The culture of risk regulation: Responses to environmental disasters

Disasters challenge the equilibrium of regulatory regimes and make policy shifts more likely. Using an institutional theory of cultural biases and the concept of cultural “surprise”, this article analyses the direction and intensity of media argumentation in respect of policy shifts. Instead of assuming a demand for greater State intervention after dramatic focusing events, as suggested by other theoretical frames, cultural theory opens a variety of options that range from embracing regulatory responses from different cultural biases to the radicalization of current, but failing, instruments. The analysis of media reaction to the environmental disasters caused by the oil spills of Exxon Valdez (United States), Erika (France) and Prestige (Spain) shows that the demand for more hierarchy does not monopolize the overall argumentation. The change demanded often implies a radicalization of a particular prevalent view where the associated institutional setting is failing its supporters.     

“红船精神”之时代价值论析

"红船精神"所蕴含的首创精神、奋斗精神和奉献精神,已经形成了一种永恒的文化品格。在中国革命、建设与改革的不同阶段,"红船精神"具有不同的价值。新时代,"红船精神"的价值体现在四个方面:"红船精神"是激发创新精神的思想源泉,是坚定理想信念的鲜明旗帜,是增强文化自信的精神力量,是激励奋进不息的生活态度的现实动力。     

When national symbols divide: the case of pan-Catalanism and the Països Catalans

Shared symbols are an essential element in nationalist mobilisation. National symbols provide perhaps the strongest, clearest statement of national identity and are socially constructed. The effectiveness of these symbols will determine the success or failure of a political and cultural project. The effectiveness of cultural and political symbols can be seen through examination of the project of pan-Catalanism, the Països Catalans (the Catalan-speaking countries). This political project is rather unusual in the nationalist literature in being unable to advance beyond an embryonic stage. While cultural affinity can be determined within the Catalan-speaking territories, a wider claim to pan-Catalan political identity has foundered. This article argues that the absence of a shared attachment to national symbols in Catalonia, Valencia, the Balearics and other Catalan-speaking areas, provides the principal explanation why successful nation building has not been achieved.     

What role does gender have in shaping knowledge that underpins the practice of midwifery?

Midwifery is an ancient profession that continues to be practiced almost exclusively by women. This paper explores the role that millennia of gender exclusivity has had in shaping the knowledge that informs the profession. Prior to the Renaissance this knowledge was exclusively female, largely oral, tacit and intuitive whilst recognising childbearing as an important transformative period in a woman’s lifecycle. Male scientific enquiry in the seventeenth century into human anatomy extended to women’s bodies and childbirth and disrupted the female ways of knowing. Their positivist ontology focussing on the mechanics of childbirth created an opportunity for intervening in a normal process and receiving payment for it. The perceived structural superiority of a male obstetric ontology of childbirth has posed an existential threat to the midwifery profession. This paper concludes by discussing how 20^th century professional regulation of midwifery has encouraged midwives to use patriarchal structures and frameworks of knowledge to co-exist within the hegemonic biomedical model advocated by the majority of their obstetric colleagues.     

当代文学女性创伤叙事的三个维度

女性创伤叙事具有独特而重要的价值。作为文化记忆的创伤、作为认同困境的创伤和作为个体体验的创伤是当代女性创伤叙事的基本图景。那些具有大事件性质的“缠绕式”的创伤是历史的骨架和关节；历史演进中各种新的创伤是具有时代症候的特质呈现；历史和时代之外的个人创伤构成历史骨架之外的血肉和脉络。当代文学的女性创伤叙事呈现出三个可能的维度，从女性创伤出发，又超脱出性别的界限，将女性创伤叙事的视野和层次提升到两性、国民甚至人类的高度，形成一种现实主义的人文情怀，显现出更为广阔的形态。     

