Suchergebnisse

We consider the efficiency of chemical energy extraction from the environment by the growth of a copolymer made of two constituent units in the entropy-driven regime. We show that the thermodynamic nonlinearity associated with the information processing aspect is responsible for a branching of the system properties such as power, speed of growth, entropy production, and efficiency, with varying affinity. The standard linear thermodynamics argument which predicts an efficiency of 1/2 at maximum power is inappropriate because the regime of maximum power is located either outside of the linear regime or on a separate bifurcated branch, and because the usual thermodynamic force is not the natural variable for this optimization. ; ME is supported by the FNRS Belgium (Charge de Recherches) and by the Government of Luxembourg (Bourse de Formation Recherches). KL and CVdB gratefully acknowledge the support of the US National Science Foundation through Grant No PHY-0855471.

Democracy and constitutionalism are institutions that have been opposed to each other from their concept roots and historic origins. The former is seen as a possibility for popular participation in the decisions made regarding public matters, while the latter as control over public issues, including popular participation. In this article, we inquire into the concept aspects of this tension, and attempt to prove that both can be agreeable concepts for the civic and contemporary political endeavors ; La democracia y el constitucionalismo son instituciones que desde sus raíces conceptuales y orígenes históricos han estado contrapuestos. La primera se observa como la posibilidad de la partición popular en las decisiones de lo público, y el segundo como los controles al ejercicio de lo público, incluyendo la participación popular. En este artículo se indaga sobre aspectos conceptuales de esta tensión y se intenta demostrar que pueden ser conceptos conciliables en el ejercicio ciudadano y político contemporáneo.

The article analyzes some aspects of the debate on the nation, whose protagonists were two Central American liberals: Jose Cecilio del Valle and Antonio Batres Jauregui. Both can be considered the founding intellectuals of liberal and moderate positivist thought –the former pertaining to the early years of the XIX century and the latter to the century's final years– each with different and contrasting views regarding the integration, in the nation, of the subordinate sectors. ; El artículo analiza algunos aspectos del debate sobre la nación que tuvo como protagonistas a dos liberales centroamericanos: José Cecilio del Valle y Antonio Batres Jáuregui. Ambos pueden ser considerados los intelectuales orgánicos del pensamiento liberal y moderado positivista respectivamente, aquél de principios del siglo XIX y éste de finales del mismo, con posiciones distintas y contrapuestas por lo que se refiere a la integración en la nación de los sectores subalternos.

Der vorliegende Artikel geht auf einen Aufsatz zurück, der im Frühjahr 2007 fertiggestellt wurde. Das am Gymnasium Eringerfeld konzipierte Sprachförderprogramm, auf das u.a. im Folgenden hingewiesen wird, befand sich im Schuljahr 2007/08 in der Phase der Weiterentwicklung und dürfte mittlerweile in einer überarbeiteten Version vorliegen. Auf jeden Fall behalten die im nachstehenden Text zur Sprache gebrachten pädagogisch-didaktischen sowie bildungstheoretischen Aspekte in ihrer Bezugnahme sowohl auf gesellschaftspolitische Zusammenhänge wie auch auf das Gymnasium selbst ihre Gültigkeit: sie haben Aussagekraft von grundsätzlichem Charakter. ; The here presented text is based on an essay which was completed in spring, 2007. In the school year 2007/08 the language support programme, which was developed at the Gymnasium (grammar school) Eringerfeld and to which I will refer a. o. in the following, went through a phase of further development and may be supposed to have meanwhile been published in a revised version. In any case, those paedagogical-didactic and education-theoretical aspects as being mentioned in the following text are still valid as far as their reference both to social-political contexts and the "Gymnasium" itself is concerned: their meaningfulness is of a fundamental nature.

