: creating or deepening social divisions, sustaining rival visions of the polity, or introducing new levels of social inequality.
Compassionate Communalism is informed by Cammett`s use of many methods of data collection and analysis, including Geographic Information Systems (GIS) analysis of the location of hospitals and of religious communities; a large national survey of Lebanese citizens regarding access to social welfare; standardized open-ended interviews with representatives from political parties, religious charities, NGOs, and government ministries, as well as local academics and journalists; large-scale proxy interviewing of welfare beneficiaries conducted by trained Lebanese graduate students matched with coreligionist respondents; archival research; and field visits to schools, hospitals, clinics, and other social assistance programs as well as political party offices throughout the country.
About the Author
Melani Cammett is Associate Professor of Political Science at Brown University. She is the author of Compassionate Communalism: Welfare and Sectarianism in Lebanon and coeditor of The Politics of Non-state Social Welfare, both from Cornell. She is also the author of Globalization and Business Politics in Arab North Africa. www.melanicammett.net
In the Media
Read an interview with Melani Cammett on Jadaliyya.
"Overall, Compassionate Communalism is the kind of work on non-state social welfare that fills a gap in the political economy literature. I highly recommend the book for anyone interested in Lebanese and Middle Eastern politics, political economy in weak states, ethnic politics and consocialism."
—Barea M. Sinno, International Affairs (March 4, 2016)
Scholarly Praise for Compassionate Communalism
"This book is a remarkable accomplishment—simultaneously a revealing look at the varied and complex dynamics of ethnic and sectarian politics in Lebanon, a profound reflection on the basic questions of political science—who gets what, when, and how—and an ingenious use of multiple methodologies in the search for nuanced, plausible, and valuable answers. In examining the on-the-ground dynamics of welfare distribution by several sectarian parties and movements, Melani Cammett shows that the various configurations of political mobilization, participation, and competition shape political patronage in surprisingly predictable patterns—from very narrowly particularistic to very broadly distributive. These findings will prove instructive not only to those interested in politics in the Middle East but also to anyone concerned with the nature of political organization and exchange, as well as admirers of well-constructed social science research."
—Lisa Anderson, The American University in Cairo
"A theoretically compelling, carefully researched, and well-written study of the politics of service system provision by sectarian-based parties, Compassionate Communalism is a must-read for students of service provision, clientelism, and political parties in Lebanon and beyond."
—Ellen Lust, Yale University, author of Structuring Conflict in the Arab World
Additional Information
May 2014
336 Pages
$82.95 (list price)
Cloth ISBN: 978-0-8014-5232-1
$27.95 (list price)
Paper ISBN: 978-0-8014-7893-2
Where to Purchase
Cornell University Press
Amazon
Excerpt
In June 2007, Hamza Shahrour, a twenty-four-year-old Lebanese man, died of heart failure in Beirut. Hamza’s death might have been prevented had he received timely medical attention, but the hospital where his family first took him refused to admit him. In Lebanon, examples abound of low-income patients who are turned away from hospital emergency rooms because they cannot cover the costs of treatment, and the Lebanese media periodically feature stories about patients who die in ambulances outside private hospitals that have refused to accept them on financial grounds (Al-Nahar Staff 1998; Balaa 2005). In the case of Hamza Shahrour, however, it was not poverty but sectarian identity that allegedly compelled the hospital staff to refuse to treat him. A Shiʿi Muslim, Hamza was taken to the Rafiq Al-Hariri Hospital, which is officially public but which at various times has been controlled by the Future Movement, a predominantly Sunni Muslim political party and an important force in Lebanese politics. After his death, Hamza’s mother lamented, “I wish my son had been a Sunni. Maybe he would be sitting next to me now instead of dying, having been turned away from the Hariri hospital” (IRIN News 2008). This account of Hamza’s treatment suggests that the Future Movement allocates social benefits along sectarian lines. But this claim is surprising in light of the history of the Future Movement. For years, the organization was seen as relatively open to all Lebanese, regardless of sect, even though its founder was a prominent Sunni leader. Thus, the interpretation by Hamza’s mother suggests that Lebanese citizens view the organization as “sectarian,” despite its history of cross-sectarian generosity.
The Future Movement is hardly the only political party in Lebanon accused of discrimination along sectarian lines in recent years. Doctors from the Rasoul al-ʿAzam Hospital, a hospital in the southern suburbs of Beirut run by the Shiʿi Muslim party Hezbollah, admit that Hezbollah members and their families receive priority treatment (IRIN News 2008). Although their own welfare institutions are currently far less developed than those of their Sunni and Shiʿa counterparts, Christian political parties use connections with religious charities and other provider organizations to ensure that their supporters receive preferential access to social services. Christian leaders with bases of regional support, such as Nayla Moawad or Suleiman Franjieh, both of whom come from important political families in North Lebanon, run welfare networks that are widely perceived by Lebanese citizens to favor their own supporters. Long-standing Christian political parties, such as the Lebanese Forces and Kataeb, whose welfare programs were largely dismantled after the end of the fifteen-year Lebanese civil war in 1990, are resuscitating and building their social service wings at present. Political leaders of these parties openly acknowledge that they must reward their supporters with services as they rebuild party institutions; “We know we need to help our sup- porters, especially now that we are constituting ourselves into a real political party,” explained one Lebanese Forces official.
Social welfare, then, not only concerns the ways in which people meet their basic social needs; in Lebanon and in other countries in the Middle East, South and Southeast Asia, and other regions of the Global South, where public welfare functions are underdeveloped and identity-based organizations provide social protection, it is a lens through which to study sectarian and ethnic politics. At its core, sectarianism refers to processes of constructing and maintaining the boundaries of a religious community, demarcating who belongs and who is excluded. Social welfare, too, entails processes of inclusion and exclusion, shaping both the constitution and experiences of membership in a political community. At the national level, for example, access to social services and benefits is at the heart of contests over citizenship, a status that determines one’s rights and obligations and their entailments within the polity. Similarly, who benefits from the provision of social services by sectarian organizations—whether based on formal or informal eligibility criteria— effectively constitutes membership in these groups. Through the direct pro- vision of social services or through indirect access to benefits provided by other public and private organizations, these organizations aim to build sup- port, consolidate their control over territory and people, and present them- selves as protectors and guarantors of well-being. A focus on the relationship between provider and beneficiary exposes the kinds of linkages—material and immaterial—that sectarian organizations construct with ordinary people, enabling identity-based groups to lock in their control over social and political life.
In light of standard expectations of sectarian politics in academic and jour-nalistic accounts, the story of Hamza’s death told by his mother is tragic but not surprising; sectarian or ethnic groups generally favor “their own”—in access to social services, jobs, the distribution of patronage, or other forms of resource allocation—especially when resources are scarce and a larger, cross-cutting sense of solidarity is absent or underdeveloped (Alesina et al. 2003; Easterly and Levine 1997; Habyarimana et al. 2007; Lieberman 2003; Tsai 2007). Far more puzzling, then, are instances when sectarian organizations purposively serve people from other sects. Sunnis and Christians attest that they receive medical care, financial assistance, and even educational scholarships from Hezbollah institutions,3 and Hezbollah emphasizes that it welcomed Christian business owners and residents in neighborhoods located in the southern suburbs of Beirut, such as Shiyah and Baabda, after the civil war (Harik 2004). Likewise, Shiʿa Lebanese report that they benefit from similar services provided by Sunni institutions linked to political parties and religious charities. Even their harshest critics in Lebanon attest that sectarian parties make deliberate efforts to serve members of out-groups.
This book takes these apparently anomalous cases of cross-sectarian welfare provision as a starting point for studying the broader phenomenon of sectarianism: How does sectarianism affect the efforts of ordinary people to meet their basic needs? This broad concern points to more targeted questions about the behavior of sectarian parties: Why do some sectarian providers dis- tribute welfare goods broadly, even to out-group members, while others concentrate service provision within their associated communities? Similarly, why do sectarian organizations purposively cater to members of out-groups to a greater or lesser degree in different time periods or geographical areas? The book also poses a second set of questions about what it means for organizations to serve their own communities: Even if sectarian organizations primarily serve in-group members, are all treated equally or are some favored over others? Given resource limitations, sectarian organizations are compelled to distribute welfare goods unevenly among different categories of in-group members.
Excerpt from Compassionate Communalism: Welfare and Sectarianism in Lebanon by Melani Cammett published by Cornell University Press. ©2014. All rights reserved.
Table of Contents
Compassionate Communalism: Welfare and Sectarianism in Lebanon - Melani Claire Cammett
- List of Figures, Maps, and Tables
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- Chapter 1: Welfare and Sectarianism in Plural Societies
- Chapter 2: Political Secularism and the Residual Welfare System in Lebanon
- Chapter 3: Political Mobilization Strategies and In-Group Competition among Sectarian Parties
- Chapter 4: The Political Geography of Welfare and Sectarianism
- Chapter 5: Political Loyalty and Access to Welfare
- Chapter 6: Sectarian Parties and Distributional Politics
- Chapter 7: Welfare and Identity Politics Beyond Lebanon
- Conclusion: The Consequences of Welfare Provision by Identity-Based Organizations
- Appendixes:
- A. List of Elite Interview Respondents and Provider Questionnaire
- B. List of Nonelite Interview Respondents and Questionnaire
- C. National Survey Questions
- Notes
- References
Call for Reviews
If you would like to review the book for the Arab Studies Journal and Jadaliyya, please email [email protected]
Spoils of Truce: Corruption and State-Building in Postwar Lebanon
by Reinoud Leenders
About the Book
In Spoils of Truce, Reinoud Leenders documents the extensive corruption that accompanied the reconstruction of Lebanon after the end of a decade and a half of civil war. With the signing of the Ta`if peace accord in 1989, the rebuilding of the country`s shattered physical infrastructure and the establishment of a functioning state apparatus became critical demands. Despite the urgent needs of its citizens, however, graft was rampant. Leenders describes the extent and nature of this corruption in key sectors of the Lebanese economy and government, including transportation, health care, energy, natural resources, construction, and social assistance programs.
Exploring in detail how corruption implicated senior policymakers and high-ranking public servants, Leenders offers a clear-eyed perspective on state institutions in the developing world. He also addresses the overriding role of the Syrian leadership’s interests in Lebanon and in particular its manipulation of the country’s internal differences. His qualitative and disaggregated approach to dissecting the politics of creating and reshaping state institutions complements the more typical quantitative methods used in the study of corruption. More broadly, Spoils of Truce will be uncomfortable reading for those who insist that power-sharing strategies in conflict management and resolution provide some sort of panacea for divided societies hoping to recover from armed conflict.
About the Author
Reinoud Leenders is Reader in International Relations with a focus on Middle East Studies in the Department of War Studies at King`s College, London. He is coeditor of Middle East Authoritarianisms: Governance, Contestation, and Regime Resilience in Syria and Iran.
www.kcl.ac.uk/sspp/departments/warstudies/people/readers/leenders.aspx
In the Media
Read an interview with the author on Jadaliyya.
"One of the most disturbing legacies of the post-civil war experience in Lebanon has been the persistence of corruption in the country`s sociopolitical institutions. In this well-researched book, Leenders . . . examines the myriad causes of corruption in the country . . . . [and] convincingly demonstrates how Lebanon`s archaic political system perpetuates corruption. . . . Although the book`s focus is on Lebanon, the author`s theoretical arguments can be applied to the study of corruption in many other Arab countries. Summing Up: Highly recommended."
—Choice (June 2013)
"Here is the most remarkable study day on the Lebanese political system and its operation since the end of the Civil War and the Taif Agreement . . . . This reads like a fascinating detective story except that it is real people who find themselves without care and without electricity, millions of dollars disappear into private pockets and a country that participated in sixes and sevens."
— Élizabeth Picard, Journal of the Worlds Muslims and Mediterranean (April 2014)
"Through rich descriptions of select postwar institutions, Spoils of Truce advances our knowledge of corruption beyond existing aggregate survey indicators and anecdotal evidence. The result is a more‐complete understanding not just of the magnitude and dynamics of corruption, but also of how crucial institutions evolved between 1989 and 2005. . . . . The demand for an alternative theoretical framework originates in the intriguing possibilities offered by the book`s carefulinvestigation of corruption cases and how they interact with these struggles. It is above all a testament to Leenders’s success in arguing that public institutions deserve a central place even in contexts where they are especially vulnerable to political manipulation."
-–Julia Choucair‐Vizoso, Political Science Quarterly (April 2014)
"...Reinoud Leenders` `Spoils of Truce: Corruption and State-Building in Postwar Lebanon` not only offers an interesting read for the general reader, but would also provide excellent material for students in international and political sciences at bachelor and master level, as well as for researchers, experts, consultatnts and politicians."
— JIRS Editorial Board, Journal of Intercultural and Religious Studies (December 2013)
Scholarly Praise for Spoils of Truce
"At last we have a thorough, insightful study of corruption in an Arab country that is theoretically grounded, empirically rich, and convincing in its fundamental premise that corruption is the inherent by-product of a defective political system. Sadly, Reinoud Leenders`s book is also highly relevant to Arab politics more generally for, like Lebanon, more than 50 percent of the Arab countries rank in the bottom half of the Corruption Perception Index. His insights are eminently transportable."
—Robert Springborg, Naval Postgraduate School, coauthor of Globalization and the Politics of Development in the Middle East
"In using the issue of corruption to address questions about the development and effects of state institutions, Reinoud Leenders usefully highlights the often overlooked role of the Lebanese state in shaping economic behavior. He offers a compelling and richly theoretical argument about the centrality of the Lebanese state in explaining the prominence of corruption in Lebanon and its effects on patterns of economic and political governance. In the process, Leenders has produced the most important work on Lebanon`s political economy in a generation."
—Steven Heydemann, Senior Advisor, United States Institute of Peace
"Spoils of Truce is based on a wealth of information about corruption in postwar Lebanon. Reinoud Leenders convincingly links corruption to the nature of state institutions, thus rehabilitating the study of the state and its role in shaping Lebanese politics."
—Marie-Joëlle Zahar, Université de Montréal
Additional Information
September 2012
312 Pages
$46.95 (list price)
Cloth ISBN: 978-0-8014-5100-3
Where to Purchase
Cornell University Press
Amazon
Excerpt
The Backdrop to This Book
This book presents an assessment of political corruption in postwar Lebanon and offers an explanation for its pervasiveness. In this respect it engages with a growing body of literature on the study of comparative corruption, bribery, rent-seeking, and crony capitalism, primarily in less developed countries (LDCs). Until the late 1970s, social scientists working on corruption in LDCs routinely complained about their colleagues’ lack of interest, prompting one of them to talk about a “conspiracy of silence” (Andreski 1978, 347). Such complaints are no longer justified. An overwhelming quantity of studies has transformed the onetime “conspiracy of silence” into a cacophony of views, models, and opinions dealing with corruption. A great deal of this relatively recent academic interest in corruption evolved out of concerns that in many LDCs, efforts to boost “modernization” or “development”—repackaged and made pertinent by the World Bank and the IMF’s “structural adjustment programs”—had failed to deliver.2 Against this background, it has increasingly been asserted that corruption raises serious obstacles to economic growth and associated “good governance,” and that the phenomenon constitutes a drain on emerging economies.3 Most economists have focused on assessing or demonstrating the economic costs of corruption or—using an inverse logic—highlighting the economic virtues of corruption’s assumed antitheses: transparency, accountability, and “good governance.” Other analysts have taken a moral or more overtly political interest in the subject, driven by outrage over a host of other disastrous effects attributed to corruption.
In Lebanon, politicians, activists, intellectuals, journalists, and the public at large have echoed such views, primarily in search of an explanation for the country’s unsatisfactory economic performance and mounting debt burden since its supposed “recovery” from war in the 1990s.4 In 2004 the Lebanese economist Samir Makdisi succinctly summarized Lebanon’s economic slump in reference to a series of indicators showing that “the economy [is] relatively stagnant, fiscal deficits [are] running high, the public debt burden [is] rapidly mounting, the [Lebanese] pound [is] under pressure, and the Central Bank’s foreign exchange reserves [are] under pressure” (2004, 107). My research is not designed to support or to take issue with those who blame poor economic performance on endemic corruption, either in Lebanon or generally. Nor do I necessarily agree or disagree with a range of political activists who denounce corrupt politicians when, for example, conflicts of interest and corrupt transactions damage the environment or perpetuate socioeconomic disparities. Such arguments certainly increase the relevance of any study on corruption. Yet I must emphasize that my own interest in political corruption originated in a different set of considerations.
In their zeal to condemn corruption, Lebanon’s activists appear intuitively to underscore a way to analyze and understand the fundamental roles and qualities of the Lebanese state. Challenging corruption can be seen as a first step toward a reappraisal of state-society boundaries and accepted standards of political behavior. Not coincidentally, the still inconclusive debate in comparative political thought about fundamental questions pertaining to the state has interrogated “the paired opposition” between public and private (Weintraub 1997, 4). A focus on corruption condenses some of these questions by exploring whether, how, and where this supposedly clear dichotomy is maintained when state institutions are being built, altered, and put into operation. It is this background that prompted me to look at the extent and causes of political corruption in postwar Lebanon.
A focus on political corruption and Lebanon’s state institutions promises an added value: in contrast to the lively debates raging in Lebanon, academic research on the country’s society, economy, and politics seems to suggest that the state is of little relevance and not worth further analysis. The result, as one Lebanese economist put it, is that “generally speaking, the Lebanese [state] administration is a victim of clichés and remains largely unknown” (Nahas 2005, 109). Studies of Lebanon have pointed out a vast range of interesting aspects of its turbulent politics and political economy, and many of them contributed to my own understanding of the country. But I found no detailed characterization of the contemporary Lebanese state or its institutions, and especially none that covers the postwar period. This relative lack of interest in the Lebanese state also marks much of the literature on Lebanon’s sectarian or confessional politics. Thus the Lebanese state is virtually absent in studies evolving out of the school of “consociational democracy,” which cast Lebanon, particularly in the prewar period, as one of its major examples in the “Third World.”5 This is less of a surprise when we realize that this comparative and essentially normative approach to conflict management rarely showed much interest in the state anywhere, not just in Lebanon.6 In sum, the virtual absence of the state in the study of Lebanese politics may simply suggest that others do not share my research interest in how the state in Lebanon has manifested itself and why. Yet while the literature implies that the Lebanese state was of secondary importance, the fierce political battles over the role of the state indicated quite the contrary. To find guidelines for studying political corruption in postwar Lebanon, I had to look elsewhere. I found some consolation in the fact that Lebanon is not the only country believed to sustain high levels of political corruption.
The Perils and Pitfalls of “Corruptology”
Hard facts are a rare commodity in most research on the politics of developing countries, and fully reliable data on corruption are even harder to obtain. Lebanon is sparsely endowed with information on its political, economic, and social life that in many other countries is often taken for granted. This hampers an investigation into corruption, particularly one that insists on disentangling real manifestations of corruption in full detail. Yet a focus on corruption, typically concealed from the public eye and constituting at least a significant part of Lebanon’s omnipresent non-formal economic transactions, can help to address the data gap and, in turn, become the basis of a more detailed, more comprehensive, and better understanding of the country’s state-society relations and politics.
This is not to play down the contentious nature of corruption and the problems this may cause the researcher. Indeed, no indicator of corruption goes uncontested. Moreover, on the one hand, state officials and politicians do not like to advertise shady deals that others may classify as corruption. Their opponents and critics, on the other hand, may have a clear interest in exaggerating reports of corruption or fabricating them altogether in an attempt to discredit rivals. The tasks for the researcher on political corruption are made even more difficult as he or she (or his or her informer) is confronted not only by the standards regarding verifiable analyses prized by academic colleagues, but also by real or potential actions (including threats, intimidation, violence, or libel suits) taken by politicians, senior officials, and their sympathizers who feel called to account. Indeed, at least a dozen Lebanese whistleblowers about real or alleged corruption have been subjected to such sanctions.
Readers accustomed to countries where the rule of law is commonly upheld may suggest that, in order to circumvent the problems associated with politically informed slander and untrustworthy allegations, research on corruption is better limited to cases that have been proved in court. Anyone familiar with Lebanon’s largely defunct judiciary and legal process will know that putting one’s faith in the Lebanese courts, for research purposes or indeed with the aim of seeking justice, is not a viable option. Perhaps most tellingly, the number of politicians and/or state officials brought to trial on corruption charges is negligible; actual convictions have been even less frequent. This is not for lack of relevant legislation. The country’s Penal Code (art. 351) makes corruption and related misconduct a criminal offense. In December 1999 the Lebanese Parliament amended a largely defunct law, the “Illicit Wealth Law” (Legislative Decree 38 of 18 February 1953, commonly referred to as the law on “where did you get this from?”—min ween lika haida?), purportedly to ensure more effective enforcement of existing anti- corruption legislation. It obliged ministers and senior public servants to declare their personal wealth prior to taking up and immediately after leaving office. In addition, the Lebanese constitution (art. 80) allows for establishing a Supreme Court, composed of members of Parliament and senior judges and invested with the authority to revoke the political immunity of presidents, ministers, and members of Parliament and try them for offenses ranging from treason to corruption. Yet a host of factors—including loopholes within existing legislation, persistent political interference in the judiciary, judicial mismanagement and inefficiency, and indeed judicial corruption—has consistently worked against the use of these legal tools (Taqi ad-Din et al. 1999; Takieddine 2004; Mugraby 2000; UNDP 2001; World Bank 2005a; CDL 12 March 1998).
In the absence of one comprehensive and reliable indicator of corruption, I concur with David Kang’s observation that only “a variety of indicators can give us a sense of the size and pattern of corruption” (2002, 19). In the period under study, many allegations have been raised in a wide range of sources: local and regional media, a few books, reports by NGOs, private consultancy agencies, and the World Bank, and reports prepared by various ministries, the state’s auditing and inspection agencies, lawyers, and, albeit to a lesser extent, the judiciary. I make use of all these sources, in addition to unstructured interviews and available state documents. Yet even when immense caution is taken in interpreting and contextualizing such sources, data obtained from informers and written sources are still likely to reflect the always controversial and often risky nature of debating corruption. For this reason, all the corruption cases referred to in this book come with such obligatory adjectives as “allegedly” and “reportedly,” thereby testifying to the sorry state of “corruptology” as a science. In addition, the names of directly accused politicians and officials have largely been withheld.
Excerpt from Spoils of Truce: Corruption and State-Building in Postwar Lebanon by Reinoud Leenders published by Cornell University Press. © 2012. All rights reserved.
Tabel of Contents
Spoils of Truce: Corruption and State-Building in Postwar Lebanon - Reinoud Leenders
- Acknowledgements
- List of Abbreviations
- Chapter 1: Corruption: A Window into the State of Postwar Lebanon
- Chapter 2: Assessing Corruption
- Chapter 3: Public Institutions and Bureaucratic Organization
- Chapter 4: The Political Settlement of the Second Republic
- Chapter 5: The Politics of State-Building and Corruption
- Chapter 6: Corruption and the Primacy of Politics
- Epilogue
- References
If you would like to review the book for Arab Studies Journal and Jadaliyya, please email [email protected]
Spheres of Intervention: US Foreign Policy and the Collapse of Lebanon, 1967-1976
By James R. Stocker
About the Book
In Spheres of Intervention, James R. Stocker examines the history of diplomatic relations between the United States and Lebanon during a transformational period for Lebanon and a time of dynamic changes in US policy toward the Middle East. Drawing on tens of thousands of pages of declassified materials from US archives and a variety of Arabic and other non-English sources, Stocker provides a new interpretation of Lebanon`s slide into civil war, as well as insight into the strategy behind US diplomatic initiatives toward the Arab-Israeli conflict. During this period, Stocker argues, Lebanon was often a pawn in the games of larger powers. The stability of Lebanon was an aim of US policy at a time when Israel’s borders with Egypt and Jordan were in active contention.
Following the June 1967 Arab-Israeli War, the internal political situation in Lebanon became increasingly unstable due to the regional military and political stalemate, the radicalization of the country’s domestic politics, and the appearance of Palestinian militias on Lebanese territory. US officials were more deeply involved in Lebanese affairs than most outside the region realized. After a series of internal crises in 1969, 1970, and 1973, civil war broke out in Lebanon in 1975. The conflict reached a temporary halt after a Syrian military intervention the following year, but this was only an end to the first stage of what would be a sixteen-year civil war. During these crises, the US sought to help the Lebanese government in a variety of ways, including providing military aid to the Lebanese military, convincing Arab countries to take measures to help the Lebanese government, mediating Lebanon’s relations with Israel, and even supporting certain militias.
About the Author
James R. Stocker is Assistant Professor of International Affairs at Trinity Washington University. https://jrstocker.wordpress.com
Scholarly Praise for Spheres of Intervention
"As we survey the current turmoil in the Middle East, we are all the more in need of careful, dispassionate, and insightful historical scholarship on US interactions with that region, and particularly
with the small but pivotal nation of Lebanon. James R. Stocker gives us that, and more. Spheres of Intervention is a richly researched, perceptive, and skillfully crafted book about a diplomatic relationship that has powerfully shaped Middle Eastern politics down to our own day. Resourcefully mining recently declassified US government documents, and incorporating Arabic- and French-language sources seldom found in Anglophone accounts, Stocker provides the most comprehensive and up-to-date treatment we have of official US involvement in the Lebanese civil war of 1975–1976."
—Salim Yaqub, University of California, Santa Barbara, author of Containing Arab Nationalism: The Eisenhower Doctrine and the Middle East
"Spheres of Intervention is a necessary and very valuable contribution to our knowledge about Lebanon`s recent history, Lebanese-American relations, and US Mideast foreign policy. This book is a must-read for those with a special interest in Lebanon and for historians of US policy in the Middle East. In the first book to take extensive advantage of the declassified US diplomatic cables of the period, James R. Stocker fills an important gap in our understanding of Lebanon’s foreign relations during the decade and a half leading to its collapse in 1975."
—Paul Salem, Vice President for Policy, Middle East Institute, author of Bitter Legacy: Ideology and Politics in the Arab World
"Before the collapse of the state in Iraq, Syria, Libya, and Yemen there was Lebanon`s descent into prolonged and costly civil war. James R. Stocker has meticulously examined the record of US involvement in Lebanon’s drift toward war in the years 1967–1976. He rightly concludes that Lebanon per se was rarely central in the thinking of American policymakers, especially Henry Kissinger. But what the United States did or did not do in the surrounding region had important spillover effects in Lebanon. The unwillingness of the United States to tackle the Palestinian issue, which was of key importance to the Lebanese, meant that it was very hard to stabilize Lebanon once the civil war began in earnest in 1975. This is a sobering account of the destruction of a country on the margins of American grand strategy. Today’s crises in the Middle East have far too many resemblances to the story told so authoritatively in these pages."
—William B. Quandt, author of Peace Process
Additional Information
May 2016
296 Pages
$45.00 (list price)
Cloth ISBN: 978-1-5017-0077-4
Where to Purchase
Cornell University Press
Amazon
Excerpt
On Martyr’s Day, November 11, 2010, speaking live over an Internet video connection, Hizbullah secretary general Hassan Nasrallah gave a history lesson. At the time, the Special Tribunal for Lebanon investigating the murder of Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri was expected to soon issue criminal indictments for numerous suspects, including Hizbullah members. In his speech, Nasrallah repeatedly asserted that the tribunal was a US and Israeli plot to undermine the stability of Lebanon. Then, announcing that he was addressing his opponents in the March 14 coalition, particularly the Christian youth, the party leader proceeded to trace the origins of contemporary US policy back to the days of Henry Kissinger. In June 1976, Kissinger sent a response to an open letter written by Maronite Christian politician Raymond Edde. Edde’s letter had accused Kissinger of attempting to destroy and partition Lebanon. In his response, according to Nasrallah, Kissinger explained that Lebanon’s formula of coexistence threatened US interests in the region, which depended on “sectarian states” such as Israel. For this reason, Kissinger allegedly wrote, the United States had manufactured the Lebanese Civil War. This admission, Nasrallah proclaimed, should be “taught in the educational curricula in Lebanon and the Arab world” and “printed and circulated so that every Lebanese man, child and old man reads it.” After all, he continued, “this is America and this is the American policy.”
Soon after his speech, reporters and political opponents of Hizbullah in Lebanon pointed out that the Kissinger letter was not real, but rather a 1976 satirical piece published in the pages of al-Hawadith, a now-defunct Beirut-based leftist newspaper. A few days later, the author of the fake letter, journalist Salim Nasar, told the story of its creation. At the height of the Two Years’ War, just a few days after the Syrian military intervention in June 1976, Nasar was at his home in the mountains. A journalist from al-Hawadith came to Nasar’s house, needing material for the latest edition of the paper and carrying editions of several local papers to discuss. In one of these was Edde’s open letter. Nasar then decided to write a response based on what he thought Kissinger would answer. However, thirty-five years later, Nasar still insisted that the information that he put in the fake letter came from Lebanese officials and a former White House translator, and that Nasrallah’s characterizations of US policy in his speech were “100% true.”
The interesting part of this story is not whether the Hizbullah leader had all the details correct in his speech. Rather, it is that it illustrates how widespread the viewpoint is that the United States played an important role in Lebanon’s nearly sixteen-year-long civil war. Not only did a major Lebanese political figure tout this letter as a real historical document, but he also weaved it together with current political developments into a larger narrative of the history of US-Lebanese relations. The fact that the letter’s author confirmed Nasrallah’s analysis, even as he acknowledged that the document was made up, suggests not just the influence of Hizbullah in contemporary Lebanon but also the power of the narrative itself. Many who have spent time in Lebanon have heard some version of this interpretation of US policy. But with a few exceptions, most Western accounts of the Lebanese Civil War ignore this narrative and its implications.
Rather, accounts of Lebanese history in the years between 1967 and 1976 usually portray a period of destabilization culminating in civil war. Internal tensions, already running high in the aftermath of the 1967 Arab-Israeli War, erupted in January 1969 following an Israeli attack on the Beirut airport. Within a few months, the Lebanese army clashed with Palestinian militias present on Lebanese territory, sparking a crisis that would last until November, when an agreement was signed in Cairo between the Lebanese government and the fedayeen, as the militants were known. The country was again thrown into crisis by clashes between Christian militias and fedayeen in the spring of 1970. The political conflict dragged on throughout the summer, abating only after the Palestinians were defeated in September 1970, not by the Lebanese security forces, but by the Jordanian army, hundreds of miles away. Fighting broke out again in May 1973 as the Lebanese army confronted the fedayeen once more. Finally, the country entered a continuous state of conflict from April 1975 until the achievement of an Arab-brokered peace accord in October 1976. These eighteen months of bloodshed, often called the Two Years’ War, set the stage for nearly fifteen more years of civil war in Lebanon.5 Estimates of the number of lives lost during 1975 and 1976 alone range between twenty-five thousand and forty thousand.
These years were also a transitional period in US relations with the Middle East. After Israel’s victory in the 1967 war, the Johnson administration refused to press Israel to withdraw from territory it had occupied without some concessions from Arab states. In January 1969, President Richard Nixon took office, marking the start of an era in which the United States would become more deeply involved in the Arab-Israeli conflict than under any previous US administration. During 1969 and 1970, under Secretary of State William Rogers, the State Department launched two diplomatic efforts to broker a settlement to the Arab-Israeli conflict, as well as another failed attempt in 1971. Beginning in 1971, US Middle East policy was increasingly dominated by National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger, who sought to prevent any new diplomatic initiatives. This changed after a regional war broke out in October 1973. Kissinger, now secretary of state, undertook his own diplomatic initiative, which achieved two initial disengagement agreements between Israel and the Arab states in the first half of 1974. Following Nixon’s resignation later that year, Kissinger continued to pursue Middle East initiatives during the administration of Gerald Ford, achieving a second disengagement agreement between Egypt and Israel in September 1975. This agreement brought Egypt decisively into the US orbit, while excluding the Palestinians and the Syrians. Ford’s electoral defeat in November 1976 put an end to the Kissingerian period of Middle East diplomacy, leaving behind a region transformed but still far from at peace.
This book examines the intersection of these two processes: the collapse of the Lebanese state and the evolving US role in the Middle East. At its core are two related arguments. First, US policy toward Lebanon was sub- ordinated to strategies toward the Cold War and the broader Middle East. During this period, both strategies would undergo changes that would have a great impact on US-Lebanese relations. At least during the early part of the period, Lebanon was still seen as a strategic asset for the United States within the broader context of the Cold War and regional politics. Over time, as Kissinger took over the reins of Middle East policy from the State Department, Lebanon became more marginalized, particularly as the United States became involved more deeply in mediating between Israel and the Arab countries following the October War. Lebanon would only resume its importance after conflict broke out in 1975, though this time in a negative manner: no longer viewed as an asset, Lebanon had now become a potential threat to US interests in the Middle East that needed to be isolated from broader regional affairs.
