Comment: Ethiopia's Quest for an Appropriate Law: ‘An Answer’ from a Brother from Afar

There have been three waves of foreign influence in the ‘flesh’ and ‘soul’ of the Ethiopian legal regime ranging from the reception of liberal laws from Western modern legal systems to the socialist legality borrowed from the Marxist regimes of the pre-1990s. While the first epoch turned to the West for emulation, socialist legality went East. From the1990s onward, Ethiopia seems to have a hybrid (guramaile) of the two. Once again, Ethiopia’s post-2018 legal regime is rehearsing yet another chapter in its quest for the appropriate law. This comment reflects these pursuits and challenges, and it indicates the need for insight from an indigenous African wisdom of Sankofa.

It’s Sort Of Romantic

This chapter turns to the British musical in the 1950s. As in the 1920s, the spirit of “America” was again prominent in the 1950s. The American influence on British shows is clear, for example when producer Emile Littler commissioned the score to Love From Judy (1952) from Hugh Martin and Jack (later Timothy) Gray. Indeed, we can see many “American” touches in the musicals of the 1950s. The most completely “American” musical was Grab Me a Gondola (1956). The only un-American about Gondola was its modest staging: the sets looked cheap, the orchestra contained only thirteen players, and the twenty-three-person cast wasn’t enough to constitute a chorus. Nevertheless, the overall effect was that of a guilty pleasure, and the show's popularity as seen through its 673 performances convinced many a producer to try to find a way to slip American elements into British forms, even pantomime. Looking at those musicals which were free of foreign influence, we can see that many had period settings, charm, and a decorous attitude. These musicals include Dear Miss Phoebe (1950) and Peter Tranchell and James Ferman's Zuleika (1957).

ЕТЮДИ ЗА ЕЗИКОВИТЕ ИЗМЕНЕНИЯ / STUDIES ON LANGUAGE CHANGE

Language changes, their types, causes, emergence and demise as well as their spread in the variants of the different languages make up a very intricate complex of problems. Only some of them will be touched upon here: the appearance of innovations motivated by various pragmatic factors within specific social groups: the in-creased use of diminutives from abstract nouns in the internet speech of younger generations, the use of forms of address such as brat mi (брат ми), mayka mi (майка ми) in oral speech, the substitution of the vocative forms of nouns with non-vocative forms under foreign influence, the formation of causative verbs through dereflexivization, e.g. usmihvam se (усмихвам се) – usmihvam (усмихвам). The main reasons for failed or incomplete grammaticalizations are also discussed. Keywords: grammaticalization, successful/unsuccessful grammaticalization, W. Croft, interaction of linguistic, social and pragmatic factors in grammaticalization, Bulgarian language

German election wide open as race enters final stages

Significance The volatility of the election is underscored by the fact that first the Greens and then the CDU have led the polls since April. The election outcome will rest on the support of wavering centrist voters. Impacts A government led by the SPD is unlikely to pursue significant changes in relation to fiscal policy. As over 50% of voters will vote before election day, it will be difficult for the CDU to reverse polling trends significantly. Given the tight polling, foreign influence on social and mainstream media could determine the election result.

Foreign influence could affect German elections

Significance With Angela Merkel stepping down after 16 years in power, and opinion polls showing the race is narrowing, the incentive for interference is unusually high. The Greens, who are polling strongly and advocate a much tougher stance towards China and Russia, are most at risk. Impacts If there is no option for a two-party coalition after the elections, government formation talks will take a long time. If elected, Laschet will come under pressure from CDU members to take a tougher line on China. After COVID-19, climate change is the most important issue for voters ahead of the elections.

SUPPORTERS OF THE ORIGINALITY OF ARABIC GRAMMAR

Some orientalists doubted the authenticity of Arabic grammar, followed by some Arab thinkers. In this article, I tried to show that the up-growth of Arabic grammar arose far from any foreign influence, whether this influence was direct from Indian culture or Greek culture, or indirectly through The impact of translations made by these two cultures at the hands of the Persians of the Syriacs, and I used in this matter the opinions of Arab and foreign thinkers who supported the emergence of Arabic grammar Under the auspices of the Arab-Islamic culture, such as: Muhammad Al-Tantawi, who acknowledged the originality of Arabic grammar. And Abdel-Fattah Al-Dajani, who refuted any Greek or Syriac influence on him. And Abed Al-Jabri, who tried to differentiate between the Aristotelian and Arabic categories. And Muhammad Khair Al-Halawani, who tried to respond to all those who claimed foreign influence on the Arabic grammar. Littmann, who showed that the Arabic grammar arose away from any for.

Foreign Influence and Domestic Policy

In an interconnected world, economic and political interests inevitably reach beyond national borders. Since policy choices generate external economic and political costs, foreign state and non-state actors have an interest in influencing policy actions in other sovereign countries to their advantage. Foreign influence is a strategic choice aimed at internalizing these externalities and takes three principal forms: (i) voluntary agreements, (ii) policy interventions based on rewarding or sanctioning the target country to obtain a specific change in policy, and (iii) institution interventions aimed at influencing the political institutions in the target country. We propose a unifying theoretical framework to study when foreign influence is chosen and in which form, and use it to organize and evaluate the new political economics literature on foreign influence along with work in cognate disciplines (JEL D72, D74, F51, F53, P26, P33).