ABSTRACT.The article addresses the puzzle of how societies still grappling over the common values and shared vision of their state draft a democratic constitution. It argues that an incrementalist approach to constitution‐making enabled such deeply divided societies to enact either a written constitution or function with a material constitution by deferring controversial choices regarding the foundational aspects of the polity to future political institutions. It demonstrates how various types of incrementalist constitutional strategies – such as avoidance of clear decisions, the use of ambivalent and vague legal language, or the inclusion of contrasting provisions in the constitution – were deployed in the constitutional drafting of three deeply divided societies: India, Ireland and Israel. By importing the existing ideational conflicts into their constitutions, and by deviating from the common perception of constitution‐making as a revolutionary moment, the framers in these three cases enabled their constitutions to reflect the divided identity of 'the people'.

ABSTRACTChildhood oral disease is a significant health problem, particularly for vulnerable populations. Since a major focus of General Dentistry Program directors is the management of vulnerable populations, we wanted to assess their attitudes regarding the inclusion of physicians in the prevention, assessment, and treatment of childhood oral disease. A survey was mailed to all General Practice Residency and Advanced Education in General Dentistry program directors (accessed through the ADA website) to gather data. Spearman's rho was used to determine correlation among variables due to nonnormal distributions. Overall, Advanced General Dentistry directors were supportive of physicians' involvement in basic aspects of oral health care for children, with the exception of applying fluoride varnish. The large majority of directors agreed with physicians' assessing children's oral health and counseling patients on the prevention of dental problems. Directors who treated larger numbers of children from vulnerable populations tended to strongly support physician assistance with early assessment and preventive counseling.

This article examines the historical and political course followed by a colonial discipline, namely the British-initiated archaeological project, as it was extended to the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir in the early twentieth century. It examines how and in what circumstances colonial archaeology was adopted both by the Dogra-Hindu rulers and their preponderantly Muslim subjects in this indirectly governed part of the British Indian Empire. This article argues that the adoption of this project emanated not so much from interest in the discipline of archaeology qua discipline, but in its ancillary political effects. It demonstrates that whereas the Hindu princely rulers modified colonial archaeology in ways that could enable them to use it buttress their sovereignty, their Kashmiri Muslim subjects appropriated it to strip the legitimacy off that very sovereignty. In the process, this article also highlights the capacity of various indigenous actors to recast aspects of colonial projects to serve their own several purposes.

This study monitors group supervision for students' field training in a Bachelor's Degree in Social Work (BSW) program and compares it with the experience of the students receiving the traditional individual supervision. The experimental group supervision model is implemented in two consecutive years. Students' experiences are compared at three points in time: before pilot study began; at the end of the 1st year of the pilot study; and at the end of the 2nd year. Findings indicate that in most areas, and at all points in time, students receiving group supervision do not differ from their colleagues in the traditional individual supervision group. However, students receiving group supervision are less satisfied at all points in time with various aspects of the supervision they receive. These findings generally broaden our understanding of group supervision in social work field training and provide evidence to support future decisions on the nature of supervision in fieldwork training in BSW programs.

This article explores an important aspect of New Zealand's Cold War history—the impact of directives from Moscow on the Communist Party of New Zealand (CPNZ) until the dissolution of the Communist International (Comintern) in 1943. Drawing on the Comintern papers relating to New Zealand, the article largely reaffirms traditional interpretations of the Comintern. Although indigenous Communist parties operated in a specific local context that resulted in tensions between Bolshevik universalism and national specificity (the central dilemma of twentieth-century international Communism), they in the end functioned as compliant tools of Soviet foreign policy and Stalinist ideology. Although CPNZ officials did not openly cooperate with Soviet intelligence, the Comintern engaged in clandestine operations with New Zealand Communists. The CPNZ invariably deferred to Moscow, altered its policies to accord with Soviet objectives, aligned its policy to suit ideological pronouncements from the Comintern, kept Moscow informed of internal developments, and sought and received financial assistance from Moscow.