Second, the United States played a role in the process of Lebanese state collapse. Throughout this period, US policymakers attempted to walk a fine line between contributing to Lebanon’s stability and taking sides in a complex conflict that involved many different sects, ideologies and nationalities. This was not easy. Numerous parties within Lebanon solicited US support, including money, weapons, diplomatic assistance, and promises of military intervention. Most of the time, US officials refused their entreaties, but not always. The United States intervened in internal Lebanese politics in a variety of ways, from providing assistance to the Lebanese state to helping Lebanese militias arm themselves. Through these actions, US officials hoped to have an impact on the balance of power in the country. Beyond this direct role, US policies toward the Middle East, particularly toward the Palestinians, also indirectly contributed to the crisis.
This study sheds light on a number of disputed aspects of the history of US foreign policy and of Lebanon’s national history, including the role of Lebanon in US Middle East policy, the impact of US policy on the Lebanese state, and the origins of the Lebanese Civil War. Three main questions drive the book’s narrative: First, what factors motivated US policy toward Lebanon during this period? Second, how did US policy relate to the origins and outbreak of the Lebanese Civil War? Third, once the conflict broke out, how did the US react to it? The answers to these questions are complicated, but in short, while there is no evidence to support conspiracy theories like Nasrallah’s, US behavior did, in more subtle and indirect ways, profoundly shape Lebanon’s internal politics in the late 1960s and 1970s.
Excerpt from Spheres of Intervention: US Foreign Policy and the Collapse of Lebanon, 1967-1976 by James R. Stocker published by Cornell University Press. ©2016. All rights reserved.
Table of Contents
Spheres of Intervention: US Foreign Policy and the Collapse of Lebanon, 1967-1976 - James R. Stocker
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction: “This is the American Policy”
- US Interests in Lebanon
- Causes of the Lebanese Civil War
- The Course of the Conflict, 1975-76
- Chapter 1: Sparks in the Tinderbox: The United States, the June War, and the Remaking of the Lebanese Crisis
- Lebanese Domestic Tensions on the Eve of the June War
- The United States and Lebanon in the 1960s
- Lebanon's Six Day War
- Pepsi-Cola Hits the Spot
- The Beirut Airport Raid
- Chapter 2: Compromise in Cairo: The Nixon Administration and the Cairo Agreement
- "Trying to Be Helpful"
- The August Attacks and the Rogers Plan
- October Crisis and the Cairo Agreement
- Chapter 3: From Cairo to Amman: The United States and Lebanese Internal Security
- Post-Cairo US Assistance to Lebanon
- Implementing the Cairo Agreement
- The Kahhale Ambush and the Exodus from the South
- Causes of the Calm
- Chapter 4: Plus ça change: International Terrorism, Détente, and the May 1973 Crisis
- The New International Terrorism
- A New Request for Support
- The Israeli Raid on Beirut and the May Crisis
- The Aftermath
- Chapter 5: Reckoning Postponed: From the October War to the Civil War
- The October War and the Start of Negotiations
- Lebanese Domestic Politics after the October War
- Diplomacy on the Rocks
- 6. Disturbing Potential: The United States and the Renewed Conflict
- The Outbreak of Conflict
- The Military Cabinet and Syrian Mediation
- Sinai II and the Resumption of Violence in Lebanon
- The January Cease-Fire
- Chapter 7: Reluctant Interveners: The Red Line Agreement and Brown’s Mediation
- The Constitutional Document and Shifting Alignments
- The Non-Negotiation of the Red Line
- The Brown Mission and the PLO
- From Election to Intervention
- Chapter 8: Taking Its Course: The Syrian Intervention and Its Limits
- Reacting to the Syrian Intervention
- Assassinations and Evacuations
- The New US-Syrian Dialogue
- The Second Syrian Military Offensive and the End of the Conflict
- Red Line Redux? | https://www.jadaliyya.com/Details/33496 |
Note: This blog contains excerpts from the full report. Click here to read or download the full report.
In a new report released today, Enough Project Advisor Suliman Baldo describes the economic vulnerability of the Sudanese government, and why it opens a key window that gives the United States leverage to support a transition to peace in the country.
Khartoum’s Economic Achilles’ Heel: The Intersection of War, Profit, and Greed outlines how Sudan’s urgent economic crisis has caused sanctions relief to replace debt relief as the regime’s primary preoccupation, thus giving the U.S. government powerful leverage to support an inclusive peace deal in Sudan that leads to a transition to democracy. In a situation where grand corruption and mismanagement of mineral resources are among the key drivers of deadly conflicts in Sudan, understanding these economic vulnerabilities in greater detail can equip policymakers to better tailor their financial pressure measures to target top Sudanese leaders and their enablers, who orchestrate large-scale atrocity crimes and theft in Sudan.
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Urge President Obama to Take a New Approach to Sudan Sanctions
When Omar al-Bashir seized power in 1989, the regime and its supporters began to dominate and extract wealth for themselves from the economy’s key strategic and high-value sectors, including the oil, transportation, communications, and construction industries. They also privatized state corporations, giving over the control of these entities to regime-affiliated businesses and charities, and began to operate many state institutions such as the National Intelligence and Security Services (NISS) alongside companies controlled by regime cronies. Through these networks, the Bashir regime effectively hijacked the national economy and exploited that power to generate benefits for themselves.
State-enshrined grand corruption, combined with economic mismanagement and short-sighted, opportunistic overspending of finite public money have left the regime heavily indebted, causing regime officials and their cronies difficulty in supporting the lavish lifestyles to which they have grown accustomed.
The Sudanese government now claims that U.S. sanctions have created the hardships that Sudanese people experience, minimizing the role they themselves have played in mismanaging the economy. They’ve wasted and abused resources, and diverted the Sudanese public’s money away from the productive and human development sectors—particularly agriculture, health, industry, and education—toward private accounts or to fund war against Sudanese citizens in peripheral regions. In addition to devoting a disproportionate share of the national budget to the military and security sector, the regime is also believed to run a covert budget which is not subject to oversight by government agencies. This covert budget is said to benefit interest groups close to the inner circles of power, and to equip the regime’s military, security, and police forces to better repress dissent and challenges to its authority.
The Sudanese government’s vast propaganda campaign has left significant multilateral actors without the leverage or political will that the United States is now in a unique position to deploy.
The report concludes with an acknowledgment and reminder that Sudan will be able to overcome its economic difficulties only when its government makes the welfare and development of its people its top priority. For that to happen, Baldo asserts, the regime has to be seriously and proactively engaged in diplomatic efforts for finding a just and lasting peace for the country with the participation and direct involvement of the opposition, civil society groups, communities affected by Sudan’s many conflicts, and all other stakeholders and actors with influence
Policy Recommendations
The Government of Sudan must:
1. End conflict. Facilitate a genuinely comprehensive and inclusive solution to end Sudan’s civil wars, and steer the country to a democratic transition.
2. Increase accountability. Fight official corruption, and introduce transparency measures. Give Sudan’s independent Auditor’s Chamber prosecutorial powers. Empower other accountability institutions, such as Sudan’s Chamber of Public Grievances (ombudsman chamber), according to well-established international standards. Reform the mandate, composition, and powers of the recently-formed National Anti-Corruption Commission in accordance with international standards and best practice.
3. Protect the independence of the judiciary and the media.
4. Support the tracing and return of stolen public funds.
Sudanese opposition, civil society, academics, and institutional reform experts must:
5. Plan for integration and reform. Work for better coordination and integration of ongoing initiatives for the development of alternative policies for the reform of the economic sector and other sectors vital for the stability of the state in the event of transition to democracy.
6. Research and document all stolen public funds and assets. Prepare plans for the recovery of these assets and for holding accountable those responsible for their diversion.
The African Union and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) must:
7. Support illicit finance investigations. Provide technical assistance to civil society efforts to enable them to identify, investigate, and document illicit financial flows from Sudan, in particular from the diversion of oil revenue. Then, enhance accountability by supporting efforts to recover such funds. | https://enoughproject.org/blog/new-report-khartoums-economic-achilles-heel |
This chapter examines institutional change in the Ottoman economy with a focus on its financial crises and subsequent reform attempts. In the nineteenth century, the administration sought solutions such as the debasement of the coinage and domestic borrowing to finance its deficits. In , the government resorted to foreign borrowing and initiated reforms to improve its financial accounting to gain credibility in foreign markets. The OPDA era saw unprecedented levels of foreign direct investment and played a pivotal role in the integration of the Ottoman Empire into the world economy. Historically , land was the major source of wealth and income for the Ottoman state. It was principally owned by the sultan and was rented out to peasants in return for taxes.
The Great Divergence or European miracle is the socioeconomic shift in which the Western world i. Western Europe and the parts of the New World where its people became the dominant populations overcame pre-modern growth constraints and emerged during the 19th century as the most powerful and wealthy world civilization , eclipsing Mughal India , Qing China , the Islamic world , the kingdoms and empires of Africa , and Tokugawa Japan. Scholars have proposed a wide variety of theories to explain why the Great Divergence happened, including geography , culture , institutions , colonialism , resources and just pure chance. For this reason, the "California school" considers only this to be the great divergence. Technological advances, in areas such as railroads , steamboats , mining , and agriculture , were embraced to a higher degree in the West than the East during the Great Divergence.
Series Editor s : Michael Talbot. As our understanding of Ottoman history continues to evolve, a new generation of scholars are exploring questions of identities, class, society, diplomacy and trade. The British Institute at Ankara BIAA is internationally renowned for its support of new independent academic research in the region across various fields, including archaeology, ancient and modern history, heritage management, social sciences and contemporary issues in public policy, and political sciences. This collaborative collection of specially commissioned books will focus on the identity, history and society of the Ottoman Empire and the world it inhabited, from the reign of Osman I to the dissolution of the Empire in the early s. As an international publisher I.
Request PDF | INCORPORATION TO THE WORLD ECONOMY AND The Ottoman Empire and the World Economy-the Nineteenth Century.
How France's elites used soft power to pursue their imperial ambitions in the nineteenth century After Napoleon's downfall in , France embraced a mostly informal style of empire, one that emphasized economic and cultural influence rather than military conquest. A Velvet Empire is a new global history of French imperialism in the nineteenth century, providing new insights into the mechanisms of imperial collaboration that extended France's power from the Middle East to Latin America and ushered in the modern age of globalization. David Todd shows how French elites pursued a cunning strategy of imperial expansion in which new and conspicuous commodities such as champagne and silk textiles, together with loans to client states, contributed to a global campaign of seduction.
These traits are especially evident in the case of the Ottoman Empire, a powerful state that made a point of modifying its profile for different audiences. Keywords: Customary international law , General principles of international law , Sources of international law. His principal research interests lie in public international law and the history and theory of international law. Access to the complete content on Oxford Handbooks Online requires a subscription or purchase. Public users are able to search the site and view the abstracts and keywords for each book and chapter without a subscription.
Robert Olson, resat kasaba. Suny Series in Middle Eastern Studies. Albany: State University of New York. Most users should sign in with their email address. If you originally registered with a username please use that to sign in.
An important factor in the decline was the increasing lack of ability and power of the sultans themselves. But, while the grand vizier was able to stand in for the sultan in official functions, he could not take his place as the focus of loyalty for all the different classes and groups in the empire. While the sipahi s did not entirely disappear as a military force, the Janissaries and the associated artillery corps became the most important segments of the Ottoman army. In consequence, corruption and nepotism took hold at all levels of administration. Those in power found it more convenient to control the princes by keeping them uneducated and inexperienced, and the old tradition by which young princes were educated in the field was replaced by a system in which all the princes were isolated in the private apartments of the harem and limited to such education as its permanent inhabitants could provide. No matter who controlled the apparatus of government during that time, however, the results were the same—a growing paralysis of administration throughout the empire, increasing anarchy and misrule, and the fracture of society into discrete and increasingly hostile communities. Under such conditions it was inevitable that the Ottoman government could not meet the increasingly difficult problems that plagued the empire in the 16th and 17th centuries.
Бринкерхофф со смущенным видом повернулся к Мидж: - Это Джабба. Он хочет поговорить с. Директор метнул на нее настороженный взгляд, но Мидж уже бежала к аппарату. Она решила включить громкую связь. - Слушаю, Джабба. Металлический голос Джаббы заполнил комнату: - Мидж, я в главном банке данных. У нас тут творятся довольно странные вещи. | https://hampdenlodgethame.org/and-pdf/2687-the-ottoman-empire-and-the-world-economy-the-nineteenth-century-pdf-901-971.php |
Detained Mugabe-era officials denied bail in Zimbabwe
Court denies bail to Robert Mugabe-era officials facing corruption and fraud charges, citing safety concerns.
Harare, Zimbabwe – Zimbabwe‘s former minister of finance and economic development has been denied bail in his corruption trial.
Ignatius Chombo, an ally of ousted Zimbabwean leader Robert Mugabe, is being held “in the interests of his safety” and to prevent any interference with state witnesses, a magistrate’s court said on Monday evening.
Chombo was arrested on Friday and charged with corruption and abuse of power.
Speaking after the hearing, Chombo’s lawyer, Lovemore Madhuku, told Al Jazeera that he was “very disappointed” with the court’s decision.
“There was absolutely no basis for the assertion that he will interfere with state witnesses, nor was there reason to assert that he would abscond and escape the charges,” he said.
Madhuku said Chombo could be remanded at Chikurubi Maximum Security Prison, just outside the capital, Harare, until December 8.
However, Madhuku said he would be preparing an urgent motion with Zimbabwe’s High Court to have the ruling overturned within the next 48 hours.
The charges against Chombo stem from his time as minister of higher education from 1995 to 2000, and as minister of local government, public works and urban development from 2000 to 2015.
They come after a military operation led to Mugabe’s resignation last Tuesday, ending his nearly four decades in power.
Mugabe’s successor, Emmerson Mnangagwa, was inaugurated as the country’s new president on Friday.
Chipanga’s bail denied
Also on Monday, Kudzanai Chipanga, the head of the ruling ZANU-PF Youth League, was denied bail and will be remanded in custody until December 8.
Magistrate Josephine Sande refused to grant Chipanga bail, on the grounds that his security may be at risk if he is released.
Shortly before his arrest on the weekend, Chipanga, a close associate of former First Lady Grace Mugabe, was confronted by protesters who shouted threats at him for his pro-Mugabe stance.
He faces charges of fraud and slander for his criticism of the head of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces, General Constantino Chiwenga.
The charges carry a potential 20-year prison sentence.
Chiwenga had cautioned the then president against carrying out a series of purges within his ruling ZANU-PF regime, shortly before the military action that led to Mugabe’s resignation.
As part of that action, known as Operation Restore Legacy, the military arrested several of Mugabe’s allies.
At least four ministers, including Mugabe’s nephew, Patrick Zhuwao, the former minister of public service, labour and social welfare, have fled the country.
An army spokesperson, Colonel Overson Mugwisi, said some government officials are still in military custody, but said details of their detention will be given at a later stage.
Follow Tendai on Twitter and Instagram, @i_amten. | https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/11/27/detained-mugabe-era-officials-denied-bail-in-zimbabwe/ |
However, it was not hatched in isolation and was influenced by political, social, cultural, technological and scientific trends from the home country, immediate neighbours, Europe and the wider world. The timelines available here try and put the developments that occurred in the acquisition, running and dissolution of Empire into a wider context.
Introduction The outcome of the election was more than a sensation.
It was a political earthquake. Less than 12 weeks earlier, Winston Churchill had announced the unconditional surrender of Nazi Germany.
Churchill wanted his wartime coalition to continue until Japan too had been defeated, but was not unduly dismayed when his Labour ministers insisted that the country be offered a choice. The prime minister called the election for early July, confident that the British people would back the greatest hero of the hour.
The voters wanted an end to wartime austerity, and no return to prewar economic depression. Three years earlier, in the darkest days of the war, they had been offered a tantalising glimpse of how things could be in the bright dawn of victory.
The economist William Beveridge had synthesised the bravest visions of all important government departments into a single breathtaking view of the future. The Beveridge Report spelled out a system of social insurance, covering every citizen regardless of income. It offered nothing less than a cradle-to-grave welfare state.
That was the great promise dangled before the British electorate in There were other factors too. The Labour party had held office only twice before, in and inbut during the war years its leadership had acquired both experience and trust. It now looked like a party of government. Then there was the military vote.
Britain had millions of men and women in uniform inscattered over Europe, the far east, and elsewhere. They, more than any other section of the electorate, yearned for change and for a better civilian life. The military vote was overwhelmingly pro-Labour. Many students of the election believe that a key role was played by the Daily Mirrorthen the biggest selling paper in Britain, and easily the most popular among the armed forces.
It showed a battered, bandaged Allied soldier holding out to the reader a slip of paper marked Victory and Peace in Europe.
Under the drawing was the caption "Here you are! But when the result was announced on July 26 - three weeks after polling day to allow military postal votes to be counted - it was clear that postwar politics had changed utterly.Looking for details on a British Army officer not listed here yet?
Just e-mail me, and I might be able to help out. Of course, any additions, corrections etc. can also be e-mailed.
The Labour Party is a centre-left political party in the United initiativeblog.com has been described as a broad church, bringing together an alliance of social-democratic, democratic socialist and trade unionist outlooks.
The party's platform emphasises greater state intervention, social justice and strengthening workers' rights. Labour is a full member of the Party of European Socialists and.
the plutocracy cartel an entrenched global elite of vast wealth has spread its tentacles over the earth wielding extraordinary power over world affairs.
The Welfare Reforms of the Labour Government ! Part 1 Essay Types & Creation of the Welfare State? The Welfare Reforms of the Labour Government ! Exam Essay Questions How successful were the reforms in improving social conditions in Britain? How e"ective were the reforms in dealing with the problems facing Britain .
As a result of the General Election that followed, the Labour Government took office on July 26, Eleven days later, on August 6, the first atom bomb was dropped on Hiroshima. The second atom bomb devastated Nagasaki on August 9.
The Welfare State under Labour Was it a Success? 2 Table of Contents Welfare administration dealing with Social Services in , as a major branch of welfare, dealt with five main measures to realize at some extent the British welfare A Labour government was elected to power in Britain for the first time with an.
the Labour Party formed the government in July, Clement Atlee became Prime Minister. Aneurin Bevan became Minister for Health. Between and , the Labour Government passed a series of measures which became known as the ‘Welfare State’. These reforms were designed to take care of the British people 'from the cradle to the . Chapter Labour and the tripartite system. Background. The war in Europe ended in May Labour refused to accept Churchill's invitation to continue the coalition government until the war in the Far East was over, so for two months - from 25 May to 26 July - the Conservative Party ruled alone. Adeolti Jan, , on Sunday Sun – Newspaper p. 18, reporting on the relationship between labour and government as friendly which is envisaged in the personal relationship between chief Obasanjo and Comrade Oshiomole but reiterated that when the issue of any policy inimical to the plight of workers and masses are initiated by the government, like the hike in the price of fuel, Oshiomole. | https://lixofau.initiativeblog.com/how-successful-was-the-labour-government-of-1945-1951-in-dealing-with-the-problems-of-britain-50850bn.html |
The coming into power of Major General Mohammed Buhari in 1983 marked the end of second republic civilian regime and the beginning of the march towards the third republic. The new head of administration enunciated a ten point agenda programme (Buhari, 1984), which unfortunately did not include the question of return to civil rule. He believed that the major problem that Nigeria had was how to revive the economy of the country, ensure discipline at home and respect abroad (Sunday Times, 1984: 11). This created an impression that the transition to democracy was not a priority issue to Buhari administration. This led to lack of popular support for the Buhari administration and consequent condemnation of the head of state who was overthrown in August 1985 (Olagunju et. al 1993).
The August 27, 1985 coup which was premised on economic and political reforms brought Major Gen. Ibrahim Babangida to power. There was from the beginning, a disguised commitment to military disengagement and to the required economic, political and socio-cultural reforms which are vital to the creation of a viable environment for re-democratization on Nigeria. However, the military disengagement or transition timetable as well as content and trajectories of the reforms were vague, which made them subject of robust debate within the Gen. Babangida administration. Within the first 100 days, Gen. Babangida embarked on what looked like a meaningful political and economic consolidation. The period between September 1985 and January 1986 was significant in the foundation of the third republic as at starkly and poignantly showed (Olagunju, etal, 1993: 88). To further strengthen the march to democratic governance, the administration established some socio-political infrastructures, such as Center for Democratic studies (CDC) and Mass Mobilization for Social Justice and Economic Recovery (MAMSER), as the administration viewed public mobilization as a vital process in the actualization of democratic governance. The Constituent Assembly and Constitution Drafting Committee were also engaged in the process.
In the process of political transition under Gen. Babangida administration, lots of uncertainties were revealed. Prominent among this was the issue of terminal date of military rule, which was not explicitly clear in the transition calendar. The programme was staggered between 1987 and 1992, which attracted series of conflicts in its actualization. According to Olagunju, et al. (1993) the political Bureau contained two proposed conflicting time tables of major events and land marks in the transition. A major departure from the original time-table irrespective of the various shifts and changes was the constitutions of the national assembly without an executive president for the country. This led to the apogee of political administration in Nigeria being diarchical, with a military Head of State presiding over a country with democratically constituted national and state assemblies. Even though some notable Nigerians such as Azikiwe (1984) proposed the diarchy Thesis as the panacea for a stable and non-military incursion into the body polity of the nation, the transitional programme did not make any provision for such
1.2 Statement of the Problem
Major-General Muhammadu Buhari rose to become Nigeria‟s head of state and Commander-in- Chief from December 31, 1983, and his government ended August 27, 1985. He became head of state as a result of military coup d‟état which deposed civilian president Shehu Shagari. The military accused the civilian authorities of mismanaging the economy, corruption, civil disorder and uncertainty in which the nation found itself under the leadership of the former civilian government. General Buhari government focused on fighting corruption especially those committed by former government and businessmen with a link to government, as a result of the corruption drive over 500 officials of government, politicians, and people in business were thrown into prisons and tried to the military tribunal‟s setup. In his inaugural speech, General Buharistated:“to put an end to the serious economic predicament and the serious crisis of confidence now afflicting our nation”. Akinboye, S.O., (2005). With the start of its administration, the Buhari administration prided itself as an offshoot of Murtala/Obasanjo government, it hereafter built it foreign policy after that of the previous military regime. In one case, in following suits of Murtala/Obasanjo, which recognised MPLA in Angola, the Buhari regime recognised Polisario government in Western Sahara despite opposition from fellow African states. The regime also re-launched commitment to the liberation of South Africa from the apartheid regime Abegunrin, O. (2003. The key features of the General Muhammadu Buhari foreign policy wereits relations with Nigeria ECOWAS neighbours, Nigeria-Africa relations and a diplomaticface-off between Nigeria-Britain.
1.3 Aims and Objectives of the Study
Based on the pertinent questions set to be addressed in this paper, the main objective therefore is a comparative study of Major General Muhammadu Buhari1983-1985 And General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida 1985-1993 Military regime.
1.4 Significant Of The Study
At the theoretical level therefore, this study promises to be a rich contribution to the existing pool of knowledge on the nexus between civilian and military regime. This effort is particularly relevant in that even though a number of theoretical and empirical studies on military regime exist, there is as yet a dearth of empirical studies on the comparative study of Major General Muhammadu Buhari1983-1985 And General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida 1985-1993 Military regime.
The study will therefore be a useful resource for scholars, students and sundry researchers interested in further exploring this area.
At the practical level, the study will be of paramount importance to policy makers of developing countries, especially in Nigeria as it provides a practical guide for the understanding of the seeming contradiction between the variables: military regime
1.5 Scope of the Study
This study is centered on the comparative study of Major General Muhammadu Buhari 1983-1985 And General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida 1985-1993. The study were however restricted the Military juntas of Buhari and IBB.
1.6 Research Questions
- How does Nigerian Foreign policy looks like during the military juntas of Major General Muhammadu And General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida
- Does Mohammadu Buhari ‘s War against Indiscipline during the military regime a success or failure?
1.7 Operational Definition Of Terms
Juntas; a military group that rules a country after taking power by force.
Transition: this is the change of government, from civilian to military regime,viz-versa
Coup: a sudden, violent, and illegal seizure of power from a government.
Foreign policy : a government’s strategy in dealing with other nations.
1.8 Theoretical Framework
The work adopts role theory as guide to the study. The role theory is derived from the concept of role as used by psychologists and anthropologists in distinguishing individual or group role perceptions and actual performance in any social gathering. This could be family, peer group, religious group, workplace, community, market and in this case, the political groups (Folarin, 2010:89). According to Biddle (1986:68), role theory concerns one of the most important characteristics of social behavior – the fact that human beings behave in ways that are different and predictable depending on their respective social identities and the situation. He argued that role theory explains roles by presuming that persons are members of social positions and hold expectations for their own behaviours and those of other persons.
Again, Folarin (2010:93) argued that role theorists see role theory as one of the most compelling instruments bridging individual behaviour and social structure. According to him, roles, which are in part dictated by social structure and in part by social interactions, guide the behaviour of the group or individual. He concluded that, the group, in turn, influences the norms, expectations, and behaviours associated with roles. In other words, the understanding is reciprocal and didactic. It is in this sense that, the adoption of role theory to interpret the foreign policy behaviours of the Nigerian state, represented by different actors with different ideological and political orientations explain the role confusions and dissonance that have become the hallmark in the conception, formulation and implementation of the country’s foreign policy. A logical outcome of these behavioural patterns explain Nigeria’s national and international image dilemma.
1.9 Literature Review
The most populous country on the African continent, the Nigerian experience with democracy has been paradoxical and ambiguous (Diamond, 1995). Although the military controlled the government for twenty-four of the first thirty-four years of independence, Nigeria has never accepted indefinite authoritarian rule, and no military rule that has not committed itself to a transition to democracy has been able to survive. Through ten national government, ix successful military coups, a civil war, and a dizzying economic boom followed by a crushing depression – not to mention repeated assaults by military regimes on human rights and associational life Nigerians have maintained a passionate commitment to personal freedom and political participation.
The various military regimes, in Nigeria have embarked on lasting reforms that have transformed Nigeria polity, hence, their impacts are seen in political and economic spheres (Aliu, 2000). The impacts of military rule in Nigeria is seen in political and economic lives. These have both positive and negative effects, politically the military has contributed immensely to the development of Nigeria through state and local government creation exercise, constitutional engineering and enunciation of transitional programmes. The military regimes that came to power had in their various ways contributed to the realization of the unity in Nigeria, on the other hand, military regimes had contributed to democratic instability and human right abuse in the country.
On the economic scene, the contributions of military rule is also felt, whether positive or negative. The military economic contributions and policies formulation and implementation for instance, the Nigeria Enterprises promotion Decree of 1972/1977 or the indigenization policy was formulated by the military rule. Additionally, the introduction of Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP) by Babangida regime was aimed at revamping nation’s economy. Some other economy policies of successive military regimes in Nigeria are the National Directorate of Employment (NDE) Directorate of Food, Roads and Rural Infrastructures (DFRRI). Operation Feed the Nation (OFN) and so on.
1.10METHODOLOGY
This paper utilises secondary sources of data for the research; this includes journals, relevant books, periodicals, newspapers reports, internet sources, government releases, and pronouncement. | https://projectstore.com.ng/a-comparative-study-of-major-general-muhammadu-buhari-1983-1985-and-general-ibrahim-badamasi-babangida-1985-1993-military-regime/ |
TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — Several thousand Israelis rallied Saturday to demonstrate against a unity government deal reached last week that leaves Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in power as he prepares to go on trial for corruption charges.
The protesters oppose having Netanyahu as prime minister as long as he is a criminal suspect. The protesters say the unity government agreement, which gives Netanyahu influence over the appointment of judges and legal officials, “crushes democracy” and is meant to rescue Netanyahu from his legal troubles.
Netanyahu is scheduled to face trial next month on charges of fraud, breach of trust and accepting bribes. He denies the charges.
The protest filled central Tel Aviv’s Rabin Square, although demonstrators maintained distance from each other in line with health regulations in place for weeks meant to halt the spread of the coronavirus. Protesters, wearing face masks, waved Israeli flags and signs calling out Netanyahu for corruption.
Netanyahu and former military chief Benny Gantz, leader of the Blue and White party, signed the power-sharing agreement after weeks of negotiations for what they termed a “national emergency” government meant to steer the country through the coronavirus outbreak.
The agreement delivered Netanyahu a significant boost as he fought to hold on to power while fending off the corruption charges. His party will gain influence over judicial appointments, which could help Netanyahu if his case reaches the Supreme Court.
The deal requires the approval of both parties on key appointments, including the attorney general and the state prosecutor, granting Netanyahu veto power over the officials who hold sway over his legal fate. | https://www.koin.com/news/international/thousands-demonstrate-against-israeli-coalition-deal/ |
This is a guest post from New Deal 2.0.
With rampant corruption and elitism, America could be following the path of the Roman Republic.
“But, as statesmen, even these better aristocrats were not much less remiss and shortsighted than the average senators of the time. In presence of an outward foe the more eminent among them, doubtless, proved themselves useful and brave; but no one of them evinced the desire or the skill to solve the problems of politics proper, and to guide the vessel of the state through the stormy sea of intrigues and factions as a true pilot. Their political wisdom was limited to a sincere belief in the oligarchy as the sole means of salvation, and to a cordial hatred and courageous execration of demagogism as well as of every individual authority which sought to emancipate itself. Their petty ambition was contented with little.”
– Theodor Mommsen, History of Rome — the quote describes the political class of the Roman Republic’s last decades.
A century ago, Theodor Mommsen was globally renown for his history of the Roman Republic. For some reason, the book went out of print around WWII and never came back. Which is unfortunate, for Mommsen’s chronicles of the last decades of the republic are extremely relevant history for contemporary Americans. Remember, the Roman republic flourished from 500 BC to 50 BC, when it fell at the hands of Caesar. Of course today, if ever an American thinks of Rome, they undoubtedly think of Imperial Rome, the age of the emperors and its inglorious fall chronicled by Gibbon. Yet, Gibbon’s history begins where Mommsen’s ends. The fall of the Roman Republic was well known to America’s founders and its lessons well contemplated, for unlike Imperial Rome, the Republic fell at the height of its economic and military power. By the end, Rome’s politics were eminently corrupt and the weight of the empire that was conquered collapsed the unique system of self-government that had been created.
With most recent examples of the health care bill, the financial industry bill, the continued electoral buying and selling of our elected officials, and the growing ineptitude and corruption of our government agencies (the most recently reported in the MMS) who are responsible for regulation of the oil industry, it is obvious for all who care to look, we are on the same path of the Roman republic. And just as Rome, our political class’ petty ambition is content with little. Mommsen wrote history’s cold verdict on the republic’s fall:
“But, when a government cannot govern, it ceases to be legitimate, and whoever has the power has also the right to overthrow it. It is, no doubt, unhappily true that an incapable and flagitious government may for a long period trample under foot the welfare and honour of the land, before the men are found who are able and willing to wield against that government the formidable weapons of its own forging, and to evoke out of the moral revolt of the good and the distress of the many the revolution which is in such a case legitimate. But if the game attempted with the fortunes of nations may be a merry one and may be played perhaps for a long time without molestation, it is a treacherous game, which in its own time entraps the players; and no one then blames the axe, if it is laid to the root of the tree that bears such fruits. For the Roman oligarchy the time had now come.”
In his last years, Mommsen gave a series of lectures on Rome’s early emperors. When asked why he didn’t put them together in a book, he declared, “It’s too depressing.” The Roman republic’s decline took course over seven decades, from the Gracchi, maybe the republic’s last true reformers, to Caesar. The real question for us is, unlike the Romans, will we stand up and reform our unique system of self-government that has provided so much to us all? Or as Rome, will we simply succumb to a neo-Caesar? I’ve come to empathise a great deal more with the Republic’s last great defender, Cicero. I used to consider him completely politically inept, but over the years, through experience, I have developed a much greater sympathy for the environment in which he toiled. Cicero wrote,
“Long before our time the customs of our ancestors moulded admirable men, in turn these men upheld the ways and institutions of their forebears. Our age, however, inherited the Republic as if it were some beautiful painting of bygone ages, its colours already fading through great antiquity; and not only has our time neglected to freshen the colours of the picture, but we have failed to preserve its forms and outlines.”
Joe Costello was communications director for Jerry Brown’s 1992 presidential campaign and was a senior adviser for Howard Dean’s effort in 2004.
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Ottoman Albania comprised Albania during the period it was part of the Ottoman Empire, from 1385 to 1912. Ottoman rule in Albania began after the Battle of Savra in 1385 when most of the local chieftains became Ottoman vassals. The Ottomans erected their garrisons throughout southern Albania by 1415 and established formal jurisdiction over most of Albania by 1431. Independence for some Albanian regions was gained during 1443-1479, with the uprising under the lead of George Kastrioti Skanderbeg. The last towns captured by the Ottomans were Shkodër in 1479 and Durrës in 1501. The territory which today belongs to the Republic of Albania remained part of the Ottoman Empire until declaring independence in 1912 during the Balkan Wars.
The Ottomans expanded their empire from Anatolia to the Balkans in the 14th century. They crossed the Bosporus in 1352, and they crushed a Serbian army in the Battle of Maritsa in 1371 and Battle of Kosovo in 1389. Europe gained a brief respite from Ottoman pressure in 1402 when the Mongol leader, Tamerlane, attacked Anatolia from the east, killed the Turks' absolute ruler, the Sultan, and sparked a civil war. When order was restored, the Ottomans renewed their westward progress. In 1453, Sultan Mehmed II's forces overran Constantinople and killed the last Byzantine emperor.
