scholarly journals Economic-geographical study of Сhina in the domestic geographical literature

Author(s):  
A. A. Aguirrechu ◽  
K. V. Mironenko

The paper provides an overview of the economic and geographical studies of China carried out in our country. There are several stages of the formation and development of this area of China country studies. The origin of research dates back to the early 1930s, when China research was national interests of our country. The main period of study of this country by domestic economic geographers fell down in the 1950s — on the one hand, the period of the most favorable relations between the USSR and China, on the other — the period of the maximum flourishing of regional studies in our country. The cooling in political relations between the countries in the first half of the 1960s dramatically reduced the interest of economic geographers in Chinese studies, although Oriental studies in the field of humanities continued. Subsequent periods are associated with the resumption of economic and geographical research in China, but in much lesser amount, which is particularly due to the general reduction trend in regional studies.

Author(s):  
Olga Fituni ◽  

The article examines the development of African studies in modern China and the interrelationship between the attitude of the Chinese state to the development of national African studies, on the one hand, and the promotion of the national interests of the People’s Republic of China in the African direction, on the other. The paper explores the stages of the formation of Chinese African studies, the existing institutional foundations for the development of African studies in the country, the connection between the rapid quantitative growth and qualitative rise of African studies in China during the last decade and a half with the success of regular China–Africa Forums. The author exposes the scope of research topics of Chinese Africanists. A separate part of the article is devoted to the analysis of Chinese studies on relations between Russia and African states. It displays the assessments on the part of Chinese scholars of the Sochi (2019) Summit and the Russia–Africa Business Forum as well as the influence of the Russian Federation on the continent.


Author(s):  
Andy Sumner

This chapter reviews currents in theory with a focus on modernization and neoclassical statements of comparative advantage on the one hand, and structuralism, dependency, and other theories of underdevelopment on the other. The latter theories of underdevelopment hit their zenith in the policies of the import-substitution industrialization of the 1960s and 1970s. They were largely dismissed in the 1980s as the limits of import-substitution industrialization became apparent and as East Asia industrialized, undermining any argument that structural transformation was problematic in the periphery. This chapter theorizes that neither orthodox nor heterodox theories of structural transformation adequately explain the development of late developers because of the heterogeneity of contemporary capitalism. That said, heterodox theories, which coalesce around the nature of incorporation of developing countries into the global economy, do retain conceptual usefulness in their focal point, ‘developmentalism’, by which we mean the deliberate attempts at national development led by the state.


2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 488-495
Author(s):  
Cláudia Martins ◽  
Sérgio Ferreira

AbstractThe linguistic rights of Mirandese were enshrined in Portugal in 1999, though its “discovery” dates back to the very end of the 19th century at the hands of Leite de Vasconcellos. For centuries, it was the first or only language spoken by people living in the northeast of Portugal, particularly the district of Miranda do Douro. As a minority language, it has always moved among three dimensions. On the one hand, the need to assert and defend this language and have it acknowledged by the country, which proudly believe(d) in their monolingual history. Unavoidably, this has ensued the action of translation, especially active from the mid of the 20th century onwards, with an emphasis on the translation of the Bible and Portuguese canonical literature, as well as other renowned literary forms (e.g. The Adventures of Asterix). Finally, the third axis lies in migration, either within Portugal or abroad. Between the 1950s and the 1960s, Mirandese people were forced to leave Miranda do Douro and villages in the outskirts in the thousands. They fled not only due to the deeply entrenched poverty, but also the almost complete absence of future prospects, enhanced by the fact that they were regarded as not speaking “good” Portuguese, but rather a “charra” language, and as ignorant backward people. This period coincided with the building of dams on the river Douro and the cultural and linguistic shock that stemmed from this forceful contact, which exacerbated their sense of not belonging and of social shame. Bearing all this in mind, we seek to approach the role that migration played not only in the assertion of Mirandese as a language in its own right, but also in the empowerment of new generations of Mirandese people, highly qualified and politically engaged in the defence of this minority language, some of whom were former migrants. Thus, we aim to depict Mirandese’s political situation before and after the endorsement of the Portuguese Law no. 7/99.


