Hazel Rowley describes the remarkable courage and lack of convention--private and public--that kept FDR and Eleanor together. She reveals a partnership that was both supportive and daring--a partnership that they created according to their own ambitions and needs
Environmental degradation is ultimately driven by societal consumption. Individuals, corporations and governments are increasingly interested in making environmentally preferable purchasing and investment decisions. To do so requires an ability to comprehensively evaluate the environmental performance of products. Environmental life cycle assessment (LCA) can produce a detailed record of the environmental burdens attributed to a product as a result of its production, distribution, use and disposal. However, comprehensively evaluating products based on this multi-attribute data can be challenging. There is no formal guidance on how to aggregate LCA results, and no axiomatically defensible consensus methodology has emerged. The principal objective of this research is to develop a methodologically sound approach to a composite environmental performance indicator (CEPI) for evaluating decision alternatives. This is achieved using multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) and multivariate analysis methods. First, this research examines the variety of MCDA methods that can be used to explicitly interpret multi-attribute data, highlighting alternatives to the ubiquitous weighted sum. The author elucidates the hidden assumptions of MCDA models and presents a systematic approach to help analysts make appropriate methodological choices, bridging the gap between the rhetoric and mathematics of environmental and sustainability assessment. Second, this research investigates the problem of criteria interaction, which can lead to 'double counting' by aggregation models that assume independence (e.g. weighted sum). The Choquet integral is an aggregation model based on a fuzzy measure, which can account for criteria interaction. However, estimating the criteria weights has been problematic. The author develops and demonstrates a novel method of criteria weight estimation that overcomes limitations of existing approaches. Third, this research considers how to aggregate multi-attribute data into a readily understood metric that ...
Ob Simone de Beauvoir und Jean-Paul Sartre mit ihrem legendären "Beziehungspakt" wohl zum Ideal mehrerer Frauengenerationen geworden wären, wenn heute zugängliche Briefe, Tagebücher und Tonbandaufzeichnungen schon früher bekannt gewesen wären? Bekannt das Ausmass ihrer Spannungen, Gefühlsirritationen, gegenseitigen Verletzungen, Racheakte und Eifersuchtsszenen? Ihre Lügen, Intrigen und geradezu promisk anmutende Sexualität? So erhellend und mitreissend Rossums Geschichte dieser Beziehung war (BA 4/98, BA 8/02), Rowleys minutiöse Darstellung stellt alles Bisherige in den Schatten. Sie veranschaulicht, wie beider Leben und Lieben ihr Denken formte und zum literarischen Stoff wurde, ihr Denken wiederum dem Leben und Lieben Richtung gab. Sie Gefühle anderer ausbeuten und manipulieren liess, die Prämisse der eigenen Freiheit oftmals zum Freibrief gegenüber Gefühlen und Bindungen anderer wurde. Der umfangreiche, sorgfältig zitierende und darstellende Titel dürfte in interessierten Kreisen zum Bestseller avancieren