The division of the Albanian-populated lands into small, quarreling fiefdoms ruled by independent feudal lords and tribal chiefs made them easy prey for the Ottoman armies. In 1385, the Albanian ruler of Durrës, Karl Thopia, appealed to the sultan for support against his rivals, the Balšić noble family. An Ottoman force quickly marched into Albania along the Via Egnatia and routed Balsha II in the Battle of Savra. The principal Albanian clans soon swore fealty to the Ottoman Empire. Gjirokastra became the county town of the Sanjak of Albania in 1419. Sultan Murad II launched the major Ottoman onslaught in the Balkans in 1423, and the Turks took Ioannina in 1431 and Arta, on the Ionian coast, in 1449. The Turks allowed conquered Albanian clan chiefs to maintain their positions and property, but they had to pay tribute, send their sons to the Turkish court as hostages, and provide the Ottoman army with auxiliary troops.
The Albanians' resistance to the Turks in the mid-15th century won them acclaim all over Europe. Gjon Kastrioti of Krujë was one of the Albanian clan leaders who submitted to Turkish suzerainty. He was compelled to send his four sons to the Ottoman capital to be trained for military service. The youngest, George Kastrioti (1403–68), who would become the Albanians' national hero, captured the sultan's attention. Renamed Iskander when he converted to Islam, the young man participated in military expeditions to Asia Minor and Europe. When appointed to administer a Balkan district, Iskander became known as Skanderbeg. After Ottoman forces under Skanderbeg's command suffered defeat in a battle near Niš in present-day Serbia in 1443, Skanderbeg rushed to Krujë and tricked a Turkish pasha into surrendering the Albanian fortress. Skanderbeg then embraced Roman Catholicism and declared a holy war against the Turks.
Köprülü Mehmed Pasha was the most powerful Ottoman Grand Vizier of Albanian origins.
On 1 March 1444, Albanian chieftains gathered in the cathedral of Lezhë with the prince of Montenegro and delegates from Venice and proclaimed Skanderbeg commander of the Albanian resistance. All of Albania, accepted his leadership against the Ottomans, but local leaders kept control of their own districts. Under a red flag bearing Skanderbeg's heraldic emblem, an Albanian force of about 10,000-15.000 men held off Ottoman campaigns against their lands for twenty-four years. Three times the Albanians overcame sieges of Krujë. In 1450, the Albanians routed Sultan Murad II himself. Later, they repulsed attacks led by Sultan Mehmed II in 1466 and 1467. In 1461, Skanderbeg went to the aid of his suzerain, King Alfonso I of Naples, against the kings of Sicily. The government under Skanderbeg was unstable, however, and at times local Albanian rulers cooperated with the Ottomans against him.
With political and minor material support from the Kingdom of Naples and the Vatican, resistance to the Ottoman Empire continued for 35 years. Krujë fell to the Ottomans only in 1478, ten years after the death of Skanderbeg; Shkodër succumbed in 1479 after a failed siege in 1474 and a stronger siege in 1478 that ended with Venice ceding Shkodra to the Ottomans. The Venetians then evacuated Durrës, in 1501. The conquests triggered a great Albanian exodus to Venice and Italy, especially to the kingdom of Naples, as well as to Sicily, Romania and Egypt. Most of the Albanian refugees belonged to the Orthodox Church. The Albanians of Italy significantly influenced the Albanian national movement in future centuries, and Albanian Franciscan priests, most of whom were descended from émigrés to Italy, played a significant role in the preservation of Catholicism in Albania's northern regions.
Skanderbeg’s long struggle to keep Albania free became highly significant to the Albanian people, as it strengthened their solidarity, made them more conscious of their national identity, and served later as a great source of inspiration in their struggle for national unity, freedom, and independence. The memory of the mid-15th century resistance under Skanderbeg continues to be important to Albanians, and his family's banner, bearing a black two-headed eagle on a red field, became the flag under which the Albanian national movement rallied centuries later.
After the death of Skenderbeg and the fall of Kruje, the Ottoman Empire gained control of the vast ethnic Albanian territories and many new changes began to take place.
Among the biggest transformation was that the Albanian population gradually began to convert to Islam through the teachings of Bektashism, in order to gain considerable advantages in the Ottoman trade networks, bureaucracy and army. Many Albanians were recruited into the Ottoman Janissary and Devşirme and 42 Grand Viziers of the Ottoman Empire were of Albanian origin. The most prominent Albanians during Ottoman rule were: George Kastrioti Skanderbeg, Ballaban Badera, Koca Davud Pasha, Hamza Kastrioti, Iljaz Hoxha, Mimar Sinan, Nezim Frakulla, Köprülü Mehmed Pasha, Ali Pasha, Edhem Pasha, Omer Vrioni, Patrona Halil, Haxhi Shehreti, Ali Pasha of Gucia, Ibrahim Pasha of Berat, Köprülü Fazıl Ahmed, Muhammad Ali of Egypt, Kara Mahmud Bushati, Kara Murad Pasha, Ahmet Kurt Pasha, Mustafa Bushati, Ibrahim Bushati, Sedefkar Mehmed Agha.
Albanians also played a crucial role during the Ottoman–Venetian War (1499–1503), Ottoman–Hungarian Wars and Ottoman–Habsburg wars before gaining Independence.
The Fethiye Mosque just adjacent toAli Pasha's grave.
Ali Pasha of Tepelenë is one of the most famous Albanians in Ottoman history.
The weakening of Ottoman central authority and the timar system brought anarchy to the Albanian-populated lands. In the late 18th century, two Albanian centers of power emerged: Shkodër, under the Bushati family; and Ioannina, under Ali Pasha ofTepelenë. When it suited their goals, both places cooperated with the Sublime Porte, and when it was expedient to defy the central government, each acted independently.
The Bushati family dominated the Shkodër region through a network of alliances with various highland tribes. Kara Mahmud Bushati attempted to establish an autonomous principality and expand the lands under his control by playing off Austria and Russia against the Sublime Porte. In 1785, Kara Mahmud's forces attacked Montenegrin territory, and Austria offered to recognize him as the ruler of all Albania if he would ally himself with Vienna against the Sublime Porte. Seizing an opportunity, Kara Mahmud sent the sultan the heads of an Austrian delegation in 1788, and the Ottomans appointed him governor of Shkodër. When he attempted to wrest land from Montenegro in 1796, however, he was defeated and beheaded. Kara Mahmud's brother, Ibrahim Bushati, cooperated with the Sublime Porte until his death in 1810, but his successor, Mustafa Pasha Bushati, proved to be recalcitrant despite participation in Ottoman military campaigns against Greek revolutionaries and rebel pashas. He cooperated with the mountain tribes and brought a large area under his control.
South of the Shkumbini River, the mostly peasant Tosks lived in compact villages under elected rulers. Some Tosks living in settlements high in the mountains maintained their independence and often escaped payment of taxes. The Tosks of the lowlands, however, were easy for the Ottoman authorities to control. The Albanian tribal system disappeared there, and the Ottomans imposed a system of military fiefs under which the sultan granted soldiers and cavalrymen temporary landholdings, or timars, in exchange for military service. By the 18th century, many military fiefs had effectively become the hereditary landholdings of economically and politically powerful families who squeezed wealth from their hard-strapped Christian and Muslim tenant farmers. The beys, like the clan chiefs of the northern mountains, became virtually independent rulers in their own provinces, had their own military contingents, and often waged war against each other to increase their landholdings and power. The Sublime Porte attempted to press a divide-and-rule policy to keep the local beys from uniting and posing a threat to Ottoman rule itself, but with little success.
Janissary guns from the year 1826, during the Auspicious Incident.
Ottoman-Albanian relations worsened in the year 1826 during the reign of Mahmud II, he had instigated the notorious Auspicious Incident and the turmoil that followed caused the violent dissolution of the Janissary,Devşirme and the entire Balkan Muslim leadership in Rumelia causing a new wave of revolts and instability in the gradually weakening Ottoman Empire.
After crushing the Bushatis and Ali Pasha, the Sublime Porte introduced a series of reforms, known as the tanzimat, which were aimed at strengthening the empire by reining in fractious pashas. The timars officially became large individual landholdings, especially in the lowlands. In 1835, the Sublime Porte divided the Albanian-populated lands into the vilayets of Janina and Rumelia and dispatched officials from Constantinople to administer them. This provoked a series of revolts in 1843–1844, but they were suppressed by the Ottoman army.
After 1865, the central authorities redivided the Albanian lands between the vilayets of Scutari, Janina, and Monastir. The reforms angered the highland Albanian chieftains, who found their privileges reduced with no apparent compensation, and the authorities eventually abandoned efforts to control them. Ottoman troops crushed local rebellions in the lowlands, however, and conditions there remained bleak. The religious division of the northern Albanian tribes brought them into opposition. The Muslim northern Albanian tribes participated in the Ottoman campaigns against Christian Albanian tribes, such as in 1876 when they devastated the territory populated by the Mirdite Catholics. Large numbers of Tosks emigrated to join sizable Albanian émigré communities in Romania, Egypt, Bulgaria, Constantinople, southern Italy, and later the United States.
The 4 Ottoman vilayets (Kosovo,Scutari, Monastir and Janina), proposed to form the Albanian Vilayet.
In 1906 opposition groups in the Ottoman Empire emerged, one of which evolved into the Committee of Union and Progress, more commonly known as the Young Turks, which proposed restoring constitutional government in Constantinople, by revolution if necessary. In July 1908, a month after a Young Turk rebellion in Macedonia supported by an Albanian uprising in Kosovo and Vardar Macedonia escalated into widespread insurrection and mutiny within the imperial army, Sultan Abdül Hamid II agreed to demands by the Young Turks to restore constitutional rule. Many Albanians participated in the Young Turks uprising, hoping that it would gain their people autonomy within the empire. The Young Turks lifted the Ottoman ban on Albanian-language schools and on writing the Albanian language. As a consequence, Albanian intellectuals meeting in Bitola in 1908 chose the Latin alphabet as a standard script. The Young Turks, however, were set on maintaining the empire and not interested in making concessions to the myriad nationalist groups within its borders. After securing the abdication of Abdül Hamid II in April 1909, the new authorities levied taxes, outlawed guerrilla groups and nationalist societies, and attempted to extend Constantinople's control over the northern Albanian mountainmen. In addition, the Young Turks legalized thebastinado, or beating with a stick, even for misdemeanors, banned carrying rifles, and denied the existence of an Albanian nationality. The new government also appealed for Islamic solidarity to break the Albanians' unity and used the Muslim clergy to try to impose the Arabic alphabet.
The Albanians refused to submit to the Young Turks' campaign to "Ottomanize" them by force. New Albanian uprisings began in Kosovo and the northern mountains in early April 1910. Ottoman forces quashed these rebellions after three months, outlawed Albanian organizations, disarmed entire regions, and closed down schools and publications. Montenegro, preparing to grab Albanian-populated lands for itself, supported a 1911 uprising by the mountain tribes against the Young Turks regime that grew into a widespread revolt. Unable to control the Albanians by force, the Ottoman government granted concessions on schools, military recruitment, and taxation and sanctioned the use of the Latin script for the Albanian language. The government refused, however, to unite the four Albanian-inhabited vilayets into one, Albanian vilayet.
Administratively, the Ottomans divided the Albanian-inhabited lands among a number of districts, or vilayets. The Ottoman authorities did not initially stress conversion to Islam.
By 1479, the entire country, except for Durrës, Ulcinj and Bar, was under Ottoman suzerainty. Prominent viziers and pashas hailed from Albania, and were appointed to their posts long before the majority of Albanians professed Islam.
Albanian mercenaries in the Ottoman Army in the year 1857.
For details of : State OrganizationThe Ottoman sultan considered himself God's agent on Earth, the leader of a religious—not a national—state whose purpose was to defend and propagate Islam. Non-Muslims paid extra taxes and held an inferior status, but they could retain their old religion and a large measure of local autonomy. By converting to Islam, individuals among the conquered could elevate themselves to the privileged stratum of society. In the early years of the empire, all Ottoman high officials were the sultan's bondsmen the children of Christian subjects chosen in childhood for their promise, converted to Islam, and educated to serve. Some were selected from prisoners of war, others sent as gifts, and still others obtained through devshirme, the tribute of children levied in the Ottoman Empire's Balkan lands. Many of the best fighters in the sultan's elite guard, the janissaries, were conscripted as young boys from Christian Albanian families, and high-ranking Ottoman officials often had Albanian bodyguards.
According to historian Zija Shkodra, Albania was developed as much as the rest of the Balkans. In the mountains north of the Shkumbini River, Geg herders maintained their self-governing society base on clans. An association of clans was called a bajrak.
Taxes on the northern tribes were difficult if not impossible for the Ottomans to collect because of the rough terrain and fierceness of the Albanian highlanders. Some mountain tribes succeeded in defending their independence through the centuries of Ottoman rule, engaging in intermittent guerrilla warfare with the Ottomans, who never deemed it worthwhile to subjugate them.
Until recent times, Geg clan chiefs, or bajraktars, exercised patriarchal powers, arranged marriages, mediated quarrels, and meted out punishments. The tribesmen of the northern Albanian mountains recognized no law but the Code of Lekë Dukagjini (Kanuni i Lekë Dukagjinit), a collection of tribal laws transcribed in the 14th century by a Roman Catholic priest. The code regulates a variety of subjects, including blood vengeance. Even today, many Albanian highlanders regard the canon as the supreme law of the land.
For more details on this topic, see Millet (Ottoman Empire).
The Albanian, Abdurrahman Abdi Arnavut was one of the most important Ottoman commanders during the War of the Holy League.
Five centuries of Ottoman rule grouped the Albanian people along religious, regional, and tribal lines. In the early 17th century, however, Albanians converted to Islam in large numbers. Within a century, the Muslim Albanian community was the largest religious community in the country. Albanians in this time were divided into two distinct tribal and dialectal groupings: the Gegs and Tosks (see Albanian language). In the rugged northern mountains, Geg shepherds lived in a tribal society often completely independent of Ottoman rule. In the south, peasant Muslim and Orthodox Tosks worked the land for Muslim beys, provincial rulers who frequently revolted against the sultan's authority.
In the early 17th century, many Albanian converts to Islam migrated elsewhere within the Ottoman Empire and found careers in the Ottoman military and government. Some attained powerful positions in the Ottoman administration. About thirty Albanians rose to the position of grand vizier, chief deputy to the sultan himself. In the second half of the 17th century, the Albanian Köprülü family provided four grand viziers, who fought against corruption, temporarily shored up eroding central government control over rapacious local beys, and won several military victories.
As early as the 18th century, a mystic Islamic sect, the Bektashi dervishes, spread into the empire's Albanian-populated lands. Probably founded in the late 13th century in Anatolia, Bektashism became the janissaries' official faith in the late 16th century. The Bektashi sect contains features quite distinct from normative Islam and emphasizes man as a reflection of the Divine. Women, unveiled, participate in Bektashi ceremonies on an equal basis, and the celebrants use wine despite the ban on alcohol in the Sharia. The Bektashis became the largest religious group in southern Albania after the sultan disbanded the janissaries in 1826. Bektashi leaders played key roles in the Albanian nationalist movement of the late 19th century and were to a great degree responsible for the Albanians' traditional tolerance of religious differences.
In the 19th century, the Ottoman sultans tried in vain to shore up their collapsing empire by introducing a series of reforms aimed at reining in recalcitrant local officials and dousing the fires of nationalism among its myriad peoples. The power of nationalism, however, proved too strong to counteract.
Dimitris J. Kastritsis, The Sons of Bayezid: Empire building and Representation in the Ottoman Civil War of 1402–1413, (BRILL, 2007), 1–3.
Raymond Zickel and Walter R. Iwaskiw (1994). "Albania: A Country Study ("The Ottoman Conquest of Albania")". Retrieved 9 April 2008.
Riza, Emin (1992). "Ethnographic and open-air museums" (PDF). UNESCO, Paris. Retrieved 18 March 2011.
Raymond Zickel and Walter R. Iwaskiw (1994). "Albania: A Country Study ("Local Albanian Leaders in the Early 19th Century")". Retrieved 9 April 2008.
Raymond Zickel and Walter R. Iwaskiw (1994). "Albania: A Country Study ("Albanians under Ottoman Rule")". Retrieved 9 April 2008.
Vickers, Miranda (1999). The Albanians: A Modern History. I.B.Tauris. p. 30. ISBN 978-1-86064-541-9. | https://albanianstudies.weebly.com/ottoman-era.html |
The US sows hysteria about China because Washington can no longer dictate global affairs without any significant challenge.
The following remarks were given by this writer at a symposium organized by the Black Alliance for Peace on September 24th entitled “Full Spectrum Dominance: From AFRICOM to the Indo-Pacific Command.”
Greetings Comrades,
It is an honor to be speaking at this symposium organized by the Black Alliance for Peace on behalf of the No Cold War campaign. I am also humbled to be a co-coordinator of BAP’s Supporter Network and to assist in whatever capacity possible to strengthen Black and African-led organizations such as BAP working toward peace and liberation.
We have a monumental problem on our hands. The issue of the U.S.’ policy of Full-spectrum Dominance is one that is connected to a host of contradictions afflicting the U.S. imperial order at this time. For nearly a decade, U.S. military power has made an enormous strategic shift to both the Asia Pacific and to Africa. At the center of the transition is the growth of China as an economic world power and the decline of the U.S. as a global hegemon.
China has much to offer Africa and the Global South at this time. China shares a common history of colonialism and imperialist humiliation with Africa. It has the experience of successfully carrying out a struggle for national liberation and defending that struggle from the challenges of a hostile global context. And now, China is in possession of an economic miracle that it is committed to sharing with African nations as well as nations in Latin America and Asia. That miracle comes with advanced infrastructure such as high-speed rail and 5G technology , both of which are a necessity for breaking down some of the barriers to economic sovereignty that colonial underdevelopment has placed on much of the Global South, Africa included.
The “China threat” mentioned so often by U.S. officials in all quarters of Washington D.C. is a different kind of projection of power—a psychological projection of the coming end of the U.S.’ ability to dictate global affairs without any significant challenge. The United States, unlike China, has little to offer Africa or the rest of the Global South. U.S. share in the global economy has shrunk and the economic crisis precipitated by the COVID-19 pandemic will only accelerate this trend. Many nations in the Global South, especially African nations, have experienced generation after generation of poverty and underdevelopment under the U.S.-dominated financial arrangements of the IMF and World Bank . U.S. imperialism has deployed much of its military arsenal to Africa and Asia to arrest the possibility of South-South cooperation replacing U.S. and Western domination.
The U.S. ruling class is not in complete agreement over how to carry out the related tasks of containing China and suppressing the self-determination of African nations. Former president Barack Obama expanded the U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) to all but a single African country principally to gain political and military influence over African governments and persuade them over time to reject China. AFRICOM’s growth also aligned with the Obama administration’s “Pivot to Asia,” which ultimately laid the basis for the massive militarization of the Asia Pacific that Trump now oversees. China’s containment was primarily regarded as a project of military coercion where nations in Africa and Asia would bow to the dictates of the United States without needing to engage in direct conflict with China.
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Large sections of the Pentagon were not satisfied with this strategy. Out of the lust for a more confrontational approach with China came the strategy of “Great Power competition.” This strategy did not neglect the “Pivot to Asia” but rather buttressed the military encirclement of China with a host of maneuvers. Even more military assets have been shifted to the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, once called the Pacific Command, to the point of potentially draining AFRICOM of its own military resources. This would, as AFRICOM Commander General Stephen Townsend pointed out in his testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee, leave the U.S. vulnerable to losing access to rare earth minerals and other vital resources on the continent that “America needs.”
The disagreement within the military industrial complex over how to best contain China is a matter of form, not substance. Full-spectrum Dominance is where the entirety of the U.S. political and military apparatus has reached a uniform consensus. China and Africa are thus not only connected by their hundreds of billions worth in trade arrangements but also by their shared experience as targets of imperialism. The U.S. Indo-Pacific Command is currently in possession of over half of all U.S. military assets with more coming. Four hundred U.S. military bases surround China in countries such as Japan, South Korea, and the U.S. colony of Guam . While AFRICOM may be partially reduced to strengthen the U.S.’ military presence in the Asia-Pacific, there is no doubt that the U.S. will continue to undermine African sovereignty and use China, and to a smaller degree Russia, as justification.
The people of China and the people of Africa must be free to determine their destinies without interference from the U.S. military.
The last and perhaps most important point I want to make is that the struggle for self-determination of oppressed nations is always an ideological struggle. Full-spectrum Dominance is a racist project. U.S. and Western media portray Africa and China in much of the same light. Africa is portrayed as a chaotic and backward continent where corruption is endemic and inherent to political life. Africans need the U.S. military to be safe and secure from themselves. China, on the other hand, is the chief “authoritarian” country in the world for its supposed suppression of Muslims in Xinjiang, protestors in Hong Kong, and, according to the Economist, people in mainland China by way of its campaign to alleviate poverty. Asia therefore needs the U.S. military to be safe and secure from China. These jingoistic portrayals of China and Africa provide fertile ideological ground for the U.S. empire to maintain and expand military operations under the guise of stamping out terrorism or countering the “China threat.”
The transformation of Africa into a terrain for U.S. militarism has also brought about an ideological shift in the U.S. from a white savior industrial complex attitude of charity to a return of the White Man’s Burden mentality of re-civilizing the continent through force. Just as we know AFRICOM to be a coordinated military assault in the broader project of U.S.-led neocolonialism in Africa, so too is the U.S.’ military buildup in the Asia-Pacific part of a broader project to establish U.S.-compliant governments in Asia, including China. China is no longer just a convenient scapegoat for the hollowing out of the U.S. economy. Lockheed Martin and Raytheon directly fund think-tanks like the Austrailian Strategic Policy Institute to villainize China so that the U.S. can ban their social media apps, close their consulates, and sanction Chinese government officials in the name of the U.S.’ military strategy of Great Power competition.
A key task in developing a united movement to eradicate U.S. military expansionism in Africa and in Asia is to be very clear about its severe consequences for the future of humanity at large. The U.S.-led overthrow of Libya in 2011 paved the way for the death and displacement of millions in Africa and the Middle East, as well as an explosion in the expansion of AFRICOM. U.S. attempts to gain political and military control of the Asia-Pacific means that nations in the region will be subject to the same economic and political development model employed in Africa. China and Africa are targets of the same criminal system that produces conditions of economic and political instability all over the world. And while the U.S. would be foolish to provoke a hot war with China, anti-imperialist forces the world over must understand that to leave the cause of peace and self-determination up to the aggressors is akin to political suicide.
We have but one enemy, comrades, and that is U.S. imperialism and its mission of Full-spectrum Dominance. A dying empire is a dangerous empire. China will continue to rise as a global power and will not be bullied into submission. China’s connections to the Global South and Africa in particular cannot be arrested. The people of China and the people of Africa must be free to determine their destinies without interference from the U.S. military. It is thus our duty to demand that the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command withdraw its forces from the Asia Pacific and the U.S. Africa Command withdraw from the African continent, wholly and completely. | https://www.laprogressive.com/elections/africa-and-china |
We envision a future in which consumers become participants and the most impactful media platforms regenerate wise & vital cultures rather than exploit our attention.
We’re all contractors, and many of us are working on multiple projects, so we don’t expect you to give your sole attention to (N)(F)(T). However, we do expect that you’re committed and present to the needs and opportunities of your role.
Like Web3 in general (N)(F)(T) is a quickly adapting project. We are storytelling the movement and responding to opportunities as they arise, while staying committed to our north star to pioneer participatory, human-focused storytelling.
We’re a quickly growing, agile organization. We’re interested in seeding deep, long-term culture within our org and in our impact. We are a completely grant-funded project so far.
___
Role: Creative Project Manager
Keep our team focused and disciplined and delivering the best work we can (while growing and learning and playing too).
Time Commitment: Half-Time
Timing: Immediately
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- Deep executive experience leading creative teams to deliver outstanding creative work.
- Significant fluency and experience interfacing and managing creative production & design teams.
- A demonstrated history of operational excellence, self-leadership, and follow-through.
- A strong sense of personal commitment to prioritizing well-being & human values in their work ~ truth, beauty, etc.
- A strong commitment to modeling & maintaining work/life balance in the role, effectively setting boundaries, etc.
- Nice to have — meaningful understanding of the crypto / Web3 / NFT space; interest & alignment with the values of open-source / Web3.
- Relate deeply with the (N)(F)(T) team to support each team member in finding fitness (the role / expectation matches well with the demand) & meaning (they feel seen / supported / and a “part of”).
- Help to generate & maintain the conditions for the outstanding creative output at every level of the organization ~ from the filmmaking / storytelling to the design, marketing, & community engagement.
- Comprehensive oversight of all departments & workstreams, ensuring that team members are clear on their goals / milestones / deliverables & unblocked in their execution. Drive follow-up & follow-through across every part of the project.
- Develop and maintain a comprehensive project roadmap in partnership with project leadership; synthesize each team member’s role & capacity to ensure that everything remains on track. Coordinate / communicate / support recommitments as necessary in relation to team members’ capacity & workload.
- Manage team members’ work within the project budget and time constraints.
- Ensure that all team members efforts are aligned with the strategic goals of the project as a whole at each phase and that each team member is clear about how their work contributes to the whole.
- Actively manage & engage in our communications and project management tools, e.g. Slack, Notion & Asana, and support other team members to do the same.
- Actively communicate with team members to ensure they remain clear about their work and its value, and supported to accomplish it.
- Continuously refine the project management system so that it stays up to date and is being effectively used by all team members. Make iterative improvements to project management system throughout the course of the project.
- Stay in close communication with the Director / Executive Producer, Chief Learning Officer, and Head of Strategy to continue to update team members’ work in relationship to changing project strategy and goals and project budget and time constraints. | https://coindevs.co/jobs/never-forget-this-is-hiring-a-web3-creative-project-manager-part-time/ |
Are you looking to take your career from good to great? As an employee of PenFed, every day is an opportunity to thrive, and be part of a team working to ensure our organization is providing world class service to our members, employees, and our communities. We exist to help our members realize their full potential, educate and encourage their dreams, and make every effort to follow our mission and help our members “do better.” Joining PenFed is more than being an employee; it’s about being a part of the PenFed family.
PenFed is hiring a Principal Information Technology Engineer, Virtualization at our Chantilly, Virginia location. The primary purpose of this job is to provide the highest level of technical expertise and functional knowledge for the evaluation, selection, implementation and ongoing operation of highly complex, secure enterprise technologies. This is a technical leadership role for assigned technologies to ensure effective operations, communicate effectively, and coordinate between stakeholders at all levels.
Responsibilities
Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions. This is not intended to be an all-inclusive list of job duties and the position will perform other duties as assigned.
- Work as the highest-level technical engineering expert for IT. Act as an internal consultant and architect for the IT Engineering and Operations Management.
- Design, implement, and evaluate current and future initiatives for the highest level of efficiency and performance.
- Isolate and Resolve complex systems problems.
- Accountable for development and implementation of engineering standards and processes.
- Develop, modify and implement standard operating procedures for hardware/software, and system design, originate specifications, control documents, verification and validation plans, procedures, reports, or other documentation in support of design and development activities.
- Assist management and engineering staff in the evaluation, analysis, architecture, design, and implementation of enterprise programs and projects.
- Lead the Enterprise Architecture designs, guidance and requirements for incorporation into departmental processes and technical documents.
- Research, analyze, evaluate and provide recommendations to management on future technology direction.
- Perform peer review on complex change implementations, to ensure completeness and minimal impact to members.
- Deploy and document changes in accordance with enterprise problem and change management processes.
- Lead problem management and root cause analysis discussions with fellow engineers and analysts.
- Proactively identify solutions to potential issues and embrace simplification.
- Serve as escalation point for high severity issues and troubleshoot / resolve complex incidents.
- Provide assistance and expertise to management on improvements to company productivity, systems performance, high availability, monitoring, and operational costs.
- Provide training, mentoring, consulting, and knowledge transfer to other engineering staff.
- Maintain close relations with vendors and resellers. Assist management in maintaining service agreements, maintenance contracts, or other assigned vendor-related administrative duties.
- Drive and be accountable for all assigned tasks, and remain continuously self-challenged in setting and delivering on agreed deadlines and milestones.
- Serve as technical team lead on programs or projects that are assigned by management.
- Require the ability to thoroughly understand the entire enterprise environment and use that knowledge to consult and design end-to-end solutions that meet business and IT goals and strategies.
Qualifications
Equivalent combination of education and experience is considered.
- In lieu of a degree, combination of education and a minimum of twelve (12) years’ of related work experience is required that provides the necessary skills and knowledge to perform all the essential job functions.
- Extensive hands-on, senior-level experience with VMware technologies
- Extensive hands-on experience with enterprise compute (Cisco UCS, HPE)
- Strong understanding of system design and integration, with a thorough familiarity of public, private, and hybrid cloud technologies.
- Strong understanding of SAN storage technologies
- Strong understanding of network technologies
- Practical, hands-on experience with Azure and AWS platforms
- Demonstrated automation-scripting experience with infrastructure technologies
- Practical understanding of Active Directory and Azure AD Hybrid
- Familiarity w/ software distribution, patching tools, and best practices
- Strong written and verbal communication skills - ability to communicate effectively with all levels of audience including executive leadership.
- Powerful analytical and problem-solving skills- including the ability to develop solutions in new and creative ways.
- Ability to independently clarify and assess ambiguous issues in order to develop consensus toward a solution.
- Experience in developing architectural designs, topologies and implementation engineering guidance documents.
- Experience training or mentoring both technical and non-technical diverse audiences.
Licenses and Certifications
Job-specific licenses and/or certifications may be required.
Work Environment
While performing the duties of this job, the employee is regularly exposed to an indoor office setting with moderate noise.
*Most roles require working in an office setting with moderate noise and the ability to lift 25 pounds.*
Travel
Ability to travel to various worksites and be on-call is required.
Special Message Regarding COVID 19
PenFed is continuing to hire and train exceptional individuals to help us serve our 2 million members both here and around the world. In light of the current situation with novel coronavirus (COVID-19), we have modified our hiring, onboarding, training, and deployment protocols in order to comply with current local and state guidance around social distancing.
About Us
Established in 1935, PenFed today is one of the country’s strongest and most stable financial institutions with over 2 million members and over $26 billion in assets. We serve members in all 50 states and the District of Columbia, as well as in Guam, Puerto Rico and Okinawa. We are federally insured by NCUA and we are an Equal Housing Lender. We are available to members worldwide, via the web, seven days a week, twenty-four hours a day.
We provide our employees with a lucrative benefits package including robust medical, dental and vision plan options, plenty of paid time off, 401k with employer match, on-site fitness facilities at our larger locations, and more.
Equal Employment Opportunity
PenFed management will maintain and observe personnel policies which will not discriminate or permit harassment or retaliation against a person because of race, color, creed, age, sex, gender, gender identity, gender expression, religion, national origin, ancestry, marital status, military or veteran status or obligation, the presence of a physical and/or mental disability or medical condition, genetic information, sexual orientation, and all statuses protected by applicable state or local law in all recruiting, hiring, training, compensation, overtime, position classifications, work assignments, facilities, promotions, transfers, employee treatment, and in all other terms and conditions of employment. PenFed will also prohibit retaliation against individuals for raising a complaint of discrimination or harassment or participating in an investigation of same.
PenFed will also reasonably accommodate qualified individuals with a disability so that they can apply for a job or perform the essential functions of a job unless doing so causes a direct threat to these individuals or others in the workplace and the threat cannot be eliminated by reasonable accommodation or if the accommodation creates an undue hardship to PenFed. Contact human resources (HR) with any questions or requests for accommodation at 240-224-4256. | https://jobs.militarytimes.com/jobs/Principal-Virtualization-Engineer/J3P7P46235GK8S45DYQ?ipath=jrjd |
Actively educating and informing the community about the municipality, it`s practices and it`s services.
Give equal support and attention to all geographical areas covered by the municipality.
Seek the comments and input of the community and involvement in a range of of municipal issues as prescribed by legislation, especially in regard to it`s budget, it`s intergrated development plan and it`s performance management systems as well as the services it is required to provide to the community.
Through e-communication , this section maximises the opportunities to creatively and effectively communicate through the use of new technology so that the community has easy access to information about the municipality. The section continuously undertakes updates on the Municipal Website.
The website plays a key role in seeking out and exploiting the opportunities presented by electronic communication, internally and externally to benefit the municipality and the communities it serves.
The section also aims to establish a corporate identity for the municipality in order to strengthen the council`s visual profile locally, regionally and nationally by consitently using a strong corporate logo which will provide information in a clearly branded, concise manner to both internal and external audiences.
Ensure that all communication from the municipality is unambiguous, reliable and easy to understand in order to improve the image and integrity of the municipality.
Improve internal communication in order to increase staff understanding of the aims and objectives of the municipal council and promote ways of improving communication between business units. This will in tern maintain a strong two-way flow of information and encourages teamwork, trust and loyalty. It will also ensure that the councillors and staff are informed of all appropriate decisions, policies, programs, events and issues in a timely, accurate and consistent manner.