1967 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 226-239 ◽  
Author(s):  
W. J. Hudson

Relations between Australia and Indonesia became strained within months of Indonesia's attainment of independence, deteriorating as conflict developed first on the question of West Irian and then as a result of Indonesia's hostility towards Malaysia. For many years, it seemed ironical that Australia should have played a major part in the emergence of a neighbour whose external policies and internal trends endangered rather than safeguarded Australian interests. But there is more involved here than historical irony in the context of Australian-Indonesian relations. Sufficient time has now elapsed for Australian policy on the Indonesian independence question to be seen in the wider context of the whole postwar phenomenon of decolonisation. For it is not merely of interest that Australia should have assisted neighbouring Asian rebels against a European colonial Power (remembering that Australia herself was, and is, a European colonial Power) and should then have been embarrassed by the activities of the rebels coming to office. It is of greater interest that, of the immense number of colonial issues anxiously engaging the attention of international society in the 1940s and 1950s, the years which saw the virtual demise of western colonialism, this was the one issue on which Australia took up the rebel cause. Throughout this period and irrespective of the complexion of the parties in power in Canberra, Australia persistently jeopardised her regional objective of friendly relations with anti-colonial Asia by opposing strongly and, at times, bitterly the anti-colonial cause in the United Nations. If nothing else, the United Nations has provided a forum in which each year Australia and other members have been forced to declare themselves on colonial questions. And, until the 1960s when Australia switched policy, Australia fought against all the anti-colonial Powers' largely successful attempts to have developed a system of international control over colonies under the authority of Chapter XI (“Declaration Regarding Non-Self-Governing Territories”) of the United Nations charter, to tighten the trusteeship system of supervision erected under Chapters XII and XIII of the charter, and to involve the United Nations in particular disputes so as to meet alleged threats to peace — all of them being attempts, however indirectly, to hasten the attainment of independence by dependent territories. Thus, Australia supported South Africa on South-West Africa, the Netherlands on West New Guinea, the British on Southern Rhodesia and Oman, the Portuguese on their African territories, the French on Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria. But Australia opposed the Netherlands on the Indonesian question.


Author(s):  
Valerii P. Trykov ◽  

The article examines the conceptual foundations and scientific, sociocultural and philosophical prerequisites of imagology, the field of interdisciplinary research in humanitaristics, the subject of which is the image of the “Other” (foreign country, people, culture, etc.). It is shown that the imagology appeared as a response to the crisis of comparatives of the mid-20th century, with a special role in the formation of its methodology played by the German comparatist scientist H. Dyserinck and his Aachen School. The article analyzes the influence on the formation of the imagology of post-structuralist and constructivist ideological-thematic complex (auto-reference of language, discursive history, construction of social reality, etc.), linguistic and cultural turn in the West in the 1960s. Shown is that, extrapolated to national issues, this set of ideas and approaches has led to a transition from the essentialist concept of the nation to the concept of a nation as an “imaginary community” or an intellectual construct. A fundamental difference in approaches to the study of an image of the “Other” in traditional comparativism and imagology, which arises from a different understanding of the nation, has been distinguished. It is concluded that the imagology studies the image of the “Other” primarily in its manipulative, socio-ideological function, i.e., as an important tool for the formation and transformation of national and cultural identity. The article identifies ideological, socio-political factors that prepared the birth of the imagology and ensured its development in western Humanities (fear of possible recurrences of extreme nationalism and fascism in post-war Europe, the EU project, which set the task of forming a pan-European identity). It is concluded that the imagology, on the one hand, has actualized an important field of scientific research — the study of the image of the “Other”, but, on the other hand, in the broader cultural and historical perspective, marked a departure not only from the traditions of comparativism and historical poetics, but also from the humanist tradition of the European culture, becoming part of a manipulative dominant strategy in the West. To the culture of “incorporation” into a “foreign word” in order to understand it, preserve it and to ensure a genuine dialogue of cultures, the imagology has contrasted the social engineering and the technology of active “designing” a new identity.


