Consociationalism and its critics: Evidence from the historic Northern Ireland Assembly election 2007

Critics of consociational power-sharing institutional arrangements in deeply divided societies argue that such arrangements solidify the underlying conflict cleavage and render it all-important for party competition and voter behaviour. I find evidence to the contrary in the case of voter behaviour at the historic 2007 Assembly election in Northern Ireland. At least in the unionist bloc, I find the effective disappearance of the ethno-national conflict cleavage as a determinant of voter choice. This suggests that consociational arrangements have led to both inclusion and moderation, rather than polarisation and ‘ethnic outbidding’.     

The lessons of Pearl Harbor

Old Friends, New Enemies: The Royal Navy and the Imperial Japanese Navy. The Pacific War 1942–1945, by Arthur J. Marder, Mark Jacobsen, and John Horsfield. Oxford University Press, New York and Oxford, 1990. xxx + 621 pp., illus., maps, figs. £40. ISBN0–19–820150–8.

Target: Pearl Harbor, by Michael Slackman. University of Hawaii Press (with Arizona Memorial Museum Association), Honolulu, 1990. xii+356 pp., illus., maps. 519.95. ISBN 0–8248–1123–2.

Pearl Harbor Reexamined: Prologue to the Pacific War, edited by Hilary Conroy and Harry Wray. University of Hawaii Press, Honolulu, 1990. xix + 200 pp., illus. £20.90. ISBN 0–8248–1235–2.     

Special Issue on electronic media,markets and civil society in East and Southeast Asia: Introduction

Abstract

The government of Hong Kong has been trying to reform the territory's health care financing system since the early 1990s and is finally on the verge of succeeding. The objective of this paper is to assess the reform efforts and explain the causes of repeated failures and eventual success. It will argue that the government's fortunes changed only after it abandoned the core reform goal and decided to pursue peripheral objectives. It will explain the abandonment with reference to the peculiar political system in Hong Kong that makes it difficult for the government to adopt substantial policy reforms in the face of even moderate opposition. The reason for the government's policy incapacity is the existence of liberalism in a non-democratic setting, which allows the government to neither suppress opposition nor mobilize popular support. This has been illustratively evident in its health care reforms when its proposals to improve the system's fiscal sustainability invariably met an early death because they imposed costs on employers, the population or both. The current proposal has fared better not only because it addresses a simpler peripheral problem but also because it offends almost no one and pleases many among the powerful.     

Crossing the Line: Richard Casey Re‐Visited

Sir John Kerr's dismissal of the Whitlam government ensured that he became Australia's most controversial Governor‐General and the one seen to have taken vice‐regal powers to their limit. While this is understandable, Kerr's notoriety has obscured a wider appreciation of the significant activism and even intrusiveness which characterised Richard Casey's 1965–1969 term as Governor‐General. This article draws on Casey's extensive diaries to paint a broader picture of the man and to examine his activist view of the role. Casey's version of the vice‐regal role is almost certainly at the extreme end of any Australian vice‐regal activity spectrum, and is consistent with patterns in his overall career.     

A measurement of human hair oxidation by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy

Human scalp hair samples were oxidized to determine the sulfonic acid absorption peak. This peak was monitored at 1044 cm-1 by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) in hair samples from 135 whites and found to provide a degree of discrimination in treated and untreated hairs. The effects of moisture, laboratory storage, natural hair color, and variation over time were also studied.     

Abortion: Models of responsibility

My focus within the topic of abortion is on several models that are used to support the position that a woman has a responsibility to sustain the fetus she carries because she brought about its existence. I consider the following models: a creator, strict liability, fault, and a contract. Although each of these models has been used by opponents of abortion to support the position that women should accept the consequences of engaging in sexual intercourse, I argue that none of the models is adequate.This paper grew out of research begun during the 1979 Summer Seminar of the National Endowment for the Humanities led by Richard Wasserstrom. He and other participants in the Seminar contributed to my thinking then and commented later on drafts of this paper. Earlier versions of this paper were presented to the Society for Women in Philosophy and to colloquia at California State University, Los Angeles, and the University of California, Santa Cruz. I appreciate the good suggestions made during these discussions. I also want to thank Sharon Bishop, Donald Burrill, E. M. Curley, Barbara Herman, and Miles Morgan for their helpful comments.