The Communications Section is located at the Municipal Town Hall at the Mayoral Chambers. | http://www.ladysmith.co.za/show.php?id=796 |
This module involves a consideration of design at an urban scale and is taught through a Unit system with individual Unit briefs interpreting this specification. Each Unit brief will offer the opportunity to analyse and critically appraise new hypotheses through the speculation of complex design proposals, and consider context in terms of history, policy, legislation, environment, economics and community. Unit briefs for this module may develop themes in parallel with Design 4a, with which it is co-taught in Units, and may continue themes into the following term's design module(s).
Total contact hours: 45 hours
Private study hours: 255 hours
Total study hours: 300 hours
Main assessment methods
Design Project (100%)
Reassessment methods
Like for like.
Indicative Reading List
Bourquin, Nicolas (ed.). (2008). Data Flow: Visualising Information in Graphic Design. Gestalten
Crawford, Matthew. (2010). The Case for Working with Your Hands: or Why Office Work is Bad for Us and Fixing Things Feels Good. Viking
Hale, Jonathan. (2000). Building Ideas: an Introduction to Architectural Theory. Wiley
Jencks, Charles (ed.). (2005). Theories and Manifestoes of Contemporary Architecture. John Wiley & Sons
Lim, C.J. (2006). Devices: A Manual of Architectural and Spatial Machines. Architectural Press
Marcus, George. (2005). Masters of Modernism: A Critical Assessment. Monaccelli
Sennett, Richard. (2009). The Craftsman. Penguin
Sheil, Bob (ed.). (2005). Design through Making. John Wiley & Sons
See the library reading list for this module (Canterbury)
The intended subject specific learning outcomes.
On successfully completing the module students will be able to demonstrate:
1 An ability to prepare and present building design projects of diverse scale, complexity, and type in a variety of contexts, using a range of media, and in response to a
brief.
2 Knowledge of theories of urban design and the planning of communities.
3 Knowledge of the influence of the design and development of cities, past and present on the contemporary built environment.
4 Knowledge of current planning policy and development control legislation, including social, environmental and economic aspects, and the relevance of these to design
development.
5 Understanding of the needs and aspirations of building users.
6 Understanding of the impact of buildings on the environment, and the precepts of sustainable design.
7 Understanding of the way in which buildings fit into their local context
8 Understanding of the potential impact of buildings on existing and proposed communities
9 An ability to generate complex design proposals showing understanding of current architectural issues, originality in the application of subject knowledge and, where
appropriate, to test new hypotheses and speculations.
The intended generic learning outcomes.
On successfully completing the module students will be able to demonstrate:
1 An ability to evaluate and apply a comprehensive range of visual, oral and written media to test, analyse, critically appraise and explain design proposals.
2 Problem solving skills, professional judgment, and ability to take the initiative and make appropriate decisions in complex and unpredictable circumstances.
3 An ability to apply project related in-depth research and analysis to the ideas, development and quality of the design project.
4 An ability to communicate effectively and well, using a range of communication skills
University of Kent makes every effort to ensure that module information is accurate for the relevant academic session and to provide educational services as described. However, courses, services and other matters may be subject to change. Please read our full disclaimer. | https://www.kent.ac.uk/courses/modules/module/ARCH8380 |
To lead and manage the APEM Billing and CMF team according to SLA agreements, providing high quality, effective and cost efficient services. Build strong collaboration with APEM business partners and gain their trust and confidence. Drive team productivity and build team capability. Continuously seek ways to improve processes and create value add to business partners. Drive team to deliver best in class services with an optimal cost structure. Active participation in regional and global initiatives and drive results. Conduct service performance reviews with business partners and achieve all stipulated KPIs in the SLA. A good understanding of the day to day DHL business and knowing what makes your business partner successful.
Ensure timely Billing on the basis of SLAsBuild and maintain relationships with colleagues, i.e. Global and Regional OTC contacts, Regional CFO’s, country contacts (e.g. CFO’s, OTC, Operation and Sales contacts) and DHL external customers
Contribute to preparation and maintenance of SLAs
As member of the APSSC SLT, co-define and execute APSSC strategy and objectives in line with those of DHL Express globally
Ensure good relationships with all projects related to Billing with regional and global counterparts
Build and maintain relationships with internal stakeholders such as BPO, Internal Control, PMO, AR etc.
Build and maintain relationships with internal and external suppliers
Manage operations effectively and ensure that objectives are met within departmental AOP, budget and operational targetsAssist in the AOP process
Identify and propose process improvements and service enhancements and ensure implementation of compliance with regional and global initiatives
Optimise organisational design from process perspective
Identify and implement, in tandem with the FC and BPO team, opportunities to improve service quality and cost.
Continue to lead the team on Continuous Improvement and GEMBA activities
Support migration of Billing System (DVRA, GRE, IBS+, etc.)
Champion the continuous development of people, and ensure succession planning in line with strategy
Build leader capabilities and motivate the team Ensure a consistent and effective performance management cycle is carried out for the entire department, e.g. set and evaluate SMART targets in tandem with Performance Control in line with annual operating plan.
Ensure the development of resources over time and with the right skill-set, to deliver agreed service levels and cost effectiveness. | https://mys.jobs/virtual-mys/head-of-billing-cmf-apem/D4033055790F4683A70A6E8AFCCABCE2/job/?vs=28 |
What are pleadings?
Pleadings are legal documents that are filed with the Court. Pleadings may contain the parties’ allegations, defenses and the facts on which the claims are based. Pleadings are used to help narrow and define the issues to be litigated.
What is discovery?
Discovery is the legal process in which the parties involved exchange factual and evidential information related to the case. This discovery process allows both parties the ability to obtain disclosure of information and facts, secure evidence for use at trial, and clarify the issues to be litigated.
What is a deposition?
At a deposition, witnesses are questioned under oath about their knowledge of relevant facts of the case and information about themselves. Just as in discovery process, depositions allow the parties to secure facts and information for use at trial. Because depositions occur earlier in the course of litigation, recollections of the witnesses about the events may be clearer. In addition, if a witness passes away, or is otherwise unavailable for trial, the testimony can be used at trial. A court reporter is present and records all testimony.
What should I do if I receive notification that someone is suing me?
We recommend that you contact a lawyer as soon as possible to discuss your situation. When a lawsuit is filed in the court, certain deadlines and specific procedures must be followed. An experienced litigation attorney can explain the process, advise you of the next step in the process, and draft the proper documents to ensure protection of your rights.
Can I file a lawsuit at any time?
Many claims carry a statute of limitation which set out specific timeframes in which a lawsuit can be filed. In most cases, if that time expires, the lawsuit cannot be filed. These time limits can vary depending on the type of case and the jurisdiction (state versus federal law). It is critical to consult with an attorney as quickly as possible if you believe that you have a claim to file.
What is the difference between litigation, mediation and arbitration?
Litigation involves the filing of a lawsuit and typically results in a trial if the matter is not settled. Arbitration and mediation are both alternatives to litigation. Mediation is a cooperative process and uses a neutral third party, such as a mediator, to facilitate a mutually satisfactory resolution. Arbitration also employs a neutral third party (an arbitrator), who will listen to both sides and make a decision. Typically, mediation is a non-binding procedure and arbitration is a binding procedure. There are various costs associated with hiring an arbitrator or mediator. It is important to assess the costs before agreeing to mediation or arbitration.
Estate & Trust Planning
Estate Planning is essentially the process of preserving and protecting your assets and property during your lifetime, then providing instructions for them to be passed on to
Corporate and Business Transactions
At Davis Law Group we have a unique perspective in our corporate and business law practice. Most "corporate" law firms focus on serving the business rather than
Probate & Trust Administration
When a close relative or friend dies, there are several important legal and taxation matters to be addressed. Depending on how property and other assets are titled,
Civil Litigation
Representing a client involved in business disputes, contract disputes, including mediation, arbitration, or civil litigation in court, is a big responsibility -- one we don't take lightly.
Church and Non-Profit Organizations
Church and non-profit law requires a special understanding of the issues and challenges that face non-profit and religious institutions. The legal advice that best serves business and
Commercial Real Estate Transactions
At Davis Law Group we understand that the commercial real estate process can be one of the most stressful events our clients will ever experience. Hampton Roads
Family Law & Collaborative Practice
The attorneys at Davis Law Group have extensive experience in representing individuals who find themselves in the middle of broken relationships, and we are effective advocates when
Employment Law
Few relationships impact our daily lives as much as the relationships we have at our workplaces. For most people, it is the place they spend the majority
It’s Time to Talk Treatment: | https://www.dlgva.com/resourcesandfaqs/faqs/general-litigation/ |
The complaint is the first document filed in civil court in a personal injury lawsuit. It lets the court—and soon after, the "defendant" who is being sued—know that the injured person (now the "plaintiff") intends to seek a legal remedy for his or her losses. In this article, we'll look at the different parts of a personal injury complaint.
Typically comprised of separate, numbered paragraphs, each containing one allegation, the complaint usually identifies:
Civil complaints, like most court filings, are subject to relatively strict standards with regard to form and content, although these standards vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction.
In some civil courts, even in personal injury cases the plaintiff can utilize a "form" complaint put out by the court or a judicial council in the state. These forms let the plaintiff check off certain boxes (including some that contain pre-printed allegations) while supplying specific information like the date of the underlying incident and the defendant's name.
Personal injury complaints normally begin with jurisdictional allegations. In these opening paragraphs, your personal injury attorney will explain why you are filing your complaint in this particular court or jurisdiction. Jurisdictional allegations are a melding of both fact and law. Where a complaint is filed depends on where an injury occurred, where you live, and many other factors spelled out in state statutes or court rules, which are often cited in the jurisdictional allegations in support of your assertion of jurisdiction.
An example of a jurisdictional allegation would be something to the effect of "Both Plaintiff and defendant reside and do business in the County of X, State of Y, and as such jurisdiction in this court is appropriate."
Factual allegations in a personal injury complaint are your opportunity to tell your version of how your injury occurred. Ostensibly a simple recitation of facts, your lawyer will use the factual allegations to begin advocating in your favor when it comes to fault for the underlying accident.
Factual allegations can be as vague or specific as you or your lawyer deem necessary. In a personal injury case, it's important that the facts surrounding the actual injury are included in the complaint, so those facts can be interpreted in the appropriate context. But providing too few or too many factual allegations can act as a handcuff later, as the lawsuit progresses. Factual allegations should tell your story without boxing you in or allowing the defendant too much breathing room.
An example of a factual allegation would be "Plaintiff Smith, unaware the Defendant ABC Grocery had recently mopped the aisle, slipped and fell in the unmarked wet area."
Legal allegations in a personal injury complaint set out the legal bases for the recovery of damages. The legal allegations in a complaint are normally divided by counts, with each count representing a different theory of recovery under the law.
Most personal injury complaints include, at a minimum, a count of negligence. Often, other counts are included as well, depending upon the circumstances of the injury. For example, in a toxic tort case where a builder failed to protect a new construction home from mold exposure, there could be counts of negligence, nuisance and violation of the local consumer protection law. Each of these counts present a theory under which you could recover for any respiratory or neurological injuries you may have sustained due to mold exposure.
Legal allegations usually take the facts of a particular case and apply them to the elements of the legal basis for recovery, to show how a defendant should be held liable for the plaintiff's injuries. Negligence allegations always set forth a defendant’s duty of care under the law, how they breached the duty, how the breach caused the injury, and how the plaintiff was damaged by the breach.
An example of a legal allegation in a personal injury complaint would be "Plaintiff had a legal obligation to keep the premises free of obstruction, and inspect for any potential hazards that may cause, or could foreseeably cause, injury."
After the personal injury complaint is filed with the court—and served on the defendant along with a summons—the defendant will file an "answer" to the plaintiff's complaint, and the lawsuit will proceed from there. For more details on this process, see our article on stages of a personal injury lawsuit. For information that's tailored to your situation, it may be time to contact a personal injury lawyer.
Need a lawyer? Start here. | https://www.alllaw.com/articles/nolo/personal-injury/complaint-lawsuit.html |
Under what conditions can a custody agreement be changed?
UPDATED: Aug 5, 2011
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Under what conditions can a custody agreement be changed?
My ex and I have had an existing 50/50 custody agreement for the last 2 years and now she wishes to change it so that she can put our daughter into an early learning center. I did not agree to this so she has turned to her lawyer. I received a letter yesterday saying that the custody agreement was under the preface that I was entering the military last year. I decided not to go because I wanted to stay with my daughter. They are saying they want to change the agreement for the development and social abilities of our daughter. What are my options?
Asked on August 5, 2011 Florida
Answers:
M.T.G., Member, New York Bar / FreeAdvice Contributing Attorney
Answered 11 years ago | Contributor
Florida has very strict rules about modifying child custody agreements. The statutes are upheld in case law. The court tend to uphold the original custody order and it is not to be modified absent these specific factors. First, there must be a change in circumstances that was unforseen at the time of the original order. As most courts prefer joint custody be given to parents (joint for the purposes of making decisions about their lives) I doubt that the fact that you decided not to go in to the military is a very good argument here. If you have contested your wife having the sole right to decision making I think that the court would have decided for you on the matter absent extraordinary circumstances. Second the change in circumstances must be "material" and "substantial." this will require that your wife provide unbelieveable proof to support the change. This is not an easy task. Third, only after the burden of proof that there has been a substantial and material change in circumstances has been met, may the court decide whether a custody modification is in the "best interests of the child." Get help. Good luck.
IMPORTANT NOTICE: The Answer(s) provided above are for general information only. The attorney providing the answer was not serving as the attorney for the person submitting the question or in any attorney-client relationship with such person. Laws may vary from state to state, and sometimes change. Tiny variations in the facts, or a fact not set forth in a question, often can change a legal outcome or an attorney's conclusion. Although AttorneyPages.com has verified the attorney was admitted to practice law in at least one jurisdiction, he or she may not be authorized to practice law in the jurisdiction referred to in the question, nor is he or she necessarily experienced in the area of the law involved. Unlike the information in the Answer(s) above, upon which you should NOT rely, for personal advice you can rely upon we suggest you retain an attorney to represent you. | https://staging.freeadvice.com/legal/custody-change-for-an-ear-68600/ |
Understanding the Discovery Process in a Personal Injury Case
If you are unable to settle your personal injury claim with the insurance provider of the other party early on in the process, your personal injury lawyer will file a lawsuit on your behalf, and then you are in litigation. This means that both parties are under the court’s jurisdiction and must follow the rules of the court.
Also, the court places time limits on the parties to complete specific work on their case. In a personal injury case, this is where the discovery process comes in. The parties conduct discovery to obtain information pertinent to the lawsuit.
What is Discovery?
A significant pre-trial part of the litigation process is known as discovery. In this time period, both parties request and exchange all pertinent information related to the lawsuit. The discovery process will include information about the parties, how the incident occurred, what the specific injuries are, the medical treatment details, and all evidence of the damages (both special and general) suffered by the plaintiff.
During the discovery process, the parties can use a variety of information-gathering tools, including but not limited to request for documents, interrogatories, requests for admission, depositions, and medical exams. All parties are entitled to serve each other with various types of discovery to collect information to build their case, or in the case of the defendant to “tear down” the plaintiff’s case. In a personal injury case discovery process, there are various ways to get information.
Specific Discovery Tools
Interrogatories refer to written questions that necessitate written responses. Request for documents falls in the category as it involves specific written requests that the other party reveals all relevant documents in their control. Requests for Admission ask the other party to admit that some facts are false. Therefore, the other party does not waste time proving such facts in court.
Depositions represent the most crucial area of a personal injury case discovery process. They are live interviews that offer a chance to each party to sit down with the other side or witness and ask a series of questions related to the case.
Legal experts opine that this process can be the most beneficial too. The questions and answers of deposition are recorded live in writing for both parties to evaluate and use to build their case. Either party to a lawsuit can depose the other party. Furthermore, any witness to the incident, any witness to the plaintiff’s injuries, or any specialist relevant to the case could be deposed.
Lastly, the defendant can ask the plaintiff (injured party) to submit to a medical exam by a doctor engaged by the defense lawyer to examine and assess the injuries sustained by the plaintiff.
All responses in a discovery process are given under the penalty of perjury, which means that the individual or party responding takes an oath of truth in providing their responses. If your personal injury case elevates to the level of litigation and discovery, you definitely want to have a seasoned personal injury attorney on your side.
Suggestions for Deposition
Your lawyer will inform you what they require from you if you are deposed. However, there are two primary things to remember. First off, never guess. The aim of a deposition is to provide facts, not to speculate on what could’ve happened. Even if you feel self-conscious saying it, sometimes the right answer is “I don’t know.”
Secondly, it is natural to want to explain things to allow your listener to understand. But you must resist this impulse during a deposition. It is your adversary’s job to get the answers. Your job is only to respond to the question asked, not to provide further information.
Things to Remember About Discovery
- Be mindful that it is highly probable that anything and everything will unravel at some point during the discovery process.
- Be honest with your lawyer about the facts and documents that may be presented to allow them to prepare adequately for trial.
- Discovery can be prolonged, costly, frustrating, and intrusive, and whether you want your life to undergo that level of scrutiny should play into your decision whether or not to initiate a lawsuit.
- Be forthright, as nothing will make you lose a lawsuit faster than lying in discovery and getting caught.
Get Experienced Legal Guidance with the Discovery Process in Southern California
The discovery process is crucial and one that should be taken seriously. The adversarial counsel will undertake everything it can to challenge your version, poke holes in your story, or even discredit your character-whatever it takes to win the lawsuit. In this scenario, it is vital for you to have robust legal representation at your side.
Consider speaking to our experienced La Mesa personal injury attorneys at the law offices of Garmo & Garmo to learn more about the merits of your case and pursue a robust legal strategy for the compensatory damages you are entitled to. For a complimentary consultation with a seasoned personal injury attorney, call today at (619) 441-2500. | https://garmolaw.com/understanding-the-discovery-process-in-a-personal-injury-case/ |
Whether due to ineffective legal counsel or as a result of the submission of illegally seized evidence, some defendants are convicted and sentenced for crimes that should have been dismissed. Fortunately, in some cases, a person who was convicted of a federal white collar crime can appeal his or her case to a higher court. However, the appeals process can be quite time-consuming and complex, so it is especially important for those who have been convicted to retain an experienced white collar crime attorney who can aggressively represent their interests.
Filing an Appeal
Before a person can bring a successful appeal, he or she must submit a notice of appeal with the Clerk’s Office in the court where the judgment was rendered within one month of the issuance of the final order. Failing to submit this notice can result in an appeal being permanently barred. There are also specific filing fees that will need to be paid, although the amounts vary depending on the type of appeal.
Preparing Court Records
At this point, the clerk of the trial court will begin to prepare the record, which is made up of some or all of the following pieces of evidence:
- Transcripts requested by the appellant;
- The official judgments and orders of the court; and
- Any physical evidence submitted to the trial court.
The record is then transmitted to one of Florida’s District Courts of Appeal, after which, each party drafts and submits an appellate brief containing their legal arguments. No new evidence is presented at this time, as the appellate court, which is made up of a panel of three judges will only address the facts contained in the court record.
In some cases, one or both parties will request an oral argument where they can advocate for their positions and answer any of the judges’ questions. After reviewing the evidence and the briefs, the appellate courts then issue written decisions, accompanied by opinions explaining the court’s reasoning. Generally, decisions in federal appeals cases tend to be issued later than those issued by state courts.
Petition for Review
If an appellant loses an appeal, he or she can ask the court to reconsider its decision. However, judges will only review a decision in certain situations, such as:
- When the result conflicted with a decision issued by the same court on the same legal issues;
- When the decision is based on the court’s interpretation of another case; and
- When there are strong reasons for the court to consider overruling the earlier decision.
If the implications of a decision are unclear, however, the parties can ask the court to explain the decision in further detail.
Contact an Experienced White Collar Crime Attorney Today
The appeals process can be extremely complex, so if you live in south Florida and were recently convicted of a white collar crime, please contact a member of the legal team at Jeffrey S. Weiner, P.A., Criminal Defense Attorneys by calling (305) 670-9919 and we’ll help you schedule a free consultation with a white collar crime lawyer who can help explain your legal options.
Resources: | https://www.jeffweiner.com/blog/2017/january/appealing-a-white-collar-crime-conviction/ |
If a mortgage company does not havemy promissory note, is my home now mine free and clear?
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If a mortgage company does not havemy promissory note, is my home now mine free and clear?
I have applied for a modification, a refinance (without any success), seen a HUD counselor (who helped me write a letter requesting proof that the mortgage company has possession of the promissory note). I am about to seek legal counsel.
Asked on March 8, 2011 under Real Estate Law, Texas
Answers:
SJZ, Member, New York Bar / FreeAdvice Contributing Attorney
Answered 10 years ago | Contributor
You are asking about a hotly contested and furiously involving area of the law. There are some courts that are taking the tack that (generally) the inability to provide the promissory note prevents foreclosure, on the grounds that the mortgage is to enforce the note; the note is a negotiable instrument; and possession is required to enforce negotiable instruments.
Other courts however will generally allow enforcement, if the creditor can show bhy some other means that it should be entitled to enforce--for example, if bank 2 bought the loan from bank 1 for good consideration, the court may hold it would not be fair to let bank 2, which paid for assignment of the note, to enforce it.
Complicating the matter is that how the note was lost or unavailable matters, too--for example, there are provisions in the law to allow enforcement of lost, stolen, or destroyed notes under the appropriate circumstances.
All that can be said is: many people are making essentially the argument you are making, some seem to be succeeding, and in any event, the argument is getting a serious hearing in most courts. It would seem to be worthwhile to consult with a lawyer and consider pursuing this tack. Good luck.
IMPORTANT NOTICE: The Answer(s) provided above are for general information only. The attorney providing the answer was not serving as the attorney for the person submitting the question or in any attorney-client relationship with such person. Laws may vary from state to state, and sometimes change. Tiny variations in the facts, or a fact not set forth in a question, often can change a legal outcome or an attorney's conclusion. Although AttorneyPages.com has verified the attorney was admitted to practice law in at least one jurisdiction, he or she may not be authorized to practice law in the jurisdiction referred to in the question, nor is he or she necessarily experienced in the area of the law involved. Unlike the information in the Answer(s) above, upon which you should NOT rely, for personal advice you can rely upon we suggest you retain an attorney to represent you. | https://staging.freeadvice.com/legal/if-a-mortgage-company-doe-58257/ |
After someone is charged with a crime in Arizona, the next step in the criminal justice process is often an arraignment. In simple terms, an arraignment is a hearing during which criminal charges are formally read by the court to the defendant. After charges are read, the defendant or their lawyer has the opportunity to enter a plea.
An arraignment may seem like little more than a formality, but it’s crucial that you understand what to expect during and after a criminal arraignment in Arizona. Find out what you need to know from the criminal defense attorneys at Lerner and Rowe Law Group below.
Misdemeanor Vs. Felony Arraignments
Misdemeanor charges generally denote less serious crimes. Some common examples of misdemeanors in Arizona include most first-time DUI offenses, shoplifting, many domestic violence charges, and drug possession. On the other hand, felony offenses include more serious crimes like murder, sexual assault, burglary, and certain drug offenses.
Depending on your unique circumstances, there may be some differences between what happens at a misdemeanor arraignment hearing and a felony arraignment hearing. If you’re being charged with a misdemeanor and were not taken into police custody, your initial appearance will likely be combined with your arraignment. If you’re being charged with a felony, your arraignment won’t take place until after your preliminary hearing.
What Happens During the Arizona Arraignment Process
It’s important to note that the arraignment process may vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. The following information applies to the Arizona arraignment process in Maricopa County. For specific court procedures in your county, you can consult with one of our Arizona criminal defense lawyers.
This process may also vary depending on whether you are already in custody or received a criminal summons and whether you’re scheduled to appear in City Court, Justice Court, or Superior Court. An arraignment must take place within 10 days after the filing of an indictment or direct complaint, unless you have not been arrested or have already negotiated a plea agreement.
You’ll Hear the Exact Charges Against You
A judge will formally read all the crimes you are being charged with. It’s possible that you’ve already heard what some of these charges may be during your initial appearance or preliminary hearing, but the charges read during your arraignment are the official charges for which you’ll stand trial. In addition, the court will explain the possible legal consequences and criminal penalties if you are convicted of said charges. This usually includes a minimum and maximum sentence.
You’ll Be Informed of Your Legal Rights
Once you’ve formally heard the charges against you, the court will also remind you of your legal rights, particularly of your right to legal counsel. If you cannot afford to hire an attorney, the court may appoint a public defender to represent you.
However, it should be noted that to ensure the best possible legal outcome, you should contact an experienced criminal defense attorney prior to your arraignment—preferably at the first sign of any potential legal trouble, such as being detained or arrested, finding out you have a warrant, receiving a summons, etc.
You’ll Be Asked to Enter a Plea
After the charges are read to you, you or your lawyer will be asked to enter a plea. Here, you have three options: you can plead guilty, which means that you are admitting guilt to all the criminal charges and that you have no legal defense for your actions. Sentencing by a judge usually follows unless a prior plea agreement was established. This option is not recommended by our criminal defense attorneys as the accused is presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. The defendant should set the case for further proceedings to allow time to investigate the charges and assess the weight of the state’s evidence before deciding to enter a plea.
You can also plead not guilty, meaning you deny all guilt and fight the charges. Finally, you can plead no contest, which means you’re accepting the consequences of a guilty plea but not admitting any guilt. A no contest plea may be a strategic choice under certain circumstances, as it can prevent the plea from being used against you in a later civil case.
Your Case Will Move Forward
Once you or your lawyer has entered a plea, your criminal case will move forward and you’ll reach the end of the Arizona arraignment process. Several things may happen at this point. If you accepted a plea bargain, pleaded guilty, or pleaded no contest, the next step will be sentencing. If you pleaded not guilty, a pre-trial conference and trial date will be set. In the meantime, the conditions of your release may also be set. You may be released on your own recognizance, to pretrial services, or on bail.
Facing a Criminal Arraignment in Arizona?
If you’ve been detained, arrested, or served a criminal summons, the time to seek legal help is now. Contacting an experienced criminal defense attorney as soon as possible can mean the difference between a conviction that includes prison time and reduced or dropped charges with lesser consequences, such as probation.
At Lerner and Rowe Law Group, your initial consultation is always free and confidential. Our exemplary legal team will promptly review the details of your case at no charge, and with no obligation to hire us.
Contact one of our Arizona offices today 24/7 by calling 602-667-7777 (Phoenix) or 520-620-6200 (Tucson). We offer affordable payment plans to make getting the legal help you need more accessible. You can also connect with us online via LiveChat, or submit your case details for a confidential review by filling out this form. | https://lernerandrowelawgroup.com/arraignment-process-in-arizona/ |
My husband refused to give me new credit cards after our computers were hacked. Also, refuses to put my name on accounts and investments. Is that legal?
Asked on September 17, 2019 under Family Law, Michigan
Answers:
SJZ, Member, New York Bar / FreeAdvice Contributing Attorney
Answered 2 years ago | Contributor
Yes, one spouse can do this. The law does not get involved in a couple's finances or domestic relations unless and until there is a divorce case filed--without a divorce (or possibly legal separation, depending on the state) case, the court and law have no authority to tell the members of a married couple how to live their lives, how to treat each other, etc. So he does not have to give you credit cards or put your name on the accounts or investments, just like if you have your own job or income, you can keep your money away from him (e.g. in your own account; have your own credit card; etc.). If you end up in a divorce case, then the court wil divide assets and assign support, but not until then.
IMPORTANT NOTICE: The Answer(s) provided above are for general information only. The attorney providing the answer was not serving as the attorney for the person submitting the question or in any attorney-client relationship with such person. Laws may vary from state to state, and sometimes change. Tiny variations in the facts, or a fact not set forth in a question, often can change a legal outcome or an attorney's conclusion. Although AttorneyPages.com has verified the attorney was admitted to practice law in at least one jurisdiction, he or she may not be authorized to practice law in the jurisdiction referred to in the question, nor is he or she necessarily experienced in the area of the law involved. Unlike the information in the Answer(s) above, upon which you should NOT rely, for personal advice you can rely upon we suggest you retain an attorney to represent you. | https://www.freeadvice.com/legal/can-a-spouse-control-all-m-337564/ |
Commercial Law – St. Louis Commercial Litigation Appeals Lawyer
What is a Commercial Law Appeal?
A commercial law appeal deals with appeals of business and corporate law trial verdicts. If you find yourself on the wrong end of a commercial litigation verdict, then an appeal may likely be your best option. Commercial litigation includes cases that involve business disputes, breach of contract, and tortious interference with contract. These cases are often very technical and can cover several areas of law. Appeals are a very structured and specific legal process, with very specific rules and deadlines. If you submit a brief with improper formatting or too many pages, then your appeal can be rejected by the appellate court. If you don’t file your appeal within the allotted time, then you will likely lose your opportunity to overturn the decisions of the trial court, and the verdict will be final. If you are considering filing a commercial law appeal, then it is important to speak to an experienced appellate attorney as soon as possible.
How is a Commercial Law Appeal Different from a Trial?
It is important to understand the differences between a case at the trial level and one at the appellate level. When a case is at the trial level, the outcome is in doubt, and a judge or jury is entrusted with deciding on the facts of the case to determine the outcome. At the appellate level, the facts and outcome have been decided from the court’s perspective. Appeals are a review of what happened at the trial court level to determine if mistakes were made that affected the outcome of the case. In an appeal, you must file a detailed brief that outlines where and how legal mistakes were made at the trial level. A proper appellate brief will include a complete explanation of the law that applies and legally supported arguments that back up your position. Appeals are primarily won or lost by the quality of your appellate brief and the included legal arguments.
Which Appellate Court Will Hear Your Appeal?
The location and type of case that is being appealed will determine which appellate court has jurisdiction to decide on the case at the state or federal level. There are three appellate courts in Missouri state court: the Eastern District, Western District, and Southern District. The courthouse for the Eastern District is in St. Louis, Western District is in Kansas City, and Southern District is in Springfield. Under the Missouri Constitution, five types of state cases must be heard directly by the Missouri Supreme Court on appeal. They are as follows:
- A case challenging United States law or treaty
- A case challenging Missouri law or Constitutional provision
- A case challenging a Missouri revenue law
- A case challenging a state elected official’s right to hold office
- A case challenging a death penalty sentence.
If your case is not one that involves the above-listed topics, then your appeal will go to the Missouri Court of Appeals for determination. Federal cases that originated in the Eastern or Western District Court in Missouri are heard by the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals. In most cases, the decision of a court of appeals will end up being final as it is rare for cases to end up in the Supreme Court. This is because Supreme Courts have the power to specifically choose cases to hear for a decision. The first step towards filing an appeal is knowing where your appeal should go.
The Importance of Having an Experienced Appeals Lawyer
Most trial attorneys have never handled an appeal in their entire careers. This is because appeals are a specific area of law that most trial attorneys simply cannot focus on due to the time necessary to properly handle them. Having an appellate lawyer help you by using a fresh set of eyes on a case is typically the best option. Appellate lawyers often take a limited number of cases so they can properly research and draft complete appellate briefs. A complete appellate brief includes a table of contents, a list of cases and authorities, a summary of the case, and a legal analysis of the facts and the law.
While you may have many things you want to appeal in a case, it is important to focus on those that can actually change the outcome into one that is favorable to you. An experienced appeals attorney will help you target specific legal issues and formulate legal arguments that are supported by the facts and the law at hand. An appeal is likely your last opportunity to change the outcome of your commercial litigation case. Since you likely don’t want your case to be the first that your attorney has appealed, it is important to have your case reviewed by an experienced appellate attorney.
John Reeves; Reeves Law
As an appellate specialist, John Reeves provides consulting services to trial attorneys about preserving matters for appeal and drafting dispositive motions. His practice also includes serving as defense counsel in civil matters, including constitutional matters (§1983 litigation), commercial law, personal injury matters, municipal law, employment discrimination, and insurance coverage disputes.
After serving as an Assistant Missouri Attorney General for over six years, John entered private practice in 2015, opening his own firm in 2019. He has personally authored over 250 appellate briefs and has conducted oral arguments in all three districts of the Missouri Court of Appeals, the Missouri Supreme Court, and the federal Eighth Circuit. In addition, Mr. Reeves has personally authored both certiorari petitions and applications for extraordinary relief before the United States Supreme Court. Mr. Reeves has also written numerous dispositive motions in both federal and state court.
In October 2019, Mr. Reeves co-founded the Missouri Bar’s Appellate Practice Committee, the first statewide organization in Missouri devoted to furthering professional development for attorneys in appellate matters. He presently serves as the committee’s co-chair.
Contact Reeves Law today to schedule an appointment to discuss your appeal or to have him sit in on your current trial and case. | https://www.reeveslawstl.com/commercial-law/ |
Can I be turned over to a collection agency if I have been making payments to my creditor?
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Can I be turned over to a collection agency if I have been making payments to my creditor?
I am paying on a debt for a lease that I broke over 9 years ago. Now they want me to pay more or turn me over to a collection agency.