Author(s):  
Ori Soltes

Religious and cultural syncretism, particularly in visual art in the Jewish and Christian traditions since the 19th century, has expressed itself in diverse ways and reflects a broad and layered series of contexts. These are at once chronological—arising out of developments that may be charted over several centuries before arriving into the 19th and 20th centuries—and political, spiritual, and cultural, as well as often extending beyond the Jewish–Christian matrix. The specific directions taken by syncretism in art is also varied: it may be limited to the interweave of two religious traditions—most often Jewish and Christian—in which most often it is the minority artist seeking ways to create along lines consistent with what is created by the majority. It may also interweave three or more traditions. It may be a matter of religion alone, or it may be a matter of other issues, such as culture or gender, which may or may not be obviously intertwined with religion. The term “syncretism” has, in certain specifically anthropological and theological circles, acquired a negative connotation. This has grown out of the increasing consciousness, since the 1960s, of the political implications of that term in the course of Western history, in which hegemonic European Christianity has addressed non-Christian religious perspectives. This process intensified in the Colonial era when the West expanded its dominance over much of the globe. An obvious and particularly negative instance of this is the history of the Inquisition as it first affected Jews in late-15th-century Spain and later encompassed indigenous peoples in the Americas, Asia, and Africa. While this issue is noted—after all, art has always been interwoven with politics—it is not the focus of this article. Instead “syncretism” will not be treated as a concept that needs to be distinguished from “hybridization” or “hybridity,” although different modes of syncretism will be distinguished. Syncretistic preludes to visual artists in the 19th and 20th centuries, suggesting some of the breadth of possibility, include Pico della Mirandola, Kabir, and Baruch/Benedict Spinoza. Specific religious developments and crises in Europe from the 16th century to the 18th century brought on the emancipation of the Jews in some places on the one hand, and a contradictory continuation of anti-Jewish prejudice on the other, the latter shifting from a religious to a racial basis. This, together with evident paradoxes regarding secular and spiritual perspectives in the work of key figures in the visual arts, led to a particularly rich array of efforts from Jewish artists who revision Jesus as a subject, applying a new, Jewishly humanistic perspective to transform this most traditional of Christian subjects. Such a direction continued to spread more broadly across the 20th century. The Holocaust not only raised new visual questions and possibilities for Jewish artists, but also did so from the opposite direction for the occasional Christian—particularly German—artist. Cultural syncretism sometimes interweaves religious syncretism—which can connect and has connected Christianity or Judaism to Eastern religions—and a profusion of women artists in the last quarter of the century has added gender issues to the matrix. The discussion culminates with Siona Benjamin: a Jewish female artist who grew up in Hindu and Muslim India, attended Catholic and Zoroastrian schools, and has lived in America for many decades—all these aspects of her life resonate in her often very syncretistic paintings.


2019 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 17-24
Author(s):  
Bo Lyu

Russia is a very important partner in the Chinese development strategy «One Belt and One Way». Deepening of Russian-Chinese trade and economic cooperation meets the national interests and aspirations of Russia and China, playing a catalytic role in the development of bilateral relations and stabilizing the political and economic situation on the Eurasian continent and in the world. The development of Russian-Chinese trade relations have undergone many cooperative processes, and trade itself overtime has revealed its own pecularities, related to the time and political climate. Russia and China are the two largest economic powers in the world, and they have significant prospects and potential for cooperation. After China put forward the «One Belt and One Way» strategic development plan, the prospect of cooperation between the two countries has attracted an increasing attention. The article analyzes the history and current state of bileteral strategic trade relations. Some research opinions are put forward considering structural changes in the development process.


