Suchergebnisse

The COVID-19 pandemic brought on the so-called "coronacrisis," a global crisis event enormous in size and force. The crisis questioned the ability of states and instruments of international governance to respond quickly and effectively to the global threats. It is noteworthy that there was no strong correlation between crisis management efficacy and the type of political system of a country. However, the countries with elaborated and well-financed health systems, were able to struggle with the devastating consequences of the coronacrisis better than those with systemic, structural and financial problems of their healthcare sectors. It is obvious that the ability to manage the coronacrisis is not related to the type of political governance or ideology, but to the state administrative resources and competence of the cabinet / leaders. That potentially gave an opportunity for countries with different ideological foundations to neglect their tensions and unite the efforts in the containment of the SARS-CoV-2 virus (e.g. create mutual programmes of vaccination and medicine distribution). The main forces are the Transatlantic alliance, Russia and China. Unfortunately, no visible COVID-19-related agreement between them ever happened so far. Instead, the coronacrisis situation was used by the political rivals to intensify their aggressive rhetoric against each other (e.g., USA and Russia, USA and China) or profit from it in deepening international collaboration not connected with the pandemic itself (e.g., Russia and China). We do not observe any real mutual efforts of liquidating the pandemic consequences even within an ideological block, to say nothing about different blocks. The US–EU relationships worsened during the pandemic, especially at the background of Trump's cool attitude towards international organisations and his decision to leave the World Health Organization in the midst of the pandemic and his threatening words that US may also abandon the NATO. Likewise, John Bolton spoke of the EU as an entity hostile ...

"Qiaopi is the name given in Chinese to letters written home by Chinese migrants to accompany remittances, in the 150 years starting in the 1820s. Qiaopi had numerous functions and dimensions, ranging from economic and social to cultural and political. In June 2013, the Qiaopi Project was officially registered under UNESCO's "Memory of the World" programme, set up in 1992 because of "a growing awareness of the parlous state of preservation of documentary heritage" in the world. This book presents around one hundred letters from Singapore, China, Malaysia, Thailand, the USA, and Canada, including photographic reproductions of the original letters, transcriptions in Chinese characters, and English translations, where necessary with explanatory notes. Most of the letters collected in Chinese and non-Chinese archives, and in this sourcebook, were products of the Qiaopi system as traditionally defined. A few, especially some to and from North America, especially in the second half of the twentieth century, went through the Post Office, and were not handled by Chinese remittance companies. Not all the letters accompanied remittances."--Publisher's website