Asked on June 17, 2011 under Bankruptcy Law, Michigan
Answers:
SJZ, Member, New York Bar / FreeAdvice Contributing Attorney
Answered 10 years ago | Contributor
They might not be able to do this. If there is an agreement between a debtor and creditor as to the repayment of a debt, that agreement must be honored by both parties. As long as the debtor makes the agreed-upon payments, the creditor may not take action against him or her. So if you have an agreement, you may enforce it. Even if there is no explicit agreement between you and the creditor, you could argue that a long course of dealing (i.e. if you've paying per a certain payment plan for a long time) itself proves or establishes that there is an agreement between you and the creditor. Without an explicit agreement, it's not a given you'd win with that argument, but it is reasonable argument you could make. Note that if you have breached the terms of whatever plan or agreement you had, thaht would clearly hurt your chance of holding the creditor to it.
IMPORTANT NOTICE: The Answer(s) provided above are for general information only. The attorney providing the answer was not serving as the attorney for the person submitting the question or in any attorney-client relationship with such person. Laws may vary from state to state, and sometimes change. Tiny variations in the facts, or a fact not set forth in a question, often can change a legal outcome or an attorney's conclusion. Although AttorneyPages.com has verified the attorney was admitted to practice law in at least one jurisdiction, he or she may not be authorized to practice law in the jurisdiction referred to in the question, nor is he or she necessarily experienced in the area of the law involved. Unlike the information in the Answer(s) above, upon which you should NOT rely, for personal advice you can rely upon we suggest you retain an attorney to represent you. | https://www.freeadvice.com/legal/i-am-paying-on-a-debt-in-63133/ |
Saskia Sassen has first coined the term “global city” in The Global City: New York, London, Tokyo. Instead of “global city”, the term “world city” might be used. Both terms come from the urban studies and geography. However, a distinction can be made: the global city is directly associated with globalization. Because the transnationalization of economies has grown sharply and cities have become increasingly strategic for global capital, global cities have gained significant global importance and share several unique characteristics. Population size is not primarily important, although all global cities are large cities. More importantly, the function and assigned role in global capital and flow of resources will define the cities place in the global economy, and it’s possible ranking within the complex spatial hierarchy. Global cities are those that function primarily as hubs for global networks of business firms, financial institutions, and non-governmental organizations and include corporate headquarters and advanced business services, such as accounting, advertising, consulting, and financial legal services. The global dispersal of economic activities, helped by both space-shrinking technologies and deregulation measures, creates a huge demand for theses expended central management functions (Kim & Short, 2008). Most global cities would be considered to be in the category of world cities.
World City
World cities on the other hand are locations of significant diversity that form world-interconnections. The term was coined first by Pattrick Geddes in Cities in Evolution (1915). World cities are characterized by a lively cultural scene and play an important role in terms of socio-cultural means. These certain cities stand out for their role in facilitating transnational flows of people, and cultures. World cities may house world-renowned universities, museums, and other cultural institutions. This contributes the mixing of groups and nationalities. Immigrant communities also represent a key feature of world cities (Abrahamson, 2004).
Ecumenopolis
Ecumenopolis is Greek and means a city made from the whole world (ecumen: world, polis: city). The Greek city planner Constantinos Doxiadis invented the word in 1967, representing the idea that there would be a single continuous worldwide city in the future because urban areas and megapolises would fuse as a result of urbanization and population growth rates. So far, ecumenopolis so is only fictional, but the concept has become a frequent topic in science fiction. Planets are often the capitals of galactic empires (such as the fictional planet Coruscant from the Star Wars Universe, mentioned first by Timothy Zahn).
Couruscant - a city covering an entire Planet (Zahn, 1999)
2. Examples of Global Cities
The described services (see Terminology) tend to concentrate disproportionately in global cities, such as London, New York, and Tokyo. These leading global cities stand in a league of their own, and are key-locations of most aspects of globalization. One may also focus on international airline networks to explore the global influence of an individual city. The possible ranking within the complex economic hierarchy can be seen when taking a look at global revenues:
International passenger traffic, April 2005-March 2006
3. Examples of World Cities
Hall first identified seven world cities in The World Cities (1966): London, Paris, Randstad, Rhine-Ruhr, Moscow, New York and Tokyo. Later Friedman’s essay The World City Hypothesis situated world cities within the international division of labor. Some recent examples of World Cities characterized by these socio-cultural elements and broad diversity would be New York City, Toronto, Paris, Buenos Aires, or Berlin.
American cities with highest percentages of foreign-born residents
4. Globalization and Globalizing cities
Kim & Short write about the effects of the forces of globalization on cities and vice versa in the sixth chapter of Cities and Economies (2008). The authors state that globalization does not mean homogenization, like other authors have stated, who linked globalization to a universalizing power of certain economic, political and cultural forces across national boundaries (Kim & Short, 2008). Instead, many insist on remaining significance of governments, cultural differences and national identities. The authors also argue that previous historical processes, such as modernization, industrialization, capitalism and colonialism were as revolutionary in their days, as globalization in ours. They therefore conclude that a truly globalized world will be anything but homogeneous.
At the same time, we can observe a strong trend of convergence. Landscapes, filled with identical office buildings, easily recognizable retailers and common fashion trends greatly resemble each others. Globalized comsumption patterns have materialized in large cities in both the Wester and the non-Western World (Kim & Short, 2008). However, while globalized comsumption patterns make many different places look, feel, and taste the same, a closer look on the ground reveals distinctly local activity, alongside those globalized practices. Micro-scale studies note the coexistence of global space (Wal-mart stores) and local space (public buildings with historical memory). Individual places, they find, rework globalizing effects, instead of being completely consumed by them.
5. Soja on the Evolution of Global Cities
Edward Soja, a postmodern political geographer and urban planner on the faculty at UCLA, is a distinguished Professor of Urban Planning. He is the author of Postmetropolis - Critical Studies of Cities and Regions, which is a comprehensive text in the “growing field of critical urban studies to deal with the dramatically restructured megacities that have emerged world-wide over the last half of the twentieth-century” (blackwellpublishing.com).
Soja writes that Globalization is “global culture-society-economy-capitalism, social theory, and societal development, economic restructuring and the urban regional process, a new international division of labor, the formation of global regions, the representation of identity, transnational citizenship, and a reassertation of the power of the local” (190). Soja also states that the empowerment of globality primarily as the product of a dramatic expansion in the scale and scope of capitalist industrial production. The earliest capitalist world system began with the globalization of commercial or mercantile capital in the sixteenth century in world cities such as Amsterdam or Hamburg (192). The author lists many different forces responsible for the postmetropolitan transition during the restructuring process in a new age of globalism, such as the industrialization of major segments of the old Third World, the creation of globally networked manufacturing (such as the “world car” or the “Beneton sweater”), the accelerated movement of people, goods, services and information across national borders, or new trading blocks (such as NAFTA). However, all these processes are clustered around the globalization of capital (new international, fast markets, and labor that are more flexible and easier to move).
6. The Impact of New Technologies
In The Impact of the New Technologies (2001) Sassen writes that telecommunications and globalization have emerged as major forces shaping the organization of urban space. Whether in electronic space or in the geography of the built environment, the reorganization involves a repositioning of the urban centrality in particular. The massive trends towards the spatial dispersal of economic activities at the metropolitan, national and global level, which we associate with globalization, have contributed to a demand for new forms of territorial centralization of top-level management and control operations, writes Sassen. This spatial dispersal of economic activity is made possible by new telecommunications and contributes the continuing concentration in control, ownership and profit appropriation that characterizes the current economic system and enable instantaneous transitions of money and information around the globe. The integration of a growing number of stock markets has also contributed to raise the capital that can be mobilized through stock markets. The growth of investment as a major type of international transaction has contributed to the expansion in command functions and specialized services for firms (such as accounting, top-level financing, legal, managerial, executive, and planning functions necessary for firms). These agglomerations of firms producing central functions for the management and coordination of global economic systems are disproportionately concentrated in highly developed countries – particularly in the kind of city we call “Global City”. Such concentrations of functions represent a strategic factor in the organization of the global economy. Significant is the extent to which significant portions of economies are now digitalized and the extent at which hey can travel at great speed. At the same time, however is the city remains an integral part of these new configurations, concludes Sassen.
Abrahamson, Mark. (2004). Global Cities. New York: Oxford University Press.
Hall, P. (1966). The World Cities. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson.
Kim, Y-H., & Short, J.R. (2008). Cities and Economies Cities and Economies (Routledge Critical Introductions to Urbanism and the City). New York, NY: Routledge.
Sassen, S. (2001). The Impact of New Information Technologies and Globalization on Cities”, Cities in Transition. Rotterdam: 010 Publishers.
Sassen, S. (1991). The Global City: New York, London, Tokyo. NJ: Princeton University Press.
Soja, E. (2000). Postmetropolis: Critical Studies of Cities and Regions. Oxford:Blackwell. | http://globalcity.wikidot.com/ |
Cultural homogenization is a contentious part of the globalization debate. Critics concerned with cultural homogenization fear the “McDonaldization” of global culture, usually described as a mono-directional outward wave of American pop culture swamping alternate views and traditional value systems. Less skeptical analysts of cultural globalization focus on the concept of cultural hybridization. This project uses the apparently innocuous measure of children’s TV programming in the US as a window onto the globalization debate. While globalization critics generally assume the forces of culture to be predominantly monodirectional (US/West outward), arguments for hybridity argue for a mixing of cultures. We examine more than 50 different examples of children’s TV programming in an effort to peel away the layers of the globalization debate, exposing not just levels of hybridity, but a more complex vision of global cultural hybridization. Doing this provides a meaningful and more nuanced tool for teaching about globalization.
This approach also provides a means of teaching about cultural socialization and values change (drawing on data from the World Values Survey and generational value change), which indicates that different generational experiences frame new expectations for behavior. We use this to argue that changes in children’s media environment (TV programming in particular) are producing a more multicultural and “globalized” childhood for modern generations of children in the US. Specifically, we look at not just the countries of origin of children’s TV shows, but also production companies producing content, and the presence or emphasis on “global” or multicultural messaging in the programs. Further, as many programs are overtly educational and post curricular goals on program websites (e.g., ‘Dora the Explorer’, ‘Go, Diego, Go!’, ‘Ni-Hao, Kai-Lan’). These cultural ‘lessons’ are used anecdotally to bolster claims that a “generational shift” is in progress. We conclude by arguing (contra the basic “globalization thesis”) that children in the US are being raised in a culturally hybridized TV media environment, and may be in the process of becoming a more globally-oriented generation. | https://works.bepress.com/jondcarlson/25/ |
PARIS The globalization of the international economy launched by the United States as an accidental policy of the Clinton administration has since been much lauded as benefiting (some of) the poor of the world by drawing them into the international capitalist system.
This is not actually what it was designed to do.
It has proven, like the god Janus, to have two aspects. The second face now has been revealed. Economic globalization has, as its second result, to impoverish (some of) the rich of the world.
The free market originated in 19th century Britain in what historians call the Great Transformation. As the English political philosopher John Gray describes it, in a prophetic book (in 1998) on the destructive effects of globalization called �False Dawn,� that transformation tore from their local roots the economic markets that since medieval times and before had been tied to communities, and had evolved through the needs and adaptations of those communities and their immediate neighbors.
Because of their origins, these markets were constrained by the need to maintain social cohesion. In mid-Victorian England, in part because of the development of transportation and communications, these community-rooted markets �embedded in society and subject to many kinds of regulation and restraint� were destroyed.
They were replaced by deregulated markets that ignored social and communitarian constraints, and functioned only according to the rules that suited themselves. Because of their inter-communication and interaction, they no longer set prices according to what the farmer, artisan and community could bear.
This was the capitalism that provoked the critiques and analyses of the great classical economists of the Scottish and British Enlightenments, generally read today (in Washington think tanks) chiefly in order to justify injustice, and in deliberate disregard of the social responsibility that was part of the work of such men as Adam Smith and David Ricardo.
This was the capitalism that gave birth to the Communist Manifesto, in which Marx and Engels wrote: �All old-established national industries have been destroyed or are daily being destroyed. . . . Everlasting uncertainty and agitation distinguish the bourgeois epoch from all earlier ones.� It provoked socialism and every variety of radical and religious reform meant to restore human values to economic life. Over the years, this version of capitalism was civilized, or half-tamed, until the arrival of globalization.
With globalization, technology once again was eagerly used to destroy existing capitalism by repeating the two crimes of assassination that had destroyed the pre-capitalist economy: the use of technology to expand markets so widely as to destroy existing national and international regulations; and second, once again to commodify labor.
Labor was no longer a social or economic �partner� in manufacturing, industry and business, which meant a human collaborator. Labor became simply a �cost,� to be reduced as far as possible, or to be eliminated.
This was rationalized with two contestable euphemisms. The first was that a progressive process had been set in motion by which the profits of globalization would �trickle down� so as to benefit the entire workforce.
This is unimaginable if labor is a commodity of unlimited supply as it tends to be today, and which is a specific characteristic of globalization. The power was destroyed that labor had possessed when industry was forced to hire from a given pool of workers in a given location.
In addition, the tendency of globalization is to exploit a given work force until it no longer has a margin of survival (Ricardo�s �iron law of wages�), and then move on. See rust-belt industry and trailer-home former towns.
The second of the three self-destroying (indeed suicidal) qualities of globalization has proved to be the inner dynamism driving it to expand by means of the division, subdivision and quasi-universalization of the distribution of risk until this process broke through the barrier of professional dissimulation. This means that the risk has no accountability, because it is effectively unidentifiable which was the unconscious or unavowed purpose of the process.
This is what has happened in international finance, where the accepted and normal framework of exchange between risk and responsibility, which is inherent in capitalism, has become indecipherable. Neither banks, the international financial institutions nor governments and certainly not investors are capable of assigning value to certain tradable paper or commodities, so that economic exchange comes to a halt. Today we stand on the brink of that fatality.
The third suicidal quality of globalized capitalism has been its creation of an organization of greed and individual acquisition of power that, because of the internationalization of the global economic system, has become not only unconscionable but unassessable. There is no assessable value in it. Thus the literally irrational pursuit of objectively meaningless rewards by some of those captains of finance now on the way to jail.
Welcome to the newest version of internationalized capitalism: the suicide version. It now is on display in Washington and other parliamentary and judicial inquiries and tribunals, with consequences that we and our children will now live with.
William Pfaff is an editorial page columnist for the International Herald Tribune in Paris. | https://www.registerguard.com/rg/opinion/10482232-78/story.csp |
COVID-19 has given many doubts about the benefits of our globalized and interconnected economies. Yet it is important to take a step back and look at some of the reasons we all stand to gain from the process. One example emerging in the health and wellness field offers an important reminder and symbol of this mutually beneficial sharing of ideas and traditions in an unexpected form: mushrooms.
For some readers, globalization may carry a negative connotation in terms of its economic and societal impacts. Still others may be worried about the fragility of the system in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet even while we criticize its many flaws, it is important to also keep in mind the good it can bring. The progressive transfer of goods and services across borders also creates bridges which enable movement of ideas and traditions. Health and wellness innovators like Rritual demonstrate that the business world has much to gain from flowing with, not against, this global movement.
The traditional understanding of globalization is incomplete
The debate over globalization and its impacts is an extensive one, and hardly needs to be carried out here. The negative aspects in particular get a lot of attention, and for good reasons, corporations exploitative labor practices, the race for resource extraction and international financial and economic meddling have all taken their toll. Yet there are positives as well that must not be ignored.
In order to do so academics will often focus on broad abstract concepts: economists will laud increased efficiency while historians might point to increased cultural exchange. It is often difficult to think of these concepts in relatable terms however, or see the ways that globalization can impact our daily lives. But it does.
Many of the products we consume on a daily basis would not be accessible outside a globalized economy. The fruit and vegetables we eat out of season, and depend on for good food and health, are internationally grown and imported. Our ability to travel to, and communicate with, the world in particular has been drastically lowered. As the chart shows, it has now become accessible as a leisure activity, or business necessity, for people from all walks of life.
Yet one aspect that often goes unobserved is one of the most important – cultural and traditional exchange.
Globalization also brings wealth of wisdom
Within the category of cultural sharing, we too often present global movement as a one sided trade between a developed ‘western’ world and a resource rich ‘developing world’. But we are not just cultural exporters, we are importers as well, and one of the key commodities we import is wisdom. Knowledge that has been passed on in long standing traditions in isolated cultures around the world, is now beginning to be accessible to the globe as a whole.
These may sound like intangible concepts, but there are ways to observe them in action in modern markets. For example, the advent of adaptogens, and adaptogen mushrooms in particular, is a powerful argument in favor of mutually beneficial cultural exchange.
Adaptogens is a broad label coined by russian scientists in the 1940s who were researching substances that allow the human body to better ‘adapt’ to stress (among other things). As expected they started out focusing on chemicals, but were quickly taken in with the wonders the natural world already offered.
Soon scientists were studying the benefits of roots, leaves and even fungi from the four corners of the globe. Ginseng and reishi from chinese medicine have already achieved international fame and were joined by lesser known fungi: chaga, cordyceps, lion’s mane and even turkey tail. Curiously some of these are even widely available in ‘western’ climates, but we required the opening and cultural exchange of globalization to begin to see the wealth nature had to offer.
Plants which had been used for hundreds or even thousands of years in traditional health or wellness practices offered a deep well of opportunity. Opportunity to strengthen and support the mental fitness of all, and capitalize in the process.
Rritual bridges the final gap
Yet it is one thing for scientists to study a concept, analysing in abstraction the knowledge of others. And it’s very different for that knowledge to become accessible and beneficial in our lives. Globalization after all can only take us so far, it can offer an opportunity, but it takes insight and innovation to take advantage of it. Particularly to figure out how to make that final connection with western consumers, such that the benefit of globalization is not just esoteric, but material as well.
One company is doing just that however, providing the perfect example of how to make those connections. Rritual combines a rich understanding of the traditional ingredients they use, with powerful insights into the needs and habits of consumers.
The company specializes in adaptogen-rich mixes powered by functional mushroom ingredients combined with nuanced natural flavors. The Canadian company was built by and for health and wellness experts, both in physical and mental health. This has allowed them to understand the problems of the modern world, and provide much needed support.
Focusing on sleep functions, immune system boosting and stress relief shows they are well aware of many of the struggles of the modern globalized world. But instead of bemoaning them, they are doing something about it. Rritual is putting to use the positive side of the phenomenon, taking key cultural wisdom and international ingredients, and showing how they can best be used to enhance the lives of all.
Bringing global scope to the personal level
Rritual has quite cleverly focused its branding and campaign on making adaptogens part of our everyday lives by making them an addition to our daily rituals. Not only are adaptogens more likely to benefit us over a longer term, but the symbolic and cultural impact serves also as a connection to the ultimate source of this greater wellness, the global wisdom of the world.
What could be a better reminder of the wonders of globalization than beginning each morning by keeping up with world news, while drinking a fair trade coffee from latin america, augmented by a powdered mushroom from asia.
—
(Featured image by Pixabay via Pexels)
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INSTITUTO DE INVESTIGACIONES EN CATALISIS Y PETROQUIMICA "ING. JOSE MIGUEL PARERA"
Unidad Ejecutora - UE
capítulos de libros
Título:
Abatement of nitrate in drinking water. A comparative study of photocatalytic and conventional catalytic technologies
Autor/es:
F. A. MARCHESINI; GUADALUPE ORTIZ DE LA PLATA; O. ALFANO; M.A. ULLA; E. MIRO; A. E. CASSANO
Libro:
Advanced Oxidation Processes
Editorial:
CRC
Referencias:
Lugar: Balkema; Año: 2012;
Resumen:
he contamination of water due to both intensive fertilization and waste effluents from industries has produced an increase of nitrate concentration in groundwater. Nitrates are reduced to nitrites in the digestive system, affecting hemoglobin and impairing its function as oxygen-carrier, thus causing the blue baby syndrome. They are also related to several kinds of cancer, e.g. ovarian and prostate cancers. This contamination problem has led to the introduction of guidelines to establish upper limits for the concentration of nitrates and related species (nitrites and ammonia) in water for domestic use. The Drinking Water Directive- European Commission (98/83/EC) sets a maximum allowable concentration for nitrate of 50 ppm, 0.1 ppm for nitrite and 0.5 ppm for ammonia. The World Health Organization recommends a maximum nitrate concentration of 10 mg N/L in drinking water. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has established a maximum contaminant level (MCL) in drinking water of 10 mg/L as nitrateN to protect infants from methemoglobinemia (Ward et al., 2005). However, the effectiveness of this regulatory limit for preventing other health risks such as cancer has not been adequately studied (De Roos et al., 2003). At present, the most widespread technologies for the removal of nitrates are biological denitrification and physico-chemical processes, namely ion exchange, reverse osmosis and electro dialysis. However, they present serious problems, i.e. bacterial processes include handling difficulties, low reaction rates, need for removal of by-products and low space velocities. Physico-chemical processes usually transform the nitrate into brine which has to be treated afterwards or disposed of. Moreover, some of these technologies can be expensive. Therefore, increasing attention has lately been paid to a novel technology, still in its development stages, catalytic denitrification (Ilinitch et al., 2000; Pintar et al., 1999), which employs solid bimetallic catalysts. In this catalytic process, nitrates are reduced to nitrogen using hydrogen (Reaction 1.1); however, undesirable products such as nitrite and ammonium are also formed (Reactions 1.2 and 1.3). 2 NO3- + 5 H2 à N2 + 2 OH- + 4 H2O (Reaction 1.1) NO3- + H2 à NO2- + H2O (Reaction 1.2) 2 NO3- + 8 H2 à 2 NH4+ + 4 OH- + 2 H2O (Reaction 1.3) It is accepted that the reaction mechanism involves the reduction of nitrate into nitrite, which is in turn reduced towards nitrogen or over-reduced to give ammonia (Pintar et al., 1999). Thus, the positive catalytic effect is related to the ability of the catalyst to selectively hydrogenate nitrite into nitrogen. Nitrite can act as a reaction intermediate, having a maximum in its concentration curve at intermediate reaction times. In general, the most active catalysts for nitrate reduction show the lowest nitrite formation because they are also active for nitrite reduction (Marchesini et al., 2008). As shown in reactions 1.1 and 1.3, nitrate reduction produces OH- ions and their local accumulation could negatively affect the catalytic activity and the selectivity to N2. Therefore, the pH of ca. 5 was maintained during the reaction time by the addition of controlled amounts of HCl (Garrón et al., 2005) in order to improve the selectivity to N2. Several solid catalysts have been presented by various authors (Deganello et al., 2000; Matatov et al., 2000; Strukul et al., 2000). The catalysts were prepared over different mesoporous supports such as massive oxides, alumina or silica, with the addition of noble metals such as Pt or Pd as the main metal, and a second metal such as Cu, Co or In as promoter metal. The possible mechanism for the catalytic reduction is through the combination of active sites in the bimetallic catalyst (Prusse et al., 2000) where the nitrate is reduced to nitrite over the bimetallic particle, and then the nitrite produced is reduced over the noble metal particle to nitrogen or ammonium depending on the site selectivity and the environmental conditions, as mentioned above. The restriction about a catalytic process for nitrate removal from drinking water is severe, i.e. the product stream must conform to drinking water standards and the energy consumption must be low for the process to be cost effective; therefore, temperature and pH cannot be adjusted freely, and no toxic substances may leach from the catalyst (Bems et al., 1999). The reactions involved in photocatalysis are mostly oxidation reactions, which utilize the positive holes produced by illuminating the semi-conductor, i.e. TiO2 to generate oxidizing radicals by reaction with adsorbed OH- or water. However, this particular application, nitrate abatement, calls for a reductive reaction. The irradiation of titanium dioxide with the appropriate wavelength gives rise to the formation of not only positive holes (vacancies) but also photoelectrons. Thus, this less widely studied reaction path might provide the necessary conditions to achieve a better controlled indirect reduction of nitrates that is the ultimate target of this work. The photocatalytic route is represented by: UV + MO → MO (h + e−) (Reaction 1.4) Here, MO stands for metal oxide, usually a semiconductor such as TiO2. The employed UV must be of the required wavelength in order to overcome the semiconductor band gap. The oxidative path is usually represented by: h+ + H2O → H+ + OH (Reaction 1.5) while the reductive reaction due to the photocatalytic effect is mostly presented as: 2e− + O2 → O2 (Reaction 1.6) However, in the absence of oxygen, another reductive reaction may occur. In the presence of a redox catalyst which uses the aforementioned electrons, the desired reduction may be written as: 2e- + (Cat) + 2 H+ à H2 (Reaction 1.7) The photoreduction of nitrates was studied by Ranjitet al. (1997); they proposed that metals with high affinity for electrons be added to TiO2. Once the electrons are trapped in this way, they can be used as reducing agents for nitrates. Unfortunately, different from what happens in oxidation practices, the reactions employed in reduction processes have not been so extensively studied. Nevertheless, the possibility of using various forms of titanium dioxide modified by metals with the ability to capture electrons has acquired new impetus and increasing importance. This possibility has been explored in studies of reductive reactions (Sakthivel et al., 2004; Shiraishi et al., 2004; Zhang et al., 2006; Cohen, 2001), hydrogen production from water (Chiarmello et al., 2011; Nada et al., 2008; Kudo, 2003), and the reduction of emissions of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere (Stock et al., 2011). In this work, Pd-In metallic couples have been selected on the grounds that In promoted catalysts have good activity for nitrate conversion and a potential high selectivity to N2, as reported elsewhere (Marchesini et al., 2012). TiO2 has been selected as support because it can perform as electron supplier in the presence of UV radiation. The aim of this preliminary work is to compare the efficiency of a catalyst formed on a titanium dioxide support, complemented with a mixture of Pd-In as metallic additives operating under conventional reaction conditions with the efficiency of the same catalyst but irradiated with UV radiation. The purpose of such a comparison is to determine if its photocatalytic activity allows a better control of the reductive function and avoids the formation of undesirable reaction products, specifically nitrites and NH4+. If the results of this exploratory study were attractive enough, possible follow-ups would include the optimization of this catalyst composition and kinetic studies to characterize all the reaction parameters. | https://www.conicet.gov.ar/new_scp/detalle.php?keywords=&id=05401&inst=yes&capitulos=yes&detalles=yes&capit_id=1621929 |
Ammonia selective catalytic reduction is an effective NOX purification technology for diesel exhaust. As the core of SCR technology, Cu/SSZ-13 has become the hot research topic. High low temperature catalytic activity, hydrothermal stability and resistance to poisoning are critical for the application of Cu-SSZ-13 catalysts [1-3]. Simply changing the copper ion content is limited for catalyst activity enhancement: high Cu loading is beneficial to low-temperature NOx conversion, but detrimental to catalyst hydrothermal stability. Alkali and alkaline earth co-cation additives to Cu/SSZ-13 to improve the catalytic performance have been deeply researched . And It has also been extensively studied to improve the performance of catalysts by combining metal oxides with zeolites . However, the researches of Mn ions as the co-cation additives are still lack.
Based on the excellent low temperature activity and the substitution of B acid sites in zeolite of Mn species, we used a co-exchange of Mn ions to improve the catalyst performance. We prepared 0.2Cu0.1Mn-SSZ-13 catalyst, 0.2Cu-SSZ-13 and 0.2Cu-SSZ-13 catalysts and detailed studied the effect of added Mn ions as the co-cation. The low-temperature activity, hydrothermal stability and anti-C3H6 ability were improved. Combined with SCR, NH3 oxidation, NO oxidation reaction tests and ammonia temperature-programmed desorption, X-ray diffraction analysis, solid state nuclear magnetic resonance analysis, low-temperature N2 absorption and desorption, the effects of co-exchanged Mn ions were divided into two aspects. On the one hand, the addition of Mn ions replaced parts of H+ and different ions play a similar role in this factor. On the hand, the unique properties of Mn ions and the interaction of Cu ions provide excellent catalytic performance for the catalyst. The specific research are as follows: (1) The replacement of H+ can reduce the decrease of crystallinity and the dealumination of the skeleton during the hydrothermal aging of the catalyst. (2) The interaction between Mn ions and Cu ions leads to an increase in its low temperature activity and the presence of Mn ions could effectively inhibit the formation of CuxOy during hydrothermal aging of the catalyst. (3) The addition of Mn ions is capable of repressing the formation of carbon deposition and improve its activity.
References:
Liu Q, Fu Z, Ma L, Niu H, Liu C, Li J, Zhang Z. 2017. MnOx -CeO2 supported on Cu-SSZ-13: A novel SCR catalyst in a wide temperature range[J]. Applied Catalysis A: General, 547: 146-154.
Gao F, Wang Y, Washton N M, Kollár M, Szanyi J, Peden C H F. 2015. Effects of Alkali and Alkaline Earth Cocations on the Activity and Hydrothermal Stability of Cu/SSZ-13 NH3–SCR Catalysts[J]. ACS Catalysis, 5(11): 6780-6791. | https://cleers.org/cleers-workshops/workshop-presentations/entry/2083/ |
Cumene is a colorless liquid, also known as cumol or isopropyl benzene having the boiling-range motor fuel of high antiknock value. It is of industrial demand for the production of high molecular weight hydrocarbons such as cymene and polyalkylated benzene. The main end uses for cumene are for the production of phenolic resins, bisphenol A, and caprolactam. However, 5-10 wt% diisopropylbenzene (DIPB) isomers are produced as low value byproduct during the isopropylation of benzene to cumene (Leu et al., 1990; Sridevi et al., 2001; Reddy et al., 1993). The by-products, DIPB isomers, can be recycled for cumene production, making this process more economical. With the liquid catalysts, there are inherent problems of product separation, recycling and corrosiveness (Maity and Pradhan, 2006; Barman et al., 2005; Ercan et al., 1998). In that respect, zeolites can exhibit acidities close to those of traditional mineral acid solutions and hence proved to be better catalyst (Best and Wojciechowski, 1978; Slaugh, 1983; Bakas and Barger, 1989). Moreover, the number and strength of acid sites in zeolite can be changed to a great extent by exchanging its H+/Na+ ions with rare earth cations in the zeolite framework. A comparative study was carried out on transalkylation of DIPB with benzene over Y, beta and mordenite with different Si/Al molar ratios in supercritical CO2 and liquid phase (Sotelo et al., 2006). The influence of Si/Al ratio on the activity of catalyst was explained in terms of cumene selectivity and yield considering the competitive isomerization and by-product formation. The use of supercritical CO2 did not show superior catalytic transalkylation activity for the Y zeolite. In Mobil Oil Corp., USA, production of cumene was carried out by introducing the feed to a transalkylating zone over beta zeolite/alumina and then feeding to an alkylating zone where MCM-22/alumina catalyst was used (Collins et al., 1999). Transalkylation of DIPB has also been carried out over large pore zeolites, which proved to be very active catalysts (Pradhan and Rao, 1993). In another process, DIPBs were recycled for transalkylation in the reactor containing a single catalyst bed of beta catalyst. The combined alkylation and transalkylation was performed for alkyl aromatic production to evaluate the performance of different catalysts like MCM-22 and beta zeolite based on their Si/Al ratio, selectivity, and pore size for liquid phase production of cumene (Perego and Ingallina, 2004). The catalysts such as zeolite X, MCM-22, MCM-49, PSH-3, SSZ-25, zeolite Y, beta zeolite (Yeh et al., 2008; Barger et al., 1989; Huang et al., 1997) were used in transalkylation reaction. These studies show that choice of catalyst, its Si/Al ratio and the acidity of the catalyst highly affect the process.
Kinetics of transalkylation of diisopropylbenzene were studied over Ca modified YH zeolite catalyst which proved to be a good active catalyst (Grigore et al., 2001). Cumene synthesis over beta zeolite has been reported in the literature (Bellussi et al., 1995; Perego et al., 1996; Smirnov et al., 1997; Halgeri and Das, 1999). Therefore, further investigation was necessary to carry out transalkylation of DIPB with benzene over the modified beta zeolite to obtain higher cumene selectivity and reactant conversion. Replacement of sodium ions in zeolites with polyvalent cations like rare earth metals (La, Ce, etc.) has been reported to produce materials of superior catalytic activity (Venuto et al., 1966; Rabo et al., 1968; Hunter and Scherzer, 1971). However, very scarce literature is available on the use of rare earth metal modified beta zeolite for cumene synthesis. It was, therefore, thought desirable to investigate the kinetics of this commercially important reaction over zeolite H-beta modified by exchanging H+ ions with cerium ions. A further objective of this study was to develop a suitable kinetic model for the synthesis reactions.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
Materials
Beta zeolite, 1.5 mm extrudates, used in the present study, was obtained from Sud chemie, Vadodra, India. Ceric ammonium nitrate (99% pure) was procured from CDH chemicals, India. Benzene and 1,4-DIPB of analytical reagent grade ((>99% pure) were obtained from Sigma Aldrich Pvt. Ltd., India. Nitrogen gas (grade -I, 99.999% pure) was obtained from Sigma gases and services (India).