Sapere Aude ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (19) ◽  
pp. 250-273
Author(s):  
Émerson Pirola

Um debate de longa data no interior do marxismo é o entre perspectivas que tenderiam para uma leitura da obra marxiana centrada nas análises sobre a constituição de sujeitos políticos de e em luta, na constituição de uma classe social revolucionária que enfrente a exploração capitalista, e perspectivas centradas nas transformações do capitalismo ou nas dinâmicas estruturais da economia. Podemos dizer, esquematicamente, que as primeiras perspectivas são “subjetivistas” e as segundas “objetivistas”. Nos anos 1960 esse debate se viu determinado pela chamada polêmica do anti-humanismo, lançada por Louis Althusser contra o marxismo por ele criticado como humanista, visto que advogaria por uma noção de Sujeito idealista e abstrata, descolada dos processos estruturais da economia política capitalista. Antonio Negri, por sua vez, deu e dá grande importância para a noção de subjetividade na análise crítica e enfrentamento do capitalismo. Negri, entretanto, não ignora as críticas efetuadas por Althusser ao chamado humanismo, tomando-as como pré-requisito para o desenvolvimento original de sua teoria. Mostramos, portanto, como Althusser desenvolve suas críticas do Sujeito e do humanismo para então desenvolver as posições de Negri diante destas, a construção de sua própria teoria da subjetividade, resgatada do Marx dos Grundrisse, e apontar as limitações do pensamento althusseriano no que concerne à subjetividade.PALAVRAS-CHAVE: Sujeito. Anti-humanismo. Subjetividade. Negri. Althusser. ABSTRACTA long-standing debate within Marxism is the one between perspectives that would tend towards a reading of the Marxian work centered on analyzes of the constitution of political subjects in and in class struggle, the constitution of a revolutionary social class facing capitalist exploitation, and perspectives centered on the transformations of capitalism or the structural dynamics of the economy in general. We can say, schematically, that the first perspective are "subjectivist" and the second one "objectivist". In the 1960s this debate was determined by Louis Althusser's so-called polemic of anti-humanism, in which he criticized certain Marxism as an humanism, since it would advocate for an idealist and abstract notion of subject detached from the structural processes of capitalist political economy. Antonio Negri, in turn, gave and gives great importance to the notion of subjectivity in the dynamics and confrontation of capitalism. Negri, however, does not ignore the criticisms made by Althusser of the humanism, taking them as a prerequisite for the original development of his theory. We thus show how Althusser develops his criticisms of the Subject and humanism to develop Negri's positions for and against them, the construction of his own theory of subjectivity, rescued from Marx’s Grundrisse, and we point out the limitations of Althusser's thought as regards subjectivity.KEYWORDS: Subject. Antihumanism. Subjeticvity. Negri. Althusser.