河北太行山红色文化资源治理整合与旅游开发研究

红色文化资源是中国共产党领导中国人民进行革命、建设、改革所形成的物质财富和精神财富的综合体。河北太行山作为中国共产党的重要革命圣地,拥有丰富的红色文化资源。但在其开发利用过程中存在区域化突出、管理不规范、吸引力不足等方面的问题。因此,河北太行山地区应从制度体系构建、区域间整合、经济效益与社会效益结合等方面着手,进一步挖掘和利用好该地区的红色文化资源。     

《大学》文化精神对当代大学生廉洁教育的启示

《大学》作为儒家经典著作之一,蕴含着丰富的廉洁思想,对当代大学生廉洁教育的开展具有指导意义和实践价值。《大学》中的"内圣"主要指内修向度的廉洁修身,是当代大学生廉洁教育的基本要求;"以义为利"的价值观念是大学生实现廉洁行为的关键,是内修与外行的桥梁;"外王"主要指外行向度的廉洁修身实践,是大学生实现廉洁行为的过程和路径。     

United in diversity? The convergence of cultural values among EU member states and candidates

The European Union (EU) is considered to be a unique economic and political union that integrates most European countries. This article focuses on the cultural aspect of European integration, which has been increasingly debated over the course of deepening and widening integration and in the context of the legitimation crisis of the EU. Among the main goals of the EU is to promote certain values, which raises the question of whether it has been efficient in (or enabled) reducing cultural value gaps among the participating countries. World polity and institutional isomorphism theories suggest that cultural values may trickle down in a vertical manner from the institutions of the EU to its member states and candidates. Furthermore, hybridisation theory postulates that values diffuse horizontally through intensified interactions enabled by the EU. These two perspectives imply the possibility of cultural convergence among countries associated with the EU. By contrast, the culture clash thesis assumes that differences in cultural identity prevent value convergence across countries; growing awareness of such differences may even increase the pre-existing cultural value distances. To test these different scenarios, distances in emancipative and secular values are compared across pairs of countries using combined repeated cross-sectional data from the European Values Study and the World Values Survey gathered between 1992 and 2011. This study finds that the longer a country has been part of the EU, the more closely its values approximate those of the EU founding countries, which in turn are the most homogenous. Initial cultural distance to the founders’ average values appears irrelevant to acquiring membership or candidacy status. However, new member states experienced substantial cultural convergence with old member states after 1992, as did current candidates between 2001 and 2008. Since 1992, nations not participating in the integration process have diverged substantially from EU members, essentially leading to cultural polarisation in Europe. The findings are independent of (changes in) economic disparities and suggest the importance of cultural diffusion as one of the fundamental mechanisms of cultural change. This empirical study contributes to the literature on European integration, political and sociological theories of globalisation, and cross-cultural theories of societal value change.     

On Secularization Evolution of the Image of Kumarajiva

The paper analyzes and compares the text motif, cultural background and influence of the monk biography, Confucian history, modern and post-modern literature about Kumarajiva to reveal how the image of Kumarajiva went as a cultural symbol from Buddhism into the Chinese secular culture, modern culture and post-modern culture.     

Roads of change: political transition and state formation in Nepal’s agrarian districts

This paper explores the political field that has opened up in the wake of the recent civil war in Nepal. We focus on cultural-political developments in agrarian districts, where some of the most intriguing openings, and indeed the most pernicious closures, can be witnessed (as opposed to the national-state restructuring that commands more media and popular attention). Our research asks what spaces open up in the emerging political field at the district scale to entrench or transform dominant cultural codes and sedimented histories of socio-economic inequality. Preliminary research identifies specific sectors of local governance that have emerged as significant sites of struggle over the shape and meaning of ‘democracy’, namely forest management and infrastructure development. The primary contribution of the paper lies in specifying an analytical approach to the study of ‘post-conflict’ governance at the local scale via three conceptual terrains of inquiry – governance and planning, political subjectivity, and cultural politics. The ultimate objective is to develop a framework for assessing the conditions of possibility for a democratic restructuring of economy and society to accompany the official political institutions of liberal democracy.