Catalyst Preparation
The commercially available H-beta zeolite containing H+ ions was modified with Ce4+ ions. At first, the zeolite extrudates were calcined for 3 h at 623 K. Calcined zeolite was then refluxed with the required percentage of ceric ammonium nitrate solution at 363 K for 24 h, thereby modifying H-beta zeolite into the Ce-beta form. The catalyst particles were then filtered and washed several times with deionized water and then dried at 393 K for 14 h. Finally, they were calcined for 4 h at 723 K to remove the excess ions. The cerium-exchanged zeolite was characterized by TPD, XRD and FTIR. Beta zeolite treated with 4%, 6%, 8%, and 10% cerium ammonium nitrate solution (CeB4, CeB6, CeB8, and CeB10) was used for the present study.
Determination of Cerium in the Exchanged Catalysts
The amount of cerium ions exchanged with the H+ ions was calculated analytically (Krishnan et al., 2002). Freshly calcined cerium modified beta zeolite was taken in a flask and digested for 1 h in concentrated HCl. The digested catalyst was diluted with distilled water and filtered. The filtrate was transferred to a beaker and its volume was made up to about 250 ml by adding distilled water. 50 ml of saturated oxalic acid solution was mixed with this solution, which produced a white precipitate of cerium oxalate. The precipitate was then filtered using a Whatman no.40 ashless filter paper and washed with distilled water. The filter paper was ignited in a previously weighed silica crucible at 1173?10 K to a constant weight. On heating, cerium oxalate was converted to cerium oxide. From the weight of cerium oxide the percentage of cerium was then calculated. CeB4, CeB6, CeB8 and CeB10 were found to have been loaded with 2.87%, 4.46 wt%, 6.64 wt% and 8.34 wt% of cerium respectively.
Experimental Setup for Transalkylation Reactions
Vapor phase transalkylation reaction was carried out in a fixed-bed, continuous down-flow, stainless steel (SS 316) reactor. The reaction conditions were maintained at atmospheric pressure. A preheater was fitted with the reactor in the upstream and a condenser in the downstream. A thermowell extending from the top of the reactor to the centre of the bed was used to measure the temperature of the reactor. Typically, 0.002 kg of the catalyst supported on a wire mesh was loaded into the reactor. Before conducting the experiments, catalyst activation was done at a temperature 100 K higher than the reaction temperature (maintained according to reaction conditions), for 3 h under the atmosphere of nitrogen. A dosing pump was used to introduce the reactant feed mixture into the reactor. Nitrogen gas was flown through the reactor at the rate of 0.565 L/h to activate the catalyst before experimental runs. However during all experimental runs, the nitrogen to feed flow rate ratio was kept constant at 0.2. The reactants were vaporized in the preheater, which is maintained at a temperature 30 K lower than the reaction temperature. The vaporised reactant feed mixture passes through the catalyst bed in the reactor at proper reaction conditions. The product vapors, along with the unreacted reactants, were condensed in the condenser (277 K-279 K). The samples were collected and analyzed in a gas chromatograph (Bruker, Model: 436 GC Scion) using a fused silica capillary column having 10 m × 0.53 mm × 1.5 µm dimensions. The sample was introduced through a micro syringe into the injector port of the GC. The temperature of the injector was set at 493 K during the analyses. The column temperature was initially set at 323K, and then increased to 523 K at a rate of 10 K/min. The flow rate of carrier gas (nitrogen) was maintained at 1.5 L/h. A Flame Ionisation Detector was used at 553 K to detect the products. Peaks were identified by retention time matching with known standards. Various products like aliphatics (propene), benzene, toluene, xylene (C8), cumene, cymene (C10), isomers of DIPB were found. The selectivity of cumene, 1,3 DIPB and conversion of 1,4 DIPB were calculated as:
The mechanism of transalkylation of 1,4 DIPB with benzene is shown in Figure 1.
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
Characterization of the Modified Catalyst
The powder X-ray diffraction patterns of the zeolite samples were recorded on a Bruker Angle X-Ray Scattering Diffractometer D8, Germany with 2θ value in the range of 50-600 at a scanning speed of 20 (2θ) per minute. The diffractometer was equipped with a Ni-filtered Cu K-α radiation source. Sample preparation for the X-ray analysis involved gentle grinding of the solid into a fine powder. Approximately 0.1-0.2 g of the sample was taken into the sample holder with light compression to make it flat and tight. Ammonia Temperature Program Desorption of the parent and modified catalysts were performed in a CHEM-BET 3000 instrument (Quantachrome). Catalyst sample (0.1 g) was first degassed at 723 K for 1 h with nitrogen followed by cooling to 273 K temperature. Nitrogen-ammonia gas (1 mol%) mixture, was then passed through the sample for 1 h. The catalyst sample was heated to 372 K until the steady state was attained; thereafter the temperature of the sample was raised up to 1173 K at a heating rate of 10 K/min. The desorbed ammonia was detected by a Thermal Conductivity Detector analyzer. Studies of FTIR were done using an Agilant Cary-660 spectrophotometer in the range 400 cm-1-4000 cm-1. Samples were analysed by preparing KBr pellets. Sample was first ground thoroughly and then it was mixed with KBr salt and again ground well to make a fine powder, which was then pressed to make a pellet. It was then placed in the FTIR sample holder and 32 scans were taken for each sample.
Both modified and unmodified beta zeolites were characterized by XRD and are shown in the Fig. 2. Typical diffraction characteristics of BEA topology are observed for both the zeolites indicating the framework structure is well preserved after cerium exchange. The CeB10 diffractograms exhibited a high intensity reflection at 2θ = 7.80 and 210-220 which is a typical characteristic peak of beta zeolite (Zhang et al., 2014). This phenomenon indicates that the crystal structure of beta zeolite was not changed by metal exchange. The crystallinity of the modified sample was measured from the intensity of the peaks. At low loading of metal ions into the zeolite framework, no diffraction lines corresponding to metal species were observed as at low loading, the cerium ions replace the H+ ions (Tang et al., 2014) and are highly dispersed in the zeolite framework (Garcia et al., 2011). However, on increasing the metal loading, additional peaks of metal oxides present on the catalyst surface appear in the XRD pattern (Siregar and Amin, 2006, Amin and Anggoro, 2003; Garcia et al., 2011). At high loading of cerium (10 wt%), additional peaks related to cerium oxide (2θ = 13.560 and 46.50) were found in zeolite XRD pattern (Thakur et al., 2015). Similar observation was reported for high loading of cerium (16 wt%) into the beta zeolite framework (Wang and Zou, 2003).
The temperature programmed desorption profile of ammonia was studied with H-beta and CeB10 beta zeolites and is shown in Fig. 3. The profiles show that the catalysts contain mainly two types of acid sites of different strengths. The low temperature peak is due to ammonia desorption from the weak acid sites, whereas, the peak at high temperature is due to the desorption of strongly adsorbed ammonia from strong acid sites. TPD profiles show that, in the case of H-beta zeolite, only weak acid sites are present. In the case of Ce-beta zeolite there is an additional peak in the higher temperature range (400-600 ºC) due to the presence of strong acid sites created by ion exchange. The strength of the acid sites increases with cerium content as the desorption peaks shift gradually towards the higher temperatures with increasing cerium in the catalysts (Barman et al., 2005). Moreover, the number of acid sites also increases as the peak area increases with Ce exchange. Thus, it can be concluded from Fig. 3 that cerium exchange leads to an increase in both quantity and strength of the acid sites in zeolite (Thakur et al., 2014; Wang and Zou, 2003). The acidity of H-beta zeolite was found to be 0.88 mmol/gm and that of cerium beta zeolite was 1.79 mmol/gm.
The FTIR spectra of H-beta and cerium exchanged beta zeolite are shown in Fig. 4. The IR spectra of H-beta and CeB10 zeolite show major bands in the 450-1650 cm−1 region with additional bands at the 3450 cm−1 region. Beta zeolite shows bands approximately at 460, 520, 785, 1060, 1212, 1625 and 3440 cm−1. The peak at 520 cm−1 is characteristic of beta zeolite (Kiri et al., 1994). The major characteristic bands at 460, 785, 1060 and 1212 cm−1 are attributed to a T-O bending mode, O-T-O external symmetric stretch and O-T-O internal asymmetric stretching vibrations and O-T-O external asymmetric stretch, respectively. In case of cerium-modified beta zeolite all the peaks show a little shift in peak positions. The additional absorption band at wavenumber 553 cm-1 represents the Ce-O stretch (Ansari et al., 2009). The intensities of peaks for the modified zeolite are greatly enhanced. The broad bands observed in the case of both catalysts at 3453 cm−1 are due to the stretching vibrations of hydroxyl groups, and those at 1635 cm−1 are lattice water molecules, respectively. This suggests that the zeolite framework remains unaffected after the ion exchange process and cerium exchange of beta zeolite.
Activity of Catalyst in the Transalkylation Reaction
The activity of Ce-beta zeolites and the parent H-beta zeolite were tested for a 3.5 h time period on stream at 573 K and atmospheric pressure. Fig. 5 shows that a maximum of 83.82% selectivity of cumene was obtained over CeB10, which decreases to a value of 81.09% after 3.5 h on stream. This may be due to deactivation of zeolite by formation of coke, which blocks the catalyst surface. It is observed that the selectivity of cumene decreases with a decrease in cerium content of zeolite and was found to be 81.33% and 77.87% over CeB8 and CeB6 zeolites, respectively. Selectivity of cumene becomes lowest (73.23%) in the case of unmodified beta zeolite.
Effect of Temperature on DIPB Conversion and Product Selectivity
The effect of temperature on product selectivity is shown in Fig. 6 in the temperature range of 493 K-593 K over CeB10 catalyst. With the increase in temperature, the cumene selectivity increases gradually and reaches a maximum (83.82%) at 573 K but above this temperature the cumene selectivity is decreased due to the formation of the side product xylene.
The product distribution at different reaction temperatures is shown in Table 1. The conversion of DIPB was maximum (94.69%) at a temperature of 573 K and then decreased to 85.12% at 613 K. At higher temperature the decrease in conversion is due to deactivation of the catalyst by deposition of coke on the catalyst surface.
|Product distribution (wt%)||Temperature (K)|
|493||513||533||553||573||593|
|Aliphatics||0.76||0.79||0.72||0.40||0.07||0.03|
|Benzene||67.15||67.07||66.91||63.27||47.21||56.40|
|Toluene||0.12||0.20||0.22||0.30||0.35||0.69|
|Xylene||0.17||0.23||0.31||0.74||1.14||1.55|
|Cumene||2.96||10.60||15.03||20.18||42.94||32.54|
|n-PB||0.29||0.35||0.41||0.50||0.58||1.56|
|C10||1.39||2.41||5.31||5.16||0.97||0.53|
|1,3-DIPB||6.10||5.89||5.72||5.66||5.17||3.33|
|1,4-DIPB||21.06||12.46||5.40||3.79||1.57||3.37|
|Cumene yield (%)||2.96||10.60||15.03||20.18||42.94||32.54|
|1,4-DIPB conv(wt%)||29.01||51.69||81.78||87.20||94.69||88.63|
Reaction Conditions: Pressure =1 atm, benzene/1,4-DIPB ratio = 5:1, space time = 9.03 kg h/ kmol, N2 to feed ratio = 0.2, time on stream = 30 min, catalyst (CeB10) amount =0.002 kg.
Effect of Benzene to 1,4-DIPB Mole Ratio on Product Selectivity
In the transalkylation reaction, the benzene to 1,4 DIPB ratio was varied from 1 to 15 at a reaction temperature of 573 K and space time of 9.03 kg h/k mol. Fig. 7 shows that the maximum selectivity (83.82%) of cumene was obtained at a benzene to 1,4-DIPB ratio of 5:1, beyond this ratio, the isomerisation of 1,4-DIPB seems to increase and hence a decrease in cumene selectivity was observed.
Effect of Space Time on Selectivity of Products and Conversion of 1,4 DIPB
The effect of space-time was studied in the range of 4.21 kg h/k mol-9.03 kg h/k mol. The cumene selectivity increased with increase in space time and reached its maximum of 83.82% at a space time of 9.03 kg h/kmol. Higher contact time allows the reactants to remain in the vicinity of each other and the catalyst surface for longer time, therefore enhancing the transalkylation reaction instead of isomerisation and disproportionation. Selectivity of products as a function of space time is shown in Figure 8.
The product distribution at various space times is given in Table 2. As can be seen from Fig. 9, the conversion of 1,4-DIPB increased with an increase in space time; which may be due to the higher contact time between reactants and catalyst. Conversion of 1,4-DIPB was increased to 94.69% at a space time of 9.03 kg h/kmol.
|Product distribution (wt%)||Space Time (kg h/ k mol)|
|4.2||4.8||5.75||7.02||7.9||9.03|
|Aliphatics||0.71||0.49||0.48||0.04||0.10||0.06|
|Benzene||68.82||68.25||67.91||62.42||53.97||47.26|
|Toluene||0.94||0.58||0.29||0.48||0.22||0.35|
|Xylene||0.32||0.39||0.42||1.03||0.56||1.14|
|Cumene||16.96||18.78||21.02||28.65||37.39||42.93|
|n-PB||0.11||0.16||0.23||0.36||0.52||0.57|
|C10||3.34||2.42||1.14||0.14||0.70||0.96|
|1,3-DIPB||2.08||4.01||4.29||4.49||4.66||5.16|
|1,4-DIPB||6.72||4.92||4.22||2.39||1.88||1.57|
|Cumene yield (%)||16.96||18.78||21.02||28.65||37.39||42.93|
|1,4-DIPB conv.(wt%)||77.34||83.41||85.77||92.39||93.69||94.69|
Reaction Conditions: Pressure =1 atm, temperature = 573 K, benzene/ 1,4-DIPB ratio = 5:1, N2 to feed ratio = 0.2, time on stream = 30 min, catalyst (CeB10) amount = 0.002 kg.
MASS TRANSFER CONSIDERATIONS
In solid catalyzed gas phase reactions, the effect of external and internal mass transfer resistances may be significant. Experiments were carried out to find the importance of external diffusional resistance by varying feed rates and catalyst size at constant space-time. Table 3 shows that the conversions of 1,4-DIPB at constant space time are independent of feed rate. Therefore, the external mass transfer resistance is negligible. To investigate the effect of intraparticle diffusion the experiments were carried out keeping space-time constant but varying the catalyst particle size. The experimental data shown in Table 4 indicate that the conversion of 1,4-DIPB remain same with catalyst size which indicates negligible intraparticle mass transfer resistance in the particle size range studied.
|Space-time (kg h/kmol)||Conversion of 1,4-DIPB (%)|
|Catalyst weight = 0.002 kg||Catalyst weight =0.004 kg|
|4.2||64.34||65.11|
|4.8||69.80||70.87|
|5.75||74.03||75.12|
Reaction Conditions: Pressure = 1 atm, temperature = 573 K, benzene/ 1,4-DIPB ratio = 5:1, N2 to feed ratio = 0.2, time on stream = 30 min.
|Particle size dp (mm)||Conversion of 1,4-DIPB (%)|
|space-time (kg h/kmol) =4.2||space-time (kg h/kmol) = 4.8||space-time (kg h/kmol)= 5.75|
|0.50||65.87||70.23||75.34|
|1.00||65.35||69.98||74.76|
|1.50||64.34||69.80||74.03|
Reaction Conditions: Pressure =1 atm, temperature = 573 K, benzene/ 1,4-DIPB ratio = 5:1, N2 to feed ratio = 0.2, time on stream = 30 min.
KINETIC MODELLING
The kinetic runs were carried out at four different temperatures. The experiments were conducted in the zone in which mass transfer effects were negligible. Based on the product distribution various kinetic models (adsorption, desorption, and surface reaction control) were formulated following the Langmuir-Hinshelwood approach. These models were tested with the help of the experimental data. A non-linear regression algorithm was used for the kinetic parameter estimation. All models, except one, surface reaction control, were rejected as they resulted in negative kinetic constants. The following rate equation based on surface reaction-control was found to fit the experimental data satisfactorily. Transalkylation of 1,4 DIPB with benzene is a complex reaction which is followed by isomerization and disproportionation reactions.
For the above reactions, the possible rate equations based on different mechanisms are presented below. k4 is not considered while developing the model because the model is in terms of conversion of 1,4-DIPB and this reaction does not involves DIPB. k3 is also not considered since only those reactions whose product yield is significant are taken into considerations.
Dual-site mechanism:
where,
Single-site mechanism:
where,
Stoichiometric model:
The partial pressure of 1,4 DIPB and benzene are related to the fractional conversions and the total pressure (P) by these following equations:
The optimum values of the parameters were obtained by minimizing the objective function given by the equation:
Model Selection
By using the values of the constants for Equation (5) for the dual site mechanism, as shown in Table 5, the standard error of estimate for the rate of disappearance of 1,4-DIPB was ±3.14 x 10-4. For Equation (6), with the values of the constants from Table 6, the standard error was ± 2.41 x 10-3. For Equation (7), with the values of the constants from Table 7, the standard error was ± 9.92 x 10-3. By comparing the standard errors, model Equation (5) was considered to be the best for representing the reaction system under investigation. The experimental and the predicted 1,4 DIPB conversions from Equation (5) at four different temperatures are plotted in Fig. 10. The figure shows that the proposed reaction rate expression predicts 1,4-DIPB conversion values quite comparable to the experimental values, having an R2 value of 0.99. The kinetic constants evaluated and tabulated at various temperatures (Table 5) were used to determine the activation energy for cumene synthesis (transalkylation) which was estimated to be 116.53 kJ/mol; for the isomerisation reaction the activation energy was found to be 176.01 kJ/mol by the following equation:
|Kinetic and adsorption parameters||Temperature (K)|
|493||513||533||553|
|k1 (k mol/kg h)||1.11||2.34||10.49||20.53|
|k2 (k mol/kg h)||0.097||0.534||4.54||10.54|
|K Dipb (atm-1)||1.223||0.839||0.689||0.459|
|K B (atm-1)||2.345||2.00||1.80||1.50|
The plot of ln k vs 1/T is represented in Fig. 11. The activation energy values for various reactions compare well with the values of similar reactions on zeolites obtained by other investigators (Kondamudi and Upadhyayula, 2008). The kinetic model developed was able to predict the product distribution. Formation of cumene and 1,3-DIPB, the main products, is derived from the equations below.
Rate of formation of cumene:
Rate of formation of 1,3-DIPB:
k1, k2, kB, kDIPB were estimated by using nonlinear regression analysis using the least square criterion. pB and pDIPB values can be calculated by the Equations (10) and (11). By using the known parameters k1, k2, kB, kDIPB, pB, and pDIPB, in Equations (15) and (16), formation of cumene and, in Equation (2), formation of 1,3-DIPB can be predicted.
CONCLUSION
The catalytic performance of cerium exchanged beta zeolite was evaluated for the commercially important cumene synthesis. H-beta zeolite was successfully modified with cerium and it was found that activity and selectivity of the cerium-modified zeolite was higher than the parent zeolite due to the presence of strong acid sites in the exchanged zeolite. 94.69% conversion of 1,4-DIPB was obtained over CeB10 zeolite with 8.3 wt% Ce content, at 573 K and a benzene to 1,4-DIPB reactant ratio of 5:1. The cumene selectivity in this condition was 83.82%. Based on the product distribution patterns, a kinetic model was proposed and the parameters of the model were estimated. The activation energies for the transalkylation and isomerisation reactions were found to be 116.53 kJ/mol and 176.01 kJ/mol respectively. In industry, using this catalyst, the rate of reaction can be increased, which can save the fixed cost as well as the operating cost by minimizing energy consumption, reactor volume, and reaction time and make the process more economic. The kinetic model derived for the reactions can provide the necessary information to scale up the reactor for large scale production in industry. | http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0104-66322016000400957&lng=en&tlng=en |
PROGRAM NOTE: The tambourine is an instrument that requires an incredible amount of facility and finesse. I, personally, lacked in these areas of my playing throughout the years. This made the tambourine the bane of my existence as a percussionist, until recently. The better I became at the tambourine, the better I became on other instruments as well. Its reach has extended to many other parts of my playing, making the title appropriate.
My idea for the piece was to showcase the tambourine in unconventional ways. The beginning utilizes specific parts of the tambourine to create a rain/glass wind chime effect that sets the background for improvised solos by each player. Each solo can represent the personality of the player or a natural aspect, such as the four elements. This eventually swells into a short but energetic groove combining the elements of samba, traditional playing techniques and new found sounds of the instrument. The piece ends similar to its beginning with a few added colors that taper off into the distance.
WATCH a full performance of the piece down below! | http://www.lineagepercussion.com/store/p2/Your_REACH_is_Well..._%282020%29_for_Tambourine_Trio_%5BPDF%5D.html |
WesleyI graduated from the University of New Orleans with a bachelor's degree in music. I have been involved with music since I was a child. I began with playing the piano and I learned how to play different instruments throughout the course of my life. One of my specialties is guitar and I spend some of my time playing different gigs around town. I am able to help students with piano, guitar, drums and bass guitar. I can also help students with music theory. Learning to play an instrument takes an extended amount of time. But finding techniques and songs that students like is the best way to actually get them to practice. In my free time, I enjoy bouldering, snowboarding, and hiking.
Education
University of New Orleans - Bachelor in Arts, Music
Subjects
Drum
Music Theory
Guitar
Piano
+2 subjects
SheriHi, my name is Sheri. I'm a tutor who has a bachelor's degree in psychology from the University of Southern Mississippi. I also have a master's degree in business administration from South University-Savannah. I have experience working as an educator for a variety of different age groups. I've spent the most time working with students who are teenagers and older. I enjoy tutoring because it gives me a chance to work with a student in a one-on-one setting. I strive to provide customized lesson plans for each of the students I work with in order to maximize growth. If you need help with subjects like English, writing, social studies, and more, get in touch with me.
Education
South University-Savannah - Masters, Business Admin
University of Southern Mississippi - Bachelors, Psychology
Subjects
Political Science
Algebra
Business Writing
English
+41 subjects
BrigidMy name is Brigid, and I believe the path to helping students find their voice as a writer is to allow them to experiment first. Grammar, spelling, and other mechanics should come along later. Once I help a student figure out how they want to communicate effectively, then we get into editing. I'm looking forward to helping more students improve their writing skills by following this process. | https://www.findtutorsnearme.com/city/mandeville/ |
Whether you're a hobbyist musician or a professional voice actor, having an at-home recording studio can be incredibly convenient. But no matter how much you invest in your technology, you're still likely to encounter some issues with background noises. A professional recording studio is constructed to isolate sound as much as possible, and there are limits as to what can be done in post-processing. You'll need to soundproof your room if you're going to produce polished, high-quality recordings.
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What Instruments Are Used In Traditional Irish Folk Music?
Irish folk music has been a favorite among music lovers for many years. This type of folk music has a very distinct sound that is appreciated by people of all ages. A variety of musical instruments are used for playing traditional Irish folk songs. These are some of the different kinds of instruments that are played to create the sweet melodies of Irish folk music. Accordions Accordions are commonly used when playing traditional Irish folk music.
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You're Never Too Old To Handle These Keys: 3 Myths That Keep You From Taking Adult Piano Lessons
You'll find the words "learn to play piano" on many adults' bucket lists. That's because the piano is such a versatile instrument, it can be used to play nearly any type of music from classical to jazz. And even if the power goes out, a standard piano will still give music and keep your loved ones entertained while you wait for the lights to come back on. More importantly, learning the piano at a later age will keep your brain sharp.
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How to Get Your Kids to Respect Your Piano
If you have children, chances are good that you are going to witness them acting in ways that aren't particularly respectful towards furniture. You might see them jumping on the couch, putting their shoes on chairs, and generally mistreating your furniture. You have likely established ground rules for the furniture in order to keep it from being totally destroyed. If you have a piano in your home, it's a good idea to establish a similar set of ground rules.
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4 Ways Playing The Guitar Could Help You
Face it, life can bring on many issues that can hinder your health. When you feel bogged down with stress, scientific research actually shows that picking up an instrument and playing can prove to be beneficial for your health by reducing stress. Whether you need a mental break or you want a better workout, playing guitar has been proven to offer many health benefits. Whether you have played the guitar for years or you are just learning, playing the guitar could be as equivalent as getting a massage. | http://heritagebaptistnyc.com/year/2015/ |
“Touch of…” is a musical collaboration between guitarist David Lester of Mecca Normal and experimental solo bassist Wendy Atkinson. They are a bass and guitar duo using unconventional means of playing their instruments to create edgy instrumental soundscapes, combining improvisation with structured arrangements. In “Touch of…” the crazed guitar contrasts with the calm, spare electric and double basses.
- Year of composition:
- Genre:
- Format:
- Duration of the submitted work:
- Production: | https://sonus.ca/oeuvre/45827/Touch_of_Wendy_Atkinson_David_Lester |
A look back at some items in our archives.
…sicut aurora procedit is the composition created by Maija Hynninen for a multidisciplinary work Pix grace – Rosin. The work was conceived by violinist Mirka Malmi, composer Maija Hynninen and aerialist Ilona Jäntti during 2013–15. Interaction between the group members was tight, each producing demo material for the rest of the group to see and discuss. The name Rosin came from the idea of rosin combining the two, violinist and aerialist. By friction rosin creates a contact surface between the bow and strings, the hands of the aerialist and the trapeze.
Hypochondriasis is for chin (guqin) and live electronics. Chin is an ancient Chinese 7-string zither normally played by plucking with fingers. This piece is my first work to use electronics. For the first experiment on electronics, I choose the chin as the instrument since it’s one of the instruments I’m familiar with. However, the chin is a very personal instrument due to its soft volume and subtle timbral changes, so amplification becomes an important element and thus creates a new kind of environment, an augmented chin.
Hazardous Materials #1 (2016)
Percussion trio and electronics (sound and light)
Cindy Cox, Pianos
Concerto solo piano/sampler keyboard, twelve musicians, and live electronics
I. Dark, Racing
II. Mercurial
III. Quirky, like a turning wheel
IV. Slowly revolving, wistful
V. Brash
Myra Melford composer and artistic director, with David Szlasa - video, Oguri - dance, Sofia Rei - spoken word and Snowy Egret: Ron Miles (cornet), Stomu Takeishi (bass guitar), Liberty Ellman (guitar) and Tyshawn Sorey (drums) and Myra Melford (piano, sampler and melodica)
Edmund Campion
The Auditory Fiction pieces are composed for live musicians who perform with the aid of in-ear click-tracks. The click-tracks are designed using software tools developed at the Center for New Music and Audio Technologies primarily by John MacCallum and Matt Wright with support from Ed Campion and others. With the click-tracks in place, the musicians are enabled to play in any tempo relationship, accelerate, decelerate, change phase, and at any rate.
P.A.I.R.S is a project of UC Berkeley Graduating Senior, Andrew Rahman, and was funded by the UC Berkeley Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship Program (SURF). The purpose of the P.A.I.R.S. project is to capture the reverberation characteristics of historic spaces for archival and creative use.
Naked to the Sky (2016)
for movement artist, violin, saxophone, piano, percussion, and motion-sensitive live electronics
spark (2015)
for Wacom Tablet Transducer-Piano-Feedback Instrument
by Rama Gottfried, for pianist Ernst Surberg
OPHELIA. Her heart is a clock (2015)
for ten players, premiered by Ensemble Linea
Regent's Lecturer, Artist in Residence at CNMAT, March 10-26, 2017
CNMAT Director, Edmund Campion interviews Thomas Buckner to discuss his involvement with the history of the property and early activities at 1750 Arch Street and the later establishment of CNMAT with David Wessel.
Dr. Thor Magnusson, from the University of Sussex, is in residency at CNMAT for a week this Spring. This is part of his Sonic Writing Research project which is a two-year research program that explores work and practices using new technologies for musical expression. Through tracing the historical conditions of material and symbolic design in in three interconnected strands of inscription - instruments, notation, and phonography - the project studies how established techniques are translated into new methods of musical composition and performance in digital musical media.
RELEASED (August 15, 2017)
TESSELLATE: A CNMAT-OM OPEN MUSIC LIBRARY
CNMAT.o.stompbox -- a breakout box for Teensy & Max
Introduction
Early in the Fall semester 2017, CNMAT director Edmund Campion came to me with a request to build a system that would allow for multiple foot-pedal controllers to be connected to Max. The design criteria required that the system should:
ironic erratic erotic is a trio composed for dancer, tuba, contrabass, and motion-sensitive live electronics. It was premiered at Labor Neunzehn in Berin in May 2017 by Yuri Shimaoka (dance), Jack Adler-McKean (tuba), and Adam Goodwin (contrabass).
Kerosene Palace, for orchestra and electronics
by Scott Rubin, for David Milnes and the University of California Berkeley Symphony Orchestra
Kerosene Palace is a work scored for orchestra and electronics, which was written for David Milnes and the University of California Berkeley Symphony Orchestra. The electronics, composed of fixed soundfiles created by the composer that were cued during the performance. The diffusion of the electronic sound was supported with equipment and funds supplied by the Center for New Music and Audio Technologies. | http://cnmat.berkeley.edu/archive?page=130 |
I am a kotoist and composer, simultaneously navigating the varied worlds of traditional gagaku music (Japanese court orchestral music), new music, jazz, improvised and electronic music. Classically trained and holding degrees in both Western and Eastern music, I have been informed and inspired by performances with a wide variety of musicians, including Pharoah Sanders, whose music resonates with a sense of spirituality; L. Subramanian, virtuoso Indian violinist; Alvin Curran, avant-garde composer, the Cecil Taylor Orchestra, led by Cecil Taylor, who has spearheaded a deconstructionist concept, Steve Coleman, brilliant saxophonist/composer, Francis Wong and Mark Izu, leaders in Asian American jazz; Henry Kaiser and Fred Frith, guitar improvisers; George Lewis, innovative trombonist/composer/programmer; Roham de Saram of the Arditti String Quartet, who taught me bowing techniques; and my esteemed gagaku teacher, Suenobu Togi.
Over the years I have moved gradually from playing traditional koto, under my first koto teacher, Seiko Shimaoka, to developing my own approach to technique and vocabulary. The transition was at first tenuous, and I often feared that Shimaoka would attend one of my concerts outside of the traditional koto sphere. While she never did so, at one lesson she mentioned any disobedient student could be expelled from the school and have their costly koto certificates revoked if the teacher requested. Feeling vaguely guilty, I immediately apologized for any potential problem I might be creating. Yet, at the next lesson, she spoke proudly of an article she had read about me in the local Japanese newspaper, and, over the years, she has come to support my efforts.
The koto is a Japanese zither-like instrument with an ancient history. Koto is an abbreviation of “kami no nori koto” — the oracles of the gods. It has deep roots in the spiritual practice of Shintoism, and to a lesser extent, Buddhism. In gagaku and Shintoism the instruments are sacred; they are gods embodying spirits, just as trees, stones and air do. To pluck the string of a koto, for example, is to release its spirit/soul, its sound. In studying koto, the student becomes the koto, as the drummer becomes the drum. (“Become the fourteenth bridge,” my teacher used to say.) To lose a sense of self, to become one with the instrument — these ideals are the main ideals.
The koto finds its natural place in gagaku, an ensemble of strings, wind, and percussion instruments. Notated gagaku scores date back to the seventh and eighth century Tang Dynasty in China, a vital period when musicians from Persia, India, Japan, Korea, Vietnam and China performed and improvised together. My gagaku teacher, Sensei Togi, traces his lineage through more than 1,000 years in the Imperial Court musical family. Studying music with him was both fascinating and startling. He conducted the orchestra sitting on the floor, his left arm conducting the strings, his right arm the winds, his right leg signaling the taiko and his left leg bringing in the reeds — all four limbs moving in the most graceful method of conducting I have ever experienced. Nevertheless he wouldn’t hesitate to hit my koto or my hand with his baton if I made a mistake.
My odyssey with the koto has led me to break venerable cultural traditions, touching on points of controversy musically, aesthetically, and politically, from both inside and outside my . In “Playing Other People’s Music” (Sounding Off, Music as Subversion/Resistance/Revolution, Edited by Ron Sakolsky and Fred Wei-Han Ho, 1995) Royal Hartigan states “It’s disrespectful and wrong to play traditional instruments in a non-traditional context,” an ongoing debate within the cultural imperialism/appropriation discourse. Hartigan’s position, framed as a Euro-American ethnomusicologist and percussionist theorizing and performing traditional music within the context of post-coloniality, has a certain justifiable significance. But for me, being of Japanese heritage and born in America, bi-culturalism and trans-cultural identity has always been a part of my existence; it is this hybridity that engenders and perhaps necessitates a new cultural expression for me.
As a composer concerned with new sounds, contexts, structures and realities, I have no choice but to construct my own musical reality. In traditional Japanese music the emphasis is on refinement rather than creativity, emulation of one’s teacher rather than developing a personal style. As such, traditional music represents a culture, a way of life of a collective people emanating from a particular location in history and geography. A contemporary composer, however, is required to grapple with both tradition and innovation, Western or otherwise, and the finished ouvre is primarily that of an individual. Musical configurations using collective improvisation by the individual performers, such as I have experienced in the Cecil Taylor Orchestra and performing works of Pauline Oliveros, Chirstian Wolfe, and George Lewis, reduces the singular control of the composer, and relegates more responsibility — and hence individuality — to the performer. I have composed a series of ten pieces using gagaku and Western instruments, and have been fortunate to have coaxed members of the gagaku ensemble to perform my pieces. Frequently there are sections that call for some aspect of improvisation, as well as non-traditional techniques.