2007 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yijun Liu

<table width="530" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0"> <tr> <td align="left" valign="top"> <a name="abstract"></a> <span class="subtitle" style="font-weight:bold">Abstract</span><br /> <p><img src="http://ejbe.libraries.rutgers.edu/files/rizzo.gif" align=left HSPACE=20>This is the second of the two special issues of Electronic Journal of Boundary Elements in honor of Professor Frank Rizzo. There are thirteen technical papers in this issue, contributed by Professor Rizzo’s colleagues, friends and former students. These papers cover a broad range of topics in the boundary integral equation and boundary element method (BIE/BEM), including Galerkin BEM for anisotropic elasticity (Gray, Griffith, et al.), evaluations of hypersingular integrals in Galerkin BEM (Bonnet and Guiggiani), Green’s function BEM for bimaterials (Denda), new 3-D Green’s functions for piezoelectric bimaterials (Pan), new formulations using local integral equations (Sladek and Sladek), BEM in sensitivity analysis with stress concentrations (Burczynski and Habarta), fracture of thermopiezoelectric materials (Qin), BEM for 3-D gradient elastodynamics (Polyzos, Tsepoura and Beskos), time-domain large-scale elastodynamic analysis (Yoshikawa and Nishimura), acoustic BEM for analyzing mufflers and silencers (Wu and Cheng), analysis of solids with randomly distributed inclusions (Yao, Kong and Zheng), thermal and stress analyses of thermal barrier coatings (Lu and Dong), and finally, modeling of carbon nanotube-based composites (Liu and Chen). These authors are gratefully acknowledged for their excellent contributions, and for their patience and cooperation in the process of preparing this special issue. It is interesting to note that the wide applications of the elasticity BIE/BEM in engineering all started with a simple idea. That is, boundary-value problems can be solved by boundary-only methods. The first result in this direction is also amazingly concise. During a recent trip to Urbana, Illinois, I checked out Professor Rizzo’s Ph.D. dissertation from the UIUC library. The thirty-page dissertation is without doubt a masterpiece that many current and future Ph.D. candidates may like to follow, for its originality and succinct writing. The dissertation laid a solid foundation for what is now called the BEM for elasticity and many other problems, and eventually led to the seminal paper of 1967. Behind this masterpiece are Professor Rizzo’s affection and conviction in the BIE/BEM and his willingness to explore a different route in research. This spirit of exploration and his serious attitude in research have inspired and influenced many of his former students and colleagues in the last forty years. Researchers in the pursuit of boundary-only methods can be described as explorers in a Flatland (see Professor Rizzo’s article in Issue No. 1). They can have different perspectives, but can also discover treasures that others could not uncover. As younger researchers come into this playground, new breakthroughs, just like the one made by Professor Rizzo in the 1960s, may not be far away. There will certainly be more innovative boundary-only methods emerging in the near future. More special numerical tools will be developed and more emerging problems will be solved by these new modeling tools. The fields of computational mechanics will be further diversified and thus prosperous. There are still plenty of opportunities on the boundaries! <br /><br /><br /> </td> </tr> </table>


2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ljubica Milosavljević ◽  
Bogdan Dražeta

Multiple processes in modern Serbia occurred at the end of the twentieth and the beginning of the twenty first century. Almost all of them regard political, economic, and social changes. Influences caused by these changes can be seen in the social template across the spectrum of plans, encompassing various spheres of life of individuals from business to private, all the way to the point where this division, for many, is gradually disappearing. In that sense, this paper will follow the most anthropologically interesting example of research, the one that follows the influences of the undertaken reform processes and observed changes. This is the example that regards the experience and evaluation of time among employed inhabitants of Belgrade, the capital of Serbia. The aim of this paper was to refer to the results of anthropological fieldwork conducted in 2005, which focused on the experiences, strategies and expectations of employed Belgraders in terms of their working hours and certain temporal boundaries that characterize it. Due to the increasingly intensive business contacts with foreign partners and colleagues since 2000, the working hours of employees were analyzed in a narrower context, as they were on the long list of adjustments, mostly to Western influences. These contacts were not only more frequent after the period of the 1990s, which, among other things, is characterized by a sudden break in cooperation with foreigners, but were often dictated by the EU integration process, the increase of the private sector in which operated companies were oriented towards profit, and the acceleration of time. The last aspect was examined in 2005 through a sample comprising 30 interlocutors of various business backgrounds. The ethnographic material was categorized and analyzed with regard to the differentiation of respondents by age. Fifteen respondents were chosen to represent the older generation (born in the 1940s and 1950s) and as many the younger generation (born in the 1960s and 1980s). The blurring of the boundaries between the employees’ business and private life in Belgrade became more marked at the turn of the century, and it could be clearly stated through the example of working time. Differences between the period of socialism and the period of reforms since the 1990s relate also to a sense of insecurity and fear of losing one's job or having inadequate work, and the simultaneous development of the private sector, which is characterized by stricter rules for employees. More intensive was the influence of business on the private domain of life, but also the intrusion of the private into business life. This has become a necessity and a pledge of individual functioning on both levels, which show combined characteristics of acceleration through the increase of obligations.


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