The repugnancy doctrine was introduced into Nigeria in the 19th century through the received English laws. This doctrine prescribes that the courts shall not enforce any customary law rule if it is contrary to public policy or repugnant to natural justice, equity and good conscience. The doctrine is generally criticised for its use of foreign standards to assess the validity of the customary law rules. This article, however, contends that repugnancy doctrine had played a positive role in the development of customary law in Nigeria by removing its harsh aspects. Most African countries repealed the repugnancy provisos when they obtained independence but Nigeria still retains it. The article compares the positions in South Africa and Nigeria. In the South African context, this article found that repugnancy proviso had outlived its usefulness and courts now apply customary law subject to the Constitution and any legislation that specifically deals with customary law. This position, the article commends for Nigeria.

Several studies have commented on the emergence of a new international monetary system in the post-Asian crisis years. The current international financial crisis has, however, put Bretton Woods II under considerable strain. This paper analyzes the sustainability of the precrisis order from an emerging country perspective. A simple framework in which agents have a choice between financial and real assets is constructed in order to explore possible consequences of the shocks that emerging economies are currently experiencing. Stock and flow implications are analyzed. Assuming that recent events would have reinforced monetary authorities.desire to maintain an adequate cushion of reserves while preventing exchange rate volatility, we find that the response to most shocks would involve running continuous current account surpluses, that is, a continuation of a crucial aspect of Bretton Woods II. Given political and economic constraints, is such a continuation feasible? A preliminary exploration raises serious doubts and skims alternatives.

The important place that British investments occupied in Cuba during the 1950s is reflected in the reports sent home by the ambassador. Having long complained of the low level of productivity, the British Ambassador supported Batista's coup of 1952 in the hope that the de facto government would use its position to reduce labour costs. The régime's use of repression and corruption to reduce the ability of organised labour to defend wages and conditions has not been generally studied, but this aspect of his dictatorship is evident from a reading of the British diplomatic reports, which show that it was central to the support that Batista received from local capital as well as from foreign business interests. In the year that sees the 50th anniversary of the Cuban revolution, this paper will examine the Batista régime and the insurrection against it from the point of view of the British Foreign Office and the business interests it represented.

"Without engineers it's no go" was a saying in the past and that's correct: No exercise took place without the participation of the corps of engineers; one could find them all over the "battlefield" either as immediate combat supporters or as versatile mission supporters. Even today, this statement hasn't lost anything of its validity. Both mission reality and occupation of training areas give proof of that. 'The engineers of the Army are currently represented in their area of responsibility with a total of nearly two companies in all Bundeswehr theaters of operation. In addition, especially engineer officers and NCOs perform increasingly general, non-specific engineer tasks in missions. The purpose of this article is not so much the aspect of present time missions, but rather a view to the mission reality of the future. From the viewpoint of further development, this future begins today already and is contemplating the year 2015, for instance. (Europäische Sicherheit / SWP)

Several important studies have examined congruency between presidential policy position taking and public opinion. Much of this policy-public opinion scholarship, however, explores reflexive responsive pathways between representative and represented, where presidents read public opinion and respond to the opinions of the known public. A less explored aspect of presidential responsiveness to public opinion is the idea of presidential anticipation of future public opinion similar to Key's (1964) concept of latent opinion. In this article, we offer a simple measure of anticipatory public opinion. Confirming what Key speculated about latent opinion, we find that presidents are more likely to successfully anticipate public preferences when the issue is salient and when elections are approaching, whereas popularity matters very little. Based upon these findings, presidents tend to look outward at the future political environment they face rather than inward (at current popularity) in anticipating reactions to new policy agendas.

This article examines the relationship between state economic policy and environmental performance. It tests the hypothesis that a greater reliance on free market policies leads to higher levels of resource use and pollution. This issue sits at the heart of much theoretical debate about the role of capitalism in environmental performance. The Economic Freedom Index is used as a measure of the degree to which states adhere to free market policies. Environmental performance is measured through the use of per capita ecological footprint, a measure that accounts for a broad range of resource use and pollution. Pooled time series analysis is used to examine economic policies and environmental performance in 110 countries from the years 1996 to 2003. The results indicate that free market policies are associated with greater ecological degradation, but that not all aspects of capitalism have this negative effect. Adapted from the source document.