Trilogy for Sho, Bassoon and Koto (1994, employs extended techniques for the sho (a 17 bamboo reed mouth organ), harmonics on the bassoon, and tremolo and bowing on the koto. As in gagaku, there are no harmonic progressions, but rather harmonic structures of relative dissonance and consonance. The sho, a fixed pitch instrument, capable of only nine tones and approximately 1/4 tone below 440, is required to bend notes in an uncharacteristic manner, as well as execute sets of three rhythmic cells.
The Wanderers and the Firefly (1994) is scored for three hichi-riki and snare drum. The shrieking quality of the hichi-riki, a wide double-reeded instrument, is especially effective with three hichi-riki playing in unison, then canonically, and eventually yielding to improvisation. The gagaku performers, even those who read western notation, had difficulty performing without the familiar archaic calligraphy. After trying many notational formats, including using the same gagaku characters in my handwriting, the best results were obtained through cutting and pasting gagaku notation in original calligraphy onto the score and combining it with verbal instructions. Throughout much of this piece, the snare drum is an annoying buzz — like a pestering insect — and gradually develops into a virtuoso expression of rhythms, accents and widely ranging and quickly changing timbres.
The search for new techniques, timbres and contexts for my own instrument, the koto, has comprised much of my research and activities. Exposure to Cage’s prepared piano pieces, as well as performing with improvisers who have developed a repertoire of prepared sounds on their instrument inspired me to do the same with the koto. As a result, the koto began taking on a new personality for me as new sounds emerged from the strings. An alternate persona seemed to be revealing itself. Excitedly, I documented more than 200 new techniques and tunings, such as the use of different materials for the bridges, changing location of the bridges, uses of differently material for the strings, alternate tuning possibilities, inserting metal, wood and rubber between the strings, different finger picking techniques, uses of a plectrum rather than a picks, etc. Over the years, I have developed some of these ideas and discarded others, based on the relative success of their application in performance. Bowing the koto has been one of the more successful techniques, and, in the Cecil Taylor Orchestra, I sat in the string section and bowed violin lines on my instrument. The other violinists were tolerant of such an odd addition to their section, and would watch with great curiosity and amusement as I set up my koto next to them.
How to Construct a Tar Paper Barrack (1993) is a piece for tape and koto that refers to the barracks in American internment camps where my parents and relatives lived in for four years during World War II. I recorded fragments of koto, bowed koto and piano that have been stretched, convolved and mutated digitally by computer. I then improvise with the tape, entering three sound spheres that are defined by both the pre-recorded material and my improvisation.
I have also been active in computer interfacing with the koto. The Not Quite Random Koto(1995), which employs Max (interactive object-oriented software) and digital sound processing, explores some of these possibilities while continuing to assert the physicality of the instrument. The combined use of software and internal programming allows me to respond in new ways to my environment and could more accurately be described as tranformative in design.
This year, I will be attending STEIM, an institute in Amsterdam where a team of hardware and software specialists are developing advanced technology for musical and performance application. A digital interface will be built for my koto, extending the possibilities for interacting with digital video images, various sound sources. | http://miyamasaoka.com/writings-by-miya-masaoka/1996/koto-no-tankyu-koto-explorations/ |
The Passacaglia for solo Cello, one of Walton's last works, was commissioned by Mstislav Rostropovich and first performed in 1982. The short Tema, published for the first time, was written in 1970 as part of a collective composition for the Prince of Wales.
Neuhaus taught at the Moscow Conservatory and his pupils included some of the greatest pianists of the twentieth century: Emil Gilels, Sviatoslav Richter, Nina Svetlanova, Alexei Lubimov and Radu Lupu. His legacy continues today and many teachers around the world regard this book as the most authoritative on the subject of piano playing.
This impressive volume brings together three major 20th-century chamber works: Berg's String Quartet No. 1, Op. 3; Stravinsky's Three Pieces for String Quartet; and Webern's Five Movements for String Quartet. Reprinted from authoritative sources, these works reflect the influence of Arnold Schoenberg and the musical sea changes of the early decades of the twentieth century.
This songbook contains every song recorded by The Smiths specially arranged in the original keys. Each song includes chord symbols, guitar chord boxes and complete lyrics.
The excitement of a musical career spanning over 30 years is captured here in the 22 solos composed by Gordon and transcribed directly off his recordings. Chord changes for tenor sax and 'in concert' key are provided along with Gordon's own articulations.
The ABRSM's popular and well-established Manual of Scales, Arpeggios and Broken Chords is now published in a new modern edition. Still containing all the standard scale and arpeggio patterns, it has been enlarged to include whole-tone scales, augmented arpeggios and additional broken chord patterns. Ruth Gerald, formerly Head of Keyboard Studies at the Royal College of Music and a senior ABRSM consultant and examiner, has written an informative introduction, which includes some technical guidance and practice suggestions. This new edition with its clear page layout and accessible structure is an excellent resource for all pianists.
Creative Guitar 2 studies in depth the various techniques used by today's guitar stars in their playing, including eight-finger tapping, playing harmonics and the undiscovered world of emulating other instruments. With an accompanying CD full of riffs and examples to illustrate the exercises and techniques presented, this book aims to provide guitarists with a lexicon of new musical ideas and a performance style that sounds both easy and professional.
(Play It Like It Is). This matching folio showcases Satriani's chilling guitar technique. Ten songs in all, including: Always With Me, Always With You * Satch Boogie * and more.
A workshop guide to building Irish bouzoukis and citterns. In the past forty years bouzoukis, citterns and octave mandolins have become an essential part of acoustic music. The Bouzouki Book is the first, and only, book to guides the reader through the steps to build one of these fascinating stringed musical instruments. The book includes nearly 200 colour and B&W illustrations as well as plans for all major components.
A fun way to learn to play the recorder and read music. Contains 48 favorite melodies with lyrics and chord symbols, plus a piano/guitar chord chart. Also contains theory games, duets and a trio!
(Faber Piano Adventures ). The 2nd Edition Level 4 Lesson Book follows Piano Adventures Level 3B. The book is arranged by related major and minor keys, grounding the repertoire. The emphasis on root position V7 chords, arpeggios, and "Power Scales" links applied theory to the pieces being studied. Expressive repertoire selections build a strong foundation in harmony and technique.
Film Themes: The Piano Collection brings together 30 favourite themes and songs from such films as Star Wars, Frozen, Hunger Games, How To Train Your Dragon and Twilight, plus several pieces from the Harry Potter film series and "Mia and Sebastian's Theme" from the acclaimed new movie La La Land. All pieces have been arranged for the intermediate pianist.
(String). The Wohlfahrt Op. 45 Studies are a mainstay of violin study. Book 1 (50256580) and Book 2 (50256590) are bestsellers in the Schirmer Library. The entire set, Books 1 and 2 combined, is available in this new complete publication, value priced at only $7.95
The violinist Jascha Heifetz (1901-1987) is considered among the most influential performers in history and still maintains a strong following among violinists around the world. Dario Sarlo contributes significantly to the growing field of analytical research into recordings and the history of performance style. Focussing on Heifetz and his under-acknowledged but extensive performing relationship with the Bach solo violin works (BWV 1001-1006), Sarlo examines one of the most successful performing musicians of the twentieth century along with some of the most frequently performed works of the violin literature. The book proposes a comprehensive method for analysing and interpreting the legacies of prominent historical performers in the wider context of their particular performance traditions. The study outlines this research framework and addresses how it can be transferred to related studies of other performers. By building up a comprehensive understanding of multiple individual performance styles, it will become possible to gain deeper insight into how performance style develops over time. The investigation is based upon eighteen months of archival research in the Library of Congress's extensive Jascha Heifetz Collection. It draws on numerous methods to examine what and how Heifetz played, why he played that way, and how that way of playing compares to other performers. The book offers much insight into the 'music industry' between 1915 and 1975, including touring, programming, audiences, popular and professional reception and recording. The study concludes with a discussion of Heifetz's unique performer profile in the context of violin performance history.
This best-selling, progressive encyclopedia of rock/funk patterns for all tempos utilizes a new contemporary teaching style for independence, rudiments, styles and more. 46 pages.
This book addresses core questions about the role of materials in general and of wood in particular in the construction of string instruments used in the modern symphony orchestra - violins, violas, cellos and basses. Further attention is given to materials for classical guitars, harps, harpsichords and pianos. While some of the approaches discussed are traditional, most of them depend upon new scientific approaches to the study of the structure of materials, such as for example wood cell structure, which is visible only using modern high resolution microscopic techniques. Many examples of modern and classical instruments are examined, together with the relevance of classical techniques for the treatment of wood. Composite materials, especially designed for soundboards could be a good substitute for some traditional wood species. The body and soundboard of the instrument are of major importance for their acoustical properties, but the study also examines traditional and new wood species used for items such as bows, the instrument neck, string pegs, etc. Wood species' properties for musical instruments and growth origins of woods used by great makers such as Antonio Stradivari are examined and compared with more recently grown woods available to current makers. The role of varnish in the appearance and acoustics of the final instrument is also discussed, since it has often been proposed as a 'secret ingredient' used by great makers. Aspects related to strings are commented.As well as discussing these subjects, with many illustrations from classical and contemporary instruments, the book gives attention to conservation and restoration of old instruments and the physical results of these techniques. There is also discussion of the current value of old instruments both for modern performances and as works of art having great monetary value.The book will be of interest and value to researchers, advanced students, music historians, and contemporary string instrument makers. Musicians in general, particularly those playing string instruments, will also find its revelations fascinating. It will also attract the attention of those using wood for a variety of other purposes, for its use in musical instruments uncovers many of its fundamental features. Professor Neville H. FletcherAustralian National University, Canberra
What if Bach and Mozart heard richer, more dramatic chords than we hear in music today? What sonorities and moods have we lost in playing music in "equal temperament" the equal division of the octave into twelve notes that has become our standard tuning method? Thanks to How Equal Temperament Ruined Harmony, "we may soon be able to hear for ourselves what Beethoven really meant when he called B minor 'black'" (Wall Street Journal).In this "comprehensive plea for more variety in tuning methods" (Kirkus Reviews), Ross W. Duffin presents "a serious and well-argued case" (Goldberg Magazine) that "should make any contemporary musician think differently about tuning" (Saturday Guardian)."
In this unique rhythm section workbook, 23 James Brown classics have been transcribed, broken down into individual lessons, and meticulously recreated on two one-hour CDs. Featuring legendary grooves from the guitarists, bassists, and drummers who ignited the Godfather of Soul for over three decades (including Jabo Starks, Bernard Odum, Clyde Stubblefield, Bootsy Collins, Jimmy Nolen, Country Kellum, and more), this book will enlighten and challenge your soul.
(Guitar Educational). If you've been finding yourself trapped in the pentatonic box, then Connecting Pentatonic Patterns is for you This hands-on instructional book/CD pack offers examples for guitar players of all levels, from beginner to advanced. The only prerequisites are a basic understanding of the minor pentatonic scale and a desire to expand your fretboard horizons. Study this book faithfully, and soon you'll be soloing all over the neck with the greatest of ease. Includes an audio CD with demonstrations of every example in the book, plus jam tracks for practicing
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Questions tagged [technique]
For questions about ways to use one's instrument or voice precisely to produce a desired musical effect.
970 questions
81
votes
8answers
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Ten Minute Practice Techniques For Guitar?
Unfortunately, I can't play every day. However, I am trying to practice at least 5-10 minutes here and there. What are some good theory or scale techniques/practice methods I should have ready to ...
65
votes
24answers
186k views
Best method to learn to play barre chords?
I've been trying to learn the F chord for a while now, and I am having a very hard time playing the barre chord. I've read that pulling back slightly with your finger and using the body of the guitar ...
37
votes
10answers
7k views
It is ok to correct wrong notes when playing piano?
I am learning to play the piano on my own. When I play and I hear a mistake, I go back and play the correct note. Hearing the right note helps me find the next one. But I heard that you should ignore ...
34
votes
12answers
27k views
Can I play pipe organ as a pianist?
I've never played pipe organ. I'm a pianist and a friend of mine ask me to play on the church on his wedding on a pipe organ. Are there enough difficulties playing a piano song on the pipe organ to ...
32
votes
7answers
35k views
How is this B flat guitar chord physically possible?
This chord diagram is from the GarageBand chord trainer (I'm a beginner). How is it possible to put a barre down on the third fret without also muting the top E string?
30
votes
4answers
9k views
How can I be sure that I am singing effortlessly in my natural voice?
I have years of vocalization practice, but I still start straining while singing—especially if I am not vigilant. It happens imperceptibly and is a hard habit to break. Is there a reliable technique ...
29
votes
11answers
11k views
“one finger per fret” - is it worth following this rule?
When I first got into guitar, I was given advice to follow a "one finger per fret" rule with the left hand. Basically, to fret notes with all four fingers, and to follow a pattern such that in any ...
28
votes
10answers
76k views
What is the definition of 'playing in the pocket'?
The phrase 'playing in the pocket' is used sometimes, in jazz, hip hop, funk etc. It sometimes refers to the way a drummer plays, sometimes to how an ensemble works together. I've Googled the term, ...
28
votes
10answers
66k views
How to bend and release without flicking the other strings?
I'm trying to bend up then back down on the G string (so it plays both notes, I'm not muting the bend back down to G) but I always catch my fingernail on the D string. So when I let the bend back ...
27
votes
7answers
11k views
Which fingering to use when playing the same piano key twice in a row?
I just started to learn piano, and I notice that practice sheet music for beginners sometimes specifies for all or some keys which fingers should hit them. It seems that some authors consistently ...
27
votes
9answers
24k views
What are the ergonomic / playing differences between the guitar and the piano?
The guitar and the piano are two of the most popular instruments which allow multiple notes to be played simultaneously. The acoustic quality of the two instruments are, of course, different, but ...
27
votes
12answers
28k views
What are the pros and cons of Traditional Grip vs. Matched Grip for snare and drumset?
So far I've just been learning matched grip for my snare and drumset playing, but I see of lot of people using traditional grip as well. I'm curious, what are some of the pros and cons of matched vs. ...
27
votes
10answers
24k views
What is the difference between upstrokes and downstrokes while strumming a guitar?
One of the most basic guitar skills are strumming up and down freely. And I have noticed in songs that there usually appears to be a difference in sounds between the two strokes. But when I'm ...
26
votes
7answers
2k views
What are some of the components of a good guitar solo?
Putting aside the emotional value of listening to a great guitar solo, what are some of the criteria that can be applied to make an educated judgement as to the quality of a solo within the context of ...
26
votes
4answers
7k views
How do I become better at “playing outside”?
One can spend an enormous amount of time playing melodies "in" the tonic. For example if your are in A major, you might favor A major or A lydian. However, there is a term called "playing outside" in ...
25
votes
12answers
27k views
Is “You shouldn't play all 6 strings together on an electric guitar” good teaching?
Someone I know who has been playing electric guitar for many years says this quite often, as a key difference between playing acoustic and electric guitar. He claims that even playing rhythm, you ...
25
votes
8answers
19k views
Where to rest your thumb when playing bass: Pickup vs. Strings vs. Thumbrests
I'm a beginning bass player with a couple months' lessons under my belt. I haven't gotten far along enough yet to solidify a playing style, so I'm still able to change my habits if I want to. I was ...
24
votes
14answers
8k views
Can one be too old to learn an instrument?
I own a guitar. I've owned it since I was about 13, but never really got into it because I was a spiteful teen who wanted to play the drums, and went out of my way to play the drums instead (to the ...
24
votes
8answers
17k views
How to hide a flat pick in the right hand when switching to finger picking, Warren Haynes style
Watch any Warren Haynes video on YouTube and you'll notice that he often likes to mix it up and play solos with a pick but mid-way switch to using his fingers. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EMxG90vP-...
24
votes
2answers
7k views
What are Head voice and Chest voice
Head voice and Chest voice were discussed in this question about natural voice, but despite singing in choirs for nearly 9 years I have never heard of them. Can someone provide a good description of ...
24
votes
8answers
26k views
Pick weight - functional difference, or just personal preference?
I'm at the very beginning of learning to play guitar, and I recently needed to buy some more picks. This was more complex than I was expecting, since there are apparently many different weights of ...
24
votes
8answers
52k views
What is the difference between male head voice and falsetto?
What is the fundamental difference between head voice and falsetto in male singers? I think I know the answer, but I cannot be sure in its credibility, since all my self-researched knowledge comes ...
23
votes
7answers
81k views
Why does my thumb hurt when I play bar chords?
Certain chords cause my thumb to be sore. How can I play in a way to prevent this?
22
votes
10answers
27k views
Should I look at the fretboard while I play guitar?
Is it a bad thing to constantly look at the frets while playing? Sometimes I find myself curved over a body of the guitar so much that my neck starts to hurt. It seems that some experienced players ...
22
votes
12answers
30k views
What are some techniques to control feedback in a musical setting?
I was always intrigued with the way Ted Nugent/Adrian Belew/Jeff Beck/Jimi Hendrix/SRV were able to control feedback and make it musical - are there guitar/amp settings and techniques that can make ...
22
votes
6answers
2k views
How to learn to play guitar with a slide?
I have always wanted to play guitar with a slide. How should I go about learning this skill?
22
votes
6answers
32k views
How to play chords like G/B
I heard that if there is a chord written like x/y then that means an x chord with y in the bass. This can be played by playing x normally, but then playing the y note on the 6th string, correct? Then ...
21
votes
8answers
12k views
Why does music sound bad when played backwards?
I am not sure where to post this, but I hope it fits here. If you have ever recorded music, and play the track backwards, you'll notice it sounds quite strange, almost demonic. I have always ...
21
votes
3answers
9k views
Why can't I whistle and hum different notes at the same time?
I can whistle and hum at the same time, by making the breath from my humming go out through lips formed into a whistling pucker. I've found that no matter how hard I try to do otherwise, whatever note ...
21
votes
8answers
36k views
How can I minimize going out of tune when using the whammy bar?
Perhaps my selection of musicians is biased, but usually when I see a whammy bar used, it's usually with a locking tremolo bridge like a Floyd Rose. Everybody else seems to take the whammy bar out and ...
21
votes
3answers
4k views
Improving breath support
What are some exercises or tips to help singers improve their breath support?
21
votes
5answers
21k views
What is the difference between 'martelé and 'détaché' bowing?
As the title asks, I wish it could be clear to me. Can someone give me a good characterization? Do you produce them differently on a cello than on a violin or viola?
21
votes
6answers
2k views
Skills needed for classical guitar
I've been playing steel-string acoustic for 25+ years, and I'm becoming more interested in classical guitar playing. While I'm fairly good at fingerstyle, I'm aware that making the leap to classical/...
21
votes
7answers
8k views
How to reliably execute a snare drum rimshot?
A standard snare drum rim shot, as I understand it, requires the stick to contact the drum head and rim simultaneously. I'm having trouble finding the appropriate angle (the majority of the time I ...
20
votes
7answers
12k views
How to stop distortion from making minor chords muddy?
I have a Roland/Boss GT3, which I use to get various distortion sounds. I like the sound for the most part, but I find that distorted sounds seem very ... "muddy" I guess would be the best way to ...
20
votes
2answers
1k views
Does the manner in which you release a tone on the piano affect its sound?
Watch how, for instance, Valentina Lisitsa releases her final chord of Chopin's Op. 9, no. 2 by pulling her hands up from the keyboard. Such a lift isn't reserved for slower music; this even happens ...
20
votes
2answers
3k views
How to begin learning the CAGED Method
What is the best way of approaching the CAGED Method. What are some good resources for beginning to learn this method.
20
votes
1answer
1k views
How to learn to play 'out of phase' with yourself?
There's a Piano piece by Steve Reich called piano phase, in which the same notes are played on 2 pianos (usually by different people), but over time, they shift out of phase with each other. Here's ...
19
votes
8answers
7k views
Three notes on the violin?
Okay, I've been taking the rather unusual step of playing some violin scores on the mandolin (the tunings are the same, and they're about the same size, so they're usually pretty suitable parts). ...
19
votes
8answers
38k views
What should a guitarist learn first: Rhythm or Lead?
It is a slightly subjective question, however, there is, I'm sure, a common consensus as to what lends itself better to a beginner so as not to get frustrated with the instrument. I'm curious as to ...
19
votes
7answers
67k views
Is it normal for frequent guitar playing to be accompanied by wrist pain?
Is it normal for frequent guitar playing to be accompanied by wrist pain or is it something that is caused by poor posture/position and technique? I have been playing for several years now, and mostly ...
19
votes
9answers
20k views
When singing, how to avoid being distracted by vocal harmony or other vocal lines?
I'm not a professional singer but I love singing. I find it very difficult to focus on my own vocal line when I hear other vocal lines. For example, When I was in the college choir, I sang bass, and ...
19
votes
4answers
3k views
What is a string skipping exercise?
What is a string skipping exercise? I've heard about this exercise a lot, including on this website. What is it? What skills does it develop? Can you give an example?
19
votes
7answers
4k views
How to know if it's a mode or scale?
How do I differentiate between modes? Suppose a person is playing "D Dorian". How do I know that it's "D Dorian" and not "C Major/Ionian" or "E Phrygian" and so on, and in fact "A natural minor" ...
19
votes
8answers
14k views
What determines how hard it is to press a guitar string?
When playing on different steel string acoustic guitars over the years, I noticed a huge difference in how hard it was to press down a string. This made me wonder why. There are two obvious factors ...
19
votes
4answers
13k views
Ways to warm up vocal cords?
What are some safe ways to get my vocal cords without over using them before a practice or performance?
18
votes
11answers
4k views
Practice to avoid mistakes or practice to cover mistakes
I am having a debate with the drummer in my band. His view seems to be that it is inevitable that musicians will make mistakes so it is more important to practice recovering from mistakes than it is ...
18
votes
5answers
5k views
Was Bach the first to use thumbs on a keyboard?
This question reminded me of a claim that I've heard before, namely, that J. S. Bach was the first keyboardist to utilize the thumbs in his playing technique. I'm not sure where I've heard this, but ...
18
votes
9answers
15k views
Playing one hand loudly and the other quietly
I'm currently learning to play Comptine d'un autre été from Yann Tiersen (Sheet music(pdf) - youtube video) and when I play starting from the 13th bar I barely hear the notes my right hand plays. ...
18
votes
6answers
20k views
Right hand accuracy
I've realized, that I have a big problem with right hand accuracy, when using a pick, especially, when I play arpeggios and have to skip a string or a couple of stings. Sometimes, I hit the wrong ... | https://music.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/technique?tab=Votes |
Despite having numerous albums available through one of my favorite labels (this being Pax Recordings) I only recently became aware of Sabrina Siegel’s work; through her latest Pax release, “Grace/Precarious,”which features solo explorations for cello, electric guitar, and voice. This is an album that truly earns the description “visceral,” for it is not only Siegel’s heart that is engaged in the creative process, but her body– with each track reflecting a different sort of physical struggle to balance creation against failure. It’s a remarkable album, which has quickly moved onto my short list of all-time favorites.
Being the sort of person that I am, there was no way I could hear “Grace/Precarious” and not come up with at least a few questions for Sabrina Siegel. Once you’ve heard it, you’ll understand why.
STARTLING MONIKER: I am really enjoying the “Grace/Precarious” album, and my first thought is about how this concept occurred to you. What’s the back story?
SABRINA SIEGEL: I’m so glad you are enjoying…… Well, the concept is really just a way to think about or name the relationship of the forces at play when i play instruments in general. And i can say the way i perceive the way i live and practice visual art as well…. perhaps it is the way everything goes in life. It is the way i play, always in improvisation and experimenting with difficult to controllable extended modes of playing(such as playing electric guitar with a pile of rocks, some of them very large). It is all very spontaneous, raw, natural, moment by moment, sound by sound and finding/creating mastery or balance or grace or flow in the precarious sound-creating situation at hand. One could liken this way perhaps to Jackson Pollock’s action painting, where an unconventional beauty and visual compositional balance was achieved through a grosser and seemingly less controllable mode of applying paint to canvas.
SM: As a liner note enthusiast, I’m sort of let down about not knowing the “setup” for more of the tracks. “Drop Bow Down Cello” seems pretty straightforward, but most of the others are far more difficult to figure out. In fact, without the press sheet, I don’t think I would have put it together with the title. With such an interesting process, why hide it?
SS: Well, i didn’t mean to hide anything. i did try too point to it with the little poetic writing that i did include. Maybe this leaves more space for the listener to imagine the situation and sounds as well?
I could tell you the “setups” if you like. (DaveX sez: SPOILER ALERT!) They all take place in my home, which is an old quaker meeting house made of cinderblocks with a polished concrete floor, which creates a very live sonic space. most of them are first time”experiments” that i’ve never tried before. “Yom Kippur” (i have sent an image from this one) is playing the electric guitar with rocks balancing on the strings and in hands, with the guitar balanced on a wooden chair which is then pushed and pulled around the room, involving the space, the dimensions of the room, relying on my physical strength, grace of movement, feelings, and ear, to express “musically” through this situation/medium (which evoked the vision and depth of feeling, in the performer, of the experience of Yom Kippur in it’s spiritual weight and it’s ceremonial blowing of the shofar.)
“Fire” is singing as if flame, with the fire that is alive in the fireplace right there. “I am the bow” is playing the cello with the hairs of the bow (pulled off my ruined bow) between my hands. “Big electric rose” is playing the electric guitar with rocks with an external pickup clipped on, as i had lent my cord to my neighbor and so could not utilize it’s built-in pickups (actually only one of them works, and i like the sound quality it gives this way), the recording device itself was also in a precarious situation as it was cutting out or something, creating several unusual slight rests and a few other interesting and mysterious artifacts in the recording. “After your voice” is simply an emotional or visceral response to the interruption (or one could even think of it as the punctuation) of my recording session by a friend’s voice on the answering machine. …………to identify a few for you.
SM: I find that I can think of “Grace/Precarious” in at least two manners– as a musician struggling to achieve a sound and failing in many interesting ways; or as an example of a musician using an interesting process to ‘call out’ these interesting “failures”. In the first manner, the album is full of ‘mistakes,’ but obviously not in the other manner. Do you find either of these viewpoints more relevant than the other?SS: I think that both of these ways relate to the process… perhaps the second one more so. you could think of those sounds as mistakes or just the next sounds in the work. (Perhaps this is a more valueless process or the values or way of “judging” is different, more open and active……….. to embrace all sound, all expression as what is, as what has come forth for some reason and so is of value and is something to work off of and enjoy. One could take this way and apply it to one’s whole life…….. accept what comes and work with it.) I could tell you that because i am not in complete control of what i am doing i use my body, ear, hand to come close to what i imagine would be the next sound that i would “want”.
I respond to each sound as well or as true as i can as they come. So it is almost the constant unknown, and constant intense listening and bodily feeling (you know in the handling of the rocks, with all their crags, different weights, sizes, sonic qualities, balance….etc.) to be able to make a “coherent” piece. (It’s like eating the mushroom in Alice in Wonderland….. you never know what you are going to get exactly) And the rest of it is also how i am feeling at the moment- emotional content and some thoughts too. Sometimes it is more about the energy and feeling/movement of the body, as in “The body moving” than finding a specific sound or note and is more like Dance. So every sound counts and is true to the process and ultimately there are no mistakes. But perhaps, in my experience playing this way, i could say that some works have more ” coherency” than others, or make more”musical” “sense” than others and this is where the
grace/Grace comes in……………
SM: Did any harm come to your instruments? I am particularly worried about the cello.
SS: Yes…..it is a bit unavoidable. But i am as careful as i can be. I love my guitar but it is full of scratches and dents and the strings, which i haven’t changed in two years (part of this “work with what is” way…… also it means that the guitar is always changing,) are all worn down ( i think it’s time for new strings!) and one is now missing. With the cello i am a bit more careful. There was a time though that i was in the studio with Onomatopoeia and we were recording what became the “Walking On Water” album, (which was such a great and intense experience for me) and i was playing a ceramic flute at one point and we were playing an intense piece that seemed a voodoon ritual and so i ended up banging it on a bottle over and over and there were pieces of it and glass all over……..)
SM: An argument could be made that, like a recording using extended techniques, this album uses ‘extended situation’ or ‘extended setting’. While field recordings certainly offer setting as a point of importance, “Grace/Precarious” may be the first to use setting in this way. What are your feelings on this?
SS: Wow………..I think it is great that you ask this question! I have thought of and written of “situationist” playing, where the situation is a very personal experience, with all the contents of and encounters of a singular being/beings, the individual musician/musicians with what ever is happening and related to the sound…… strengths, weakness, personality, mind, body, thoughts, the space that one is in; the “musical situation,” all of what is there in this singular moment. I think this opens “music” up, sound/noise wise, time wise, content wise, and creates a more dimensional and intimate musical experience for both musician and listener.
SM: Have there been any live performances of the album?
SS: Well it’s all just improvisation and so there really couldn’t be another performance of the album (aside from when it was recorded…but i was alone…..some of it on video) or any of my albums…..it wouldn’t be the same thing. i could repeat similar set ups for playing though…. but i’m not into repeating.
SM: The word “grace” has many meanings– the quality of elegance, a favor bestowed, or even a religious concept of a god’s strengthening influence. What is your reading of this word, and how does that relate to the recording?
SS: I guess for me it is both one’s personal physical grace (“elegance”) of movement, which involves strength, and bodily awareness etc. and Grace, G-d’s or the Tao’s “strengthening”, sustaining, flowing, buoyant “perfection”, and the relationship of the two in the experience of the musician and through it’s precipitate (the phenomenon of the outcome, the music.)
SM: This is the first album of yours to find me, and possibly my listeners as well. What have we missed, and where could we find it?
SS: There are fifteen or so albums that i (and Pax Recordings) have put all on cdbaby online, and so they are available as well on itunes and other digital distribution sites. There are three other solo albums of electric guitar played with rocks and one album of a work that i made from a recording in rural upstate New York that i think is very special in it’s meditative quality(intense one though) and experience of the perfect sonic compositional nature of Nature (the world and the way things go/flow) called “G-d’s Music (fill in your name)”. There are four albums with my duo with Charles Coxon (SIECOX), and the rest are with “experimental” ensemble Onomatopoeia, which utilize pseudo pop elements, giving a very pop first hit, but are very “situational”, all improvised, interesting, and intimate in that i sing as well – the latest one is called “The Quality Of Flowers”.
SM: Any projects/albums/performances on the horizon?
SS: I have several projects on the horizon. One most important one is raising my new beautiful son Isidore, now six weeks old. there is another SIECOX album, and a Sabrina Siegel and Onomatopoeia album to come. There is a work made from a recording of a six mile bike ride with an autistic girl that i have worked with that i think will be called “Biking and Swinging with Sara” (exploring the musicality of moving through space and time this way, with the wind, repetitive bike sounds, repetitive conversation, etc.) There is also the project of finding gallery representation for a new photographic project that i am calling “Natures Recompositions”, which are large prints made from high resolution scans of photographic slides that i left out to Nature for four years……. they are a visual illustration of grace/precarious! They (a gift of Grace) show how perfect nature is in it’s compositional beauty, as microscopic plant, crystal, and insect life moved in on the gelatin emulsion and lived a “landscape”, as opposed to a photographic eye’s framing a landscape. They look, on first view, like abstract expressionist works. I have also been working on a film about Friedrich Nietzsche for a while that i hope to finish before too long. As for performing, Onomatopoeia and i will be performing in Portland, Oregon in December in the Lunar Music series………… For now.
SM: What albums or artists are you excited about right now?
SS: Right now i’m excited to hear a new release of Erik Satie’s music that i heard about, with his more avant-garde works on it. I’m excited listening to my tape of Victor Jara again, that has been lost for a few years. He is so tremendously beautiful and dimensional in his voice, and words and what he stood for. i am also excited for Charles Coxon to release his “Crab to Sun” album soon, with it’s very special poignancy. | https://startlingmoniker.com/2007/07/12/siegelinterview/ |
Samsung Galaxy s22 ultra not connecting to network?
Hello, I've had my ultra for over a month now and everything was fine. Today all of a sudden it dropped a call multiple times and never recovered with trying to connect to the network. I tried restarting my phone, powering it on and off, I did update the phone since it found an update but I had the issue before the update. I've tried Airplane mode turning that on and off. After all of that failed I went to my local store and bought a new SIM card, it fixed my issue for an hour and now I'm right back to the same issue. I also reset the network settings as well. I'm at a loss. I need my phone for work, right now it only works when connected to wifi.
Thank you,
Responses
It's not really enough information. Did you purchase this phone from AT&T or directly from Samsung as an unlocked device? Or elsewhere?
Hello, @Jmiceli63. Thanks for reaching out to us about your connection to the network. We know it can be frustrating when your device won't connect. We can help!
Thank you @formerlyknownas for always responding with helpful insight and questions! We appreciate you!
Let's try these troubleshooting steps:
- First let's reset your network settings. To do this, go to Settings > General management > Reset > Reset network settings.
- Make sure your software’s up to date: Go to att.com/softwareupdates.
- Confirm you have wireless service. Make sure you have a signal. Check our network coverage map.
- Check your SIM card. You may have to take it out and put it back in if your phone displays Insert SIM or Emergency Call Only.
- Get device support.
Let us know if this helps!
TT, AT&T Community Specialist
I started having the same issue. ATT had me replace the sim card and it seemed to work briefly, he said it could take up to 24 hours. Now I am not even getting calls when connected to wifi. So the issue seems worse. I got my phone in February, preordered it through ATT when the phone first came out. I have to be connected to wifi calling in order to use any features.
Hello, @afrancois1! We understand how frustrating it can be for your device to only have service when connected to Wi-Fi!
Based on the information you have provided, let's meet in a Direct Message to further investigate the device not having service. Please check your Direct Message Inbox (it's the chat icon next to the bell icon in the upper right corner of the Forums).
In the meantime, check to ensure your device has the latest software update.
We look forward to chatting with you soon!
Rachel, AT&T Community Specialist
I have been having the same connection issues for over 2 months now with my S22 Ultra and absolutely no one has been able to help me with my issue. I have reset my network connections multiple times & installed a new SIM card with absolutely no change in service connection outside of Wi-Fi.
I am beyond frustrated & have been looking into other options for mobile service in my area.
Hi @HWatson, we know how inconvenient it is when you can only call when connected to Wi-Fi.
We're here to help you get connected again. Have you already tried the all the troubleshooting steps in this thread? If not, then let's start with:
- Troubleshooting your calls by double checking if your phone is on airplane mode, along with power cycling your device by turning it off and back on.
- Make sure there's wireless service in your area, as coverage is subject to change without notice.
- Use our device support page to see detailed troubleshooting steps in the Calling & contacts, Connectivity, and System topics for getting your phone connected again.
- See if your phone needs a software update.
Also, since you bought a new SIM card, please make sure it's been activated as well. If it isn't, you'll be able to use that page to activate it yourself.
Please share the results with us here.
Dylan, AT&T Community Specialist
I have completed the troubleshooting multiple times prior to and after receiving the new SIM card. Spoke with a representative after receiving the new SIM to ensure that it was activated properly.
I have powered up my S20 Ultra and will be putting my SIM card in it to see if the poor connection is device related.
Thank you for keeping us updated, @HWatson.
In addition to swapping the SIM card out, please let us know what happens specifically when you make a call. Are you getting an error message, or is the call just dropped? This will help us narrow down what's going on.
Please let us know how that goes.
Dylan, AT&T Community Specialist
The call does not go through, or when it does, it drops. I am also unable to send texts or use mobile data the majority of time that I am off of WI-FI.
I have used less than 2G of mobile data this month (far below my past monthly average)
We appreciate this information, @HWatson.
Please share what happened when you swapped the SIM card in your S20 Ultra, this way we can continue looking into our options for getting you connected outside of Wi-Fi again. Also, let us know if the S22 works using the old SIM card from the other device as well. That'll help us narrow this down too.
Please let us know if it helps. | https://forums-att.sprinklr.com/conversations/samsung/samsung-galaxy-s22-ultra-not-connecting-to-network/63005851e232bb63208ad6fc |
Visiting the Bosnian Pyramids: Travel Tips for Bosnia and Croatia/
Visiting the largest pyramids discovered in the world so far in Bosnia Herzegovina can be an experience of a lifetime. Dr. Semir “Sam” Osmanagić, the archeologist who discovered the pyramids is unearthing amazing discoveries that will affect how we view human history, energy production, healing, water purification, and much more. The site, about 21 miles northeast of the capital of Sarajevo in the town of Visoko, is a complex of structures spread over several miles that includes pyramids, a large cone-shaped mound called a tumulus, giant stone spheres 10 to 15 -feet in diameter, and more. Since 2006 Dr. Osmanagić and a team of engineers and scientists he assembled have been taking various measurements, collecting data, and analyzing it to show that what he has found are indeed energy machines that are far different than surrounding mountains. People are going into tunnels excavated under the pyramids, drinking primoridial waters found inside the tunnels and around the pyramids, and coming out healed of major illnesses, including stage 4 lung cancer, Parkinson’s disease, and many other issues.
I have been one of the people on those teams to visit and study the pyramids and surrounding structures. You can see a presentation by Sam Osmanagić discussing his findings at an event I hosted in Florida:
and an interview I did with Sam showing in more detail some of the structures and artifacts he has unearthed:
But this article is about travel tips for those interested in visiting Bosnia and nearby Croatia. Both are some of my favorite places in the world, and I will be going there again to speak at the Bosnian Pyramid Conference in June, 2019. There are lots of magnificent places to visit in Bosnia and southern Europe, but I will limit my recommendations to places I have been within driving distance to the Bosnian pyramids for those who may be interested in some side trips after visiting the Bosnian pyramids. I’ll include travel tips that will help, especially Americans, to have a better time when visiting the area.
RECOMMENDED DESTINATIONS
Sarajevo
Sarajevo is small enough that you can walk around the entire town in a few hours. There is a tourist district called the Ottoman Bazaar that has a concentrated area of shops and restaurants geared toward tourists that is a good place to see Bosnian culture and food in one place. One must-see destination in Sarajevo is the Latin Bridge, the spot where Archduke Ferdinand of Austria was shot, starting World War I. You can see other recommendations online of course, for example:
https://www.cnn.com/travel/article/sarajevo-things-to-do/index.html
Croatia, Montenegro, and the Adriatic Sea
There are MANY beautiful and amazing sights to see all around southern Europe, but outside of Bosnia, I have spent most of my time in Croatia and Montenegro, so I have some recommendations for first-time travelers who want to see some sights outside of Bosnia.
PLITVICE LAKES NATIONAL PARK
Plitvice is “Croatia's Grand Canyon,” an incredibly beautiful and peaceful place to get out in nature. June through August is peak tourist season, so there are lots of tourists there, but it's still very much worth seeing, and you can meet people from all over the world there. You can rent beautiful cottages on Airbnb.com in the Plitvice area. Plitvice is a relaxing, beautiful 5-hour drive from Sarajevo through the country, with magnificent green rolling hills and mountains along the way. You'll need your passport and rental car papers to cross the border into Croatia.
SPLIT, CROATIA
Split is a beautiful and easy 3-hour drive from Plitvice and a 4-hour drive from Sarajevo. Split is my favorite place in the world to visit. It's a medieval town situated around ancient Roman emperor Diocletian’s summer palace on the Adriatic Sea. The palace is on a giant plaza on a waterfront bay with lots of great restaurants and shops built into the palace. The many rooms that used to house Diocletian and his militia are now a fascinating maze of shops, restaurants, and hidden plazas. There is lots of nightlife with many shops and restaurants open past midnight. You can spend days just touring around the town and palace, eating great food, and visiting many eclectic shops.
Rick Steves has a good video about Plitvice and Split here:
ZAGREB, CROATIA
Zagreb is a beautiful ancient city with lots of things to do and see, lots of nightlife. It’s about a 5-hour drive from Sarajevo, Bosnia.
ZADAR, ADRIATIC ISLANDS, AND DUBROVNIK
There are many beautiful, unique, and amazing sights along the Adriatic coast. Among them, Zadar, Dubrovnik, and the many islands along the coast are awesome destinations. If you have the time, you can take cruises along the Adriatic coast to see various ports. Dubrovnik has magnificient apartments for rent on the mountain overlooking the Adriatic and Dubrovnik’s ancient castle city, now a tourist shopping mecca. Next to Plitvice and Split, this is my favorite destination.
ACCOMMODATIONS/SMOKING
Bosnia and Croatia are developing countries and A LOT of people smoke there, between 25 and 40% of people depending on location, so you'll be exposed to cigarette smoke in most public places whether they claim to be non-smoking or not. Hotels and restaurants are notorious for people smoking in non-smoking areas including in guest rooms, so it's better and cheaper to get Airbnb rooms rather than stay in a hotel room. Plus with an Airbnb place you can have a kitchen to make food. The ubiquitous smoking in Europe is probably the most difficult part to adjust to for American nonsmokers, so be prepared. If you protest smoking near you, you’ll likely be the one considered rude, so adapt and avoid as best you can.
EATING
Food in Bosnia and southern Europe is heavy on meat, eggs, bread, and dairy. If you're vegan or vegetarian, options can be limited outside of bigger cities like Sarajevo or tourist towns along the Adriatic Sea. There are good produce stands and stores all around in the late spring through early fall. You can use the HappyCow.net web site and phone app to find vegan, vegetarian, and healthier food options when traveling, even in Bosnia and Croatia. I also hit the produce stands and neighborhood grocery stores to make my own food, and there are plenty of fabulous vegan and vegetarian options in Split, Croatia, including a macrobiotic cafe. GMOs are banned in Bosnia and Croatia, so you don't have to worry about that wherever you go.
FLIGHTS/AIRPORTS
To get the best prices and flights, book at least 3 months in advance, but better to book 6 months in advance. You can find the best flights with Google Flights,
https://www.google.com/flights/
but once you find a flight there, it's best to book the flights through the airline web site so you don't run into complications, especially when using multiple carriers. I have had to transfer checked bags myself from one airline to another when booking through 3rd party sites like Kayak.com, etc. because they’ll sometimes make multi-carrier flights between airlines that aren’t partners. Dragging heavy bags through the gigantic airports in Europe and Turkey can be a royal pain.
Another web site to find cheap flights is kiwi.com, but personally I recommend NOT using it or sites like it unless you’re the kind of traveller willing to put up with difficulty and possible delays, expenses, and heartache. Kiwi has some very inexpensive flights, but be warned, they’re cheap for a reason! They show discount airlines that have horrendous on-time records, cramped seats (torturous on an 11-hour flight), multiple carrier legs that have horrible connection success rates (which can delay you by a day and cost you hundreds of dollars), crazy routes with long bus rides from one airport to another to make a connection, very low baggage size and weight limits, and airlines that nickel and dime you for EVERYTHING, from food on an 11-hour flight, to baggage, etc. etc. Some of these may seem innocuous on the surface, until you miss a connection and find out it will delay you by a day and cost you several hundred dollars with no accommodations provided by the airline, or an overweight bag costs you several hundred dollars, etc. Cheap airlines are cheap for a reason, so I highly recommend using Google Flights to find the best flights and then book through the airline web site. Booking 3 to 6 months early is the best way to get a deal.
Flights to Sarajevo are long, typically 18 to 26 hours, and have several legs. Most flights go through Germany, France, or Turkey can have long delays in customs, and they do search bags thoroughly, so plan flights with at least 2-hour layovers so you don't miss your connecting flight. It can take 30 minutes to get through security if your bags are searched. With shorter layovers, weather delays can cause you to miss your connecting flight which typically causes an overnight layover, delaying your arrival by a day.
There are some important differences to note between American airports and others. European airports in Germany and France can be huge with few to no separate hubs, so your arriving flight can arrive at a gate literally a mile away from your next departure gate in the same building, and you have to walk the distance, with far fewer moving sidewalks and many more twists and turns, so you must have plenty of layover time and be diligent about reading directional signs which may not be as apparent as in American airports. Departing flights will wait a bit for late arriving passengers, but don't count on it, book flights with at least a 2-hour layover if you can. Most of the time when flights arrive in European airports, rather than de-planing via a jet bridge connected to the terminal, the plane parks on the tarmac away from the terminals and buses take passengers to the terminal. In this scenario, you can be dropped off a long distance from your next flight's gate, requiring a very long walk to your gate which can make you miss your connecting flight if your layover is short. So again, book 2- or 3-hour layovers if possible. Your overall flight will be longer, but your stress level will be much lower.
The Istanbul, Turkey airport where many Bosnian flights pass through is one of the largest airports in the world and operates differently than American or European airports in the respect that flight boards do not have flight info more than about an hour or so before the flight leaves, and they are notorious for changing gates multiple times before departure. So if you arrive 2 or 3 hours before your next flight leaves at the far end of the airport and your departure gate is at the other far end of the airport, you won't know until an hour or so before the flight leaves. If you're not paying attention, you can miss your departing flight. I have had instances when my gate was changed 3 times while I was sitting at my gates, so PAY ATTENTION and watch the flight boards if in the Istanbul airport. To make matters worse, many of the smaller flight boards scattered around the airport will only have limited flight info, so it's best to go to the large central board at the center of the airport where the giant duty-free mall is. You also have to go through 3 or 4 security checkpoints at Istanbul, and they search your bags, so be prepared for that. The good news is, Turkish airlines and the airport have decent vegan Turkish food.
Don’t Be Late!
It should go without saying, but don’t miss your flight! Get to the airport 2 or 3 hours early depending on how big and busy your local airport is. If you miss an international flight, especially to Bosnia, it could delay you a day or more. There are only a few flights to Sarajevo per day, and if they’re booked up, you could be waiting days to catch another.
Of Bags and Babies
Absolutely make sure you know the airline baggage weight and size limits; if you go over, it will cost you hundreds of dollars in extra fees. Also when choosing seats on transatlantic flights, avoid seats near bulkheads, that's where bassinets for babies are attached to the wall, so you'll likely be subjected to 3 to 5 crying babies on the 8 to 10-hour flight.
Don’t Count on Wi-Fi
I have not been able to get wi-fi to work in several European airports and at Istanbul, and I’m a 40-year IT veteran, so don’t count on having wi-fi access when traveling. The Sarajevo airport does not have wi-fi, so you won’t have cell service, internet, email, or be able to communicate with anyone unless you have a working Bosnian SIM card already in your phone. Most everything in the airport is closed at night, so you can get stranded if you don’t have a working phone or rental car with a GPS. I am starting a service to sell working Bosnian and Croatian SIM cards by mail order and rent cell phones with Bosnian and Croatian SIM cards that will work when you arrive. See A Better Option Coming for Phone and GPS below for details.
In general, Bosnia and Croatia have good high speed internet. Most hotels and Airbnb properties have decent wi-fi, but check with your host if it’s crucial to you. I have had some issues with Airbnb properties that claimed to have decent wi-fi but didn’t.
ARRIVING AT THE SARAJEVO AIRPORT
The Sarajevo airport is tiny so it's easy to get through, but most rental car booths and the gift shop close around 8 pm, so if your flight comes in after that, there won't be much open if you need help. The rental car booths will stay open to a certain time if they know renters are on the evening flights, but you should confirm before leaving if your flight arrives after 7:30 pm or so. There is no place in the airport to get a cell phone SIM card, and the closest cell phone store (BH Telecom) closes at 5 pm (1 pm on Saturdays), so be ready with a GPS if you're not using a shuttle service or taxi.
Getting Local Currency
There is an ATM at the Sarajevo airport to get cash, but the ATM fee is significantly higher than elsewhere, so get just enough cash to hold you for a day and then go to local banks or currency exchange stores all around Sarajevo to get Bosnian marks (aka, BAM) to get cash at the lowest rate. Most banks will convert US dollars to BAM, and you can always use a bank ATM to get cash at the best rate. Currency exchange stores away from the main tourist drags will often have better rates than the banks.
Using Credit Cards
Credit cards are accepted in most places, but most credit card companies charge currency conversion fees. The fees are higher if you make the purchase in a foreign currency rather than Bosnian Marks (BAM) or Croatian Kuna (HRK), so specify the local currency when asked. It’s a good idea to get several days worth of cash from ATMs to minimize currency conversion fees. Using a credit card for every purchase will ring up a lot of conversion fees. One great way to avoid fees is to get a Chime prepaid debit card before you go. It has no conversion fees, and a $2.50 ATM transaction fee. You can transfer money into your Chime account with online banking when traveling as well.
Be sure to notify your credit card companies of your travel destinations and dates before you go, including airports and stops along the way, so they won’t block your card when traveling.
GETTING AROUND, GPS, AND CELL PHONES
Taxis, No Uber or Lyft
The Bosnian pyramid conference has shuttles to drive you to and from the airport and the various places they'll tour you around. There are buses and trains in Sarajevo, but it's a fairly small town so you can walk to most places in the downtown area. Taxis operate around Sarajevo, Visoko, and the airport, but you don’t want to take any that wait at the airport, pyramids, or tourist destinations, or you’ll get ripped off big time. Calling a taxi is problematic since dispatchers and drivers often don’t speak English, so it’s best to use the mojTaxi phone app to hail or schedule a taxi. Sarajevo Taxi and Crveni Taxi (Red Taxi) are the most reliable and use meters so you will get charged a standard reasonable rate. Most other taxis will haggle a fixed fee. If you have no other option than to use a nearby taxi, make sure it has a meter inside and confirm with the driver he’ll use the meter.
Uber and Lyft do not yet operate in Bosnia, but there is a fairly new service called GoGo that operates like them. I have not used that service so I can’t vouch for it. Drivers may not speak English, so be sure to have Google translate working or the written name/address of your destination to show the driver.
Rental Cars
If you're going to travel anywhere away from the Bosnian pyramid conference area, or if you want to come and go as you please, you'll need a rental car. Even the big international rental car agencies at the Sarajevo airport are small and not well-funded, so the selection of cars and options is limited. It’s very common while you’re picking up your car to get a free “upgrade,” which is really a downgrade to whatever they have on the lot, so scrutinize the type of car carefully before you agree to any “upgrade.” I have booked sporty Volkswagens online and then been “upgraded” to crappy boxy Fiats with no power that were hard to shift, making it hard to navigate the common steep mountains roads or pass slow cars on two-lane roads. Very important: most rental cars in Europe are manual shift, not automatic, and you pay a premium to have an automatic, so be aware, your choices will be more limited and the cost will be higher with an automatic. So if you have time, it pays to learn how to drive a manual shift.
Vehicles have steering wheels on the left side and drive on the right side of the road, just like in the US. Note also, European manual shift cars are geared differently than American cars since they often have to be able to slowly climb steep roads and alleys, so typically the first two gears on a European car are lower than American cars so shifting can take some getting used to for American drivers.
I recommend checking prices on Hotwire.com to find deals on rental cars, but then book through the car rental agency web site to avoid double-paying for liability insurance at the airport. I have had some rental agencies make me pay an insurance fee even though I had already bought insurance through 3rd party booking sites like Hotwire.com and Kayak.com. Avoid Sixt and Europcar rental cars, they have the fewest selection of cars and shorter hours than others at the Sarajevo airport. Dollar/Thrifty, Avis, Alamo/National, are better, but selections don’t compare to what you’ll find in the US.
Are Visas or Other Travel Documents Needed?
Bosnia is not a member of the EU, and as of early 2019, a visa is not required for US citizens entering Bosnia and surrounding countries of Croatia, Montenegro, and Serbia, but that can always change, so always check passport and visa requirements with the US State Department. If you cross into neighboring countries like Croatia, Montenegro, or Serbia you will need your passport and special papers for rental cars provided by the rental agency when crossing border checkpoints. So be sure to tell the rental agency which countries you will be entering so they will have the correct paperwork.
American citizens at the time of writing do not need visas for any of these countries, but again, always check with official government agencies for current info. For example, starting in January 2021, Americans will need to get pre-travel security screening before traveling to “Schengen Area” countries in the EU, and even before then, not all US residents and US citizens can enter Europe visa-free, due to their nationality and their situation, so always check official government agencies for your particular circumstances. Currently Croatia is a member of the EU, while Serbia and Montenegro are not, but none are part of the Schengen Area.
Do You Need Insurance? YES! Both Kinds!
Definitely get both full coverage rental car and trip insurance! There are MANY tiny alleys lined with cars and tight spaces all over Europe. Bosnia and Croatian towns often have very steep roads and narrow alleys that literally will only allow a few inches on each side of your car, so most certainly get insurance! European roads in general are not as wide as American roads. I have had a few close calls and I am a pretty good driver. Even if you’re the world’s greatest driver, others aren’t, and you may get hit while parked. Theft in Bosnia and Croatia are much lower than in more popular European tourist destinations like Paris or Rome, but you never know. Best to get rental car insurance from the car agency rather than a 3rd party like Hotwire.com, Kayak.com, etc. It will work better and cost less overall.
Things can happen to delay or cancel your trip, such as accident, illness, flight delays, etc. So always get travel insurance, it’s not that expensive and well worth the peace of mind. I have gotten reasonably priced good coverage from Allianz Travel Insurance.
GPS- Not that Reliable
If you're going to be traveling around the country, I recommend having two GPS's along, and download Google Maps to your phone. I have rented Garmin and other standalone GPS’s from rental car agencies and none of them worked, they’d go nuts and spin around, sending me many miles in the wrong direction. So don’t rely on rentals, bring your own Garmin.
Bosnia's cell network is not that great, so I recommend taking a Garmin GPS with a map of Europe installed, as well as a GPS on your phone with maps downloaded to your phone for the areas you'll go. In my experience, sometimes one works better than the other depending on where you are; either can send you in circles at times, but generally Garmin is more reliable than Google, unless you're using downloaded maps. Garmin uses a radio signal to communicate with satellites so no cell service is needed, whereas cell phone GPS’s need both cellular service and radio satellite location services normally. However, you can use Google Maps or Here We Go GPS without having a working SIM card (local cell service) if you first download their maps to your phone, and they work quite well driving, but beware, they usually won’t work with walking GPS.
Best Options for Phones and Communication
iPHONE VS ANDROID
I have used both iPhones and Android phones for cell service and GPS in southern Europe. In some cases GPS with Apple maps will work better than Google Maps, and vice versa at other times. Both work well with a local SIM card, but important, your phone must be unlocked to use a foreign SIM card! Nothing worse than getting to Bosnia and finding out your phone can’t accept a SIM card from a different cell carrier. If you don’t have an unlocked phone, read on, there are other options.
CELLULAR WI-FI HOTSPOTS, DUAL SIM PHONES, VIRTUAL SIMS
I have also used mobile wi-fi hotspots like the Huawei E57585Lh-22c combined with my cell phone and no SIM card in the phone which worked well but creates massive EMF, and after 5 days of cross-country travel and walking GPS with that arrangement, I felt like I was going to have a heart attack. Add several wi-fi routers you’ll be exposed to living in apartments in cities and you’ll be exposed to dangerous levels of EMF. So I recommend turning off wi-fi in places you’ll stay and avoid bringing wi-fi hot spots. Instead get a local SIM card for your phone, use it away from your body, turn it off when not in use, and place an EMF protector on all your wireless devices and your body.
Recently dual-SIM cell phones with two SIM card slots have come on the market. You can put SIM cards for the two countries you’ll be traveling in and the phone will work in either. They work well, but decent phones are quite pricey at this time. That will change over time, so keep an eye out.
Another development may make SIM cards entirely obsolete, virtual SIM cards, software, and phones. The beauty of this is you install software on your existing unlocked phone that makes your phone think it has SIMs for every country on Earth. You just select the country you’re in on the phone and it will access local carriers and charge your credit card. From what I hear, these virtual options don’t always work well, so I wouldn’t rely on them until you’ve confirmed it will work in your situation.
EMF PROTECTION
When traveling typically you’re exposed to massive electromagnetic fields (EMF). Airplanes now have on board wi-fi, hundreds of people with cell phones and other wireless devices on, avionics, and nuclear fallout in the atmosphere outside of the plane that radiates inside the plane. You’re basically inside a giant metal Faraday cage that reflects the radiation all around back at you. Add cell phones, GPS, and wi-fi when traveling to that exposure, and you have a recipe for illness. So avoid exposure to EMF as much as possible and use EMF protection on your body and devices. Use a cheap selfie stick if using walking GPS to keep the phone out of your hand and away from your body. This really helps with travel fatigue! My Rest Shield device is also superb for aiding sleep and EMF protection when staying in dwellings. The Rest Shield works on any regular power around the world, but you will need a plug adapter outside of the US.
YOUR BEST OPTION- LOCAL SIM CARDS
If you want to be able to use your unlocked phone without wi-fi, I highly recommend getting a BH Telecom SIM card with the Ultra Tourist 2 plan
https://www.bhtelecom.ba/en_tourist-ultra.html
and if you go to Croatia, a Hrvatski Telekom (T-Mobile) SIM card.
https://www.hrvatskitelekom.hr/visiting-croatia
You need separate SIMs for each country, there are none for both. These are the largest and most reliable carriers in their respective countries. They're cheap, less than $20 typically for 2 weeks of use. While everyone tells you you can just pick them up at any news stand, it's not that simple in Bosnia. Once you install the SIM card, you have to change settings in your phone typically, and the only real way to get it done properly is to have a rep at a BH Telecom store do it for you. Between the language barrier and cryptic settings, you'll never get it right on your own. Then if you run out of minutes, you'll get texts in Bosnian with instructions on how to add more minutes, but if you don't have wi-fi, there's no Google translate so you won't know what's going on, and you will lose phone functionality. So it's important to get your phone set up at a BH Telecom store, and add plenty of minutes to last you for the time you'll be there. GPS eats up your allotted data, and the store reps don't take that into consideration when recommending the number of minutes to buy.
SIM cards in Croatia are easy to use, just buy one at a news stand or Hrvatski Telekom store (all around), pop it into your phone, and it just works.
International Rental Cell Phones and SIM Cards
I have rented and purchased international cell phones and SIM cards for use in various European countries including Bosnia, Croatia, and Montenegro. In every case, they sucked. Most rental phones require you to call the destination party and then hang up. The phone then calls the party and tells them with an automated voice to call you back. This can be confusing and often you won't get the call back. It's a stupid system that they don't reveal when renting a phone. Rental phones also usually don't have GPS installed, and you can't add it. If you rent a car, you MIGHT get GPS with it, but in Bosnia the rental car companies are so poor, their GPS's are cheap and don't work well.
Bosnia is not part of the European Union and therefore cell service is more problematic for foreigners. So while these multi-country phones and SIMs sound great, they aren't in my experience. One of the better services I have used in EU countries is Mobal:
But I would not trust them in Bosnia.
What If I Don’t Have an Unlocked Phone?
You have two options, buy a cheap unlocked burner phone before you leave, or read on. If you want to buy a good inexpensive cell phone I recommend an unlocked Motorola Moto G4 Play with 128 GB micro SD memory card. That’s what I use and it works well, plenty of space for maps, photos, video, apps, etc.
Thanks for the Memory!
If you use a phone that doesn’t have plenty of storage, especially if you use downloaded maps, you may run out of space on your phone for pictures, video, and additional apps that you might need. I recommend a minimum of 64 GB of storage, but 128+ GB is better.
A Better Option Coming for Phone and GPS
However, there is another alternative. I was so frustrated with the lack of directions and support in English with these Bosnian SIM cards and European rental phones that I am creating a service to provide ready-to-go SIM cards and rental phones for Bosnia and Croatia. Additionally, these phones will come with our Harmonic Shield scalar energy EMF protection built in, greatly reducing the harmful effects of the cell phone microwave radiation. You won’t get that with any conventional solution.
As of this posting date, I am in the process now of getting that set up and should have phones and SIM cards available by mid-April 2019. I don't have pricing yet but it will be less than other phone rental services. That way you can buy a working SIM card with setup instructions in English (or other languages) or rent a fully functional phone loaded with every app you could possibly need that will work as soon as you arrive in Bosnia or Croatia. That way when you arrive you can do GPS, internet, texting, etc. as soon as you get there. If you're renting a car, that's invaluable for not only GPS, but keeping in touch with whatever local contacts you need, like Airbnb hosts, shuttle drivers, hotels, etc. If you fly into Sarajevo you can just get in your rental car, engage reliable GPS, and go.
If you’re interested this option, contact us at Fresh And Alive to be notified when it’s available.
COMMUNICATING WITH FOLKS BACK HOME
So once you have a working cell phone, what’s the best way to stay in touch with folks back home? I have used several different hardware and software solutions and have settled on these:
Skype, Wechat, Whatsapp, etc.
For texting and voice, Skype and other messenger apps have proven to be one of the most reliable ways to communicate with folks back home from your cell phone, as long as the recipient also has the app. Conventional SMS texting will only work in the country you have a SIM card for, so you can’t text people in the US with a Bosnian or Croatian SIM card.
There are other messenger apps like WeChat and WhatsApp that also work well. But understand, these apps are spyware, so all of your communications will be spied upon by government agencies and others. But then again, most apps and cell phones themselves are spyware, including Skype. Skype works on phones and computers, but it must be open on computers to receive messages in real time. Making calls to a phone from Skype costs money and it’s not cheap, so for voice calls back home to non-Skype phones, I use another option.
MagicJack
The cheapest and most reliable way to make voice calls back to US phones (landline or cell) that don’t have Skype or such installed is by using a wired phone connected to a VOIP phone adapter connected to a hard wired internet connection. Note, MagicJack doesn’t work with wi-fi. I use a mini corded travel phone connected to a MagicJack to make locals calls in the US. MagicJacks are reliable and much smaller than other VOIP phone adapters like Vonage or Ooma, etc. You connect the MagicJack to a wired internet connection and to a wired phone. Since you’re making calls over the internet, it doesn’t matter where in the world your Magicjack is physically located, the phone systems think it’s calling from the US. So you can make calls to US phones for free, and you can make dirt cheap calls to other countries if you pay for the international calling plan, which is also cheap. The MagicJack costs $35 per year which includes the hardware adapter.
Recommended Phone Apps
Here are some apps I find make life easier when traveling:
Airline apps- get the apps for whatever airlines you’ll be using. They won’t work unless you have wi-fi or cell service, but they can be very handy for checking in early and getting your boarding passes sent to your phone, etc. Even so, I highly recommend using paper boarding passes, just in case your phone doesn’t work.
Google maps or Apple Maps, and Here We Go- for GPS
Skype- for texting and calling. There are several different version with different capabilities and costs.
Google Translate- makes life WAY easier, and the phone app will even speak the words
FullContact- fantastic cloud-based contact manager. Allows you to access your contacts from any device easily, and you won’t lose them if your phone is lost.
Tripit- a super fantastic app/web site that saves a huge amount of time creating your trip itinerary, and it notifies you by text of flight changes, etc. usually before the airlines will. You set up a free account online, then forward confirmation emails from your accommodations, flights, rental cars, conferences, etc. to Tripit and it will automatically create an itinerary in time and date order. You can customize the itinerary as needed, but this saves me hours off putting together my trip itinerary. A must have app!
Airbnb- if you’re staying at Airbnb properties, this makes it much easier to stay in communication with hosts.
Chime- if you’re using a Chime prepaid Visa, this allows you to easily add funds.
AAA- if you’re a AAA member, helps you get discounts on all sorts of stuff.
SAFETY
Generally Bosnia and Croatia are very safe, there's very little crime, even in Sarajevo. It can be safer in a bigger city like Sarajevo at night than in the countryside or small villages since there are many more people out and about. You don't have so many pickpockets and thieves as in northern European tourist traps like Paris, Rome, etc. Still, keep your wits about you, don't do things you wouldn't do in any big American city. Thanks to poverty and lingering trauma from the wars in Bosnia in which most people had family and friends killed, many people do not smile and some may seem unfriendly, especially those who deal with tourists regularly. It's not personal. Those too young to remember the war are generally more friendly and gregarious. Generally it’s bad form to bring up the war unless a local person does so first.
RELIGION/CULTURE
Bosnia is mostly a muslim country, so you will see Mosques and minarets all around. Mosques broadcast prayers on loud speakers several times a day, even in the middle of the night. People generally are more religious than in the states, so be aware to avoid any faux pas.
Remember, you're in a developing European country, not your home town, so expect the unexpected and go with the flow. You may find your accommodations not so accommodating. You may find food, phones, internet, GPS, communications, transportation, not so ideal at times. You may find the widespread smoking very annoying. But generally people are very kind to visitors and a few phrases in Bosnian like "please" and "thank you," go a long way. Be a good ambassador of American culture.
LANGUAGE
Many people in the larger towns and tourist areas like Sarajevo, Split, Zagreb, Zadar, Dubrovnik, etc. speak some English. But away from those more touristy areas, most people do not speak English, so a working cell phone with Google translate makes life MUCH easier when traveling.
DRESS
While you don't have to dress fancy, generally Europeans dress more nicely than Americans, so you may want to avoid typical American dress to avoid sticking out like the ugly American tourist. Baseball caps, especially on backwards, t-shirts and tank shirts, especially with American slogans on them, flip flops, sweat pants, college sweatshirts, all scream "I'm a typical American tourist." Don’t be that person.
In the Ravne tunnels at the pyramid sites, it can be in the 50s Fahrenheit while it's in the 80s or 90s outside, so wear long pants and bring a jacket that can be easily removed. It can also get muddy inside the tunnels and it's easy to brush up against the muddy walls in places, so wear shoes and clothes that can be easily washed.
WEATHER
In the summer especially, it can rain at any time, so bring an umbrella with you. Some folks say don’t pack an umbrella, you can buy a cheap one at your destination. True, but it can be a pain to find one in unfamiliar territory, so I bring a good collapsing umbrella and/or a rain poncho depending on whether I’m roughing it or not. Temperatures between day and night can vary enough that it can feel cold at night in some places like the mountains or at Plitvice Lakes, so bring short clothes and long pants and some warm clothes even in summer. Most places don’t have air conditioning, but they don’t really need it since the stone and masonry buildings stay fairly cool during the summer days.
HAPPY TRAILS!
So if you made it this far, enjoy your trip and maybe I’ll see you there! | http://www.freshandaliveblog.com/blog/2019/2/20/visiting-the-bosnian-pyramids-travel-tips-for-bosnia-and-croatia |
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