Determination of length of human upper limb long bones from their fragments

It is impossible to measure directly the length of fragmentary or broken long bones. It is in order to calculate the height (stature) of the individual, using magnification factors. An attempt has been made to devise a method of calculating the length from such fragments for the three long bones of the upper limb.     

Foreign capital inflows and output growth rate: A reformulation

A strategy of export promotion has evolved into the new conventional wisdom. The alleged superiority of this strategy draws on an extensive list of empirical studies, an important strand of which consists of tests in cross‐country format that use bivariate correlations and/or production function‐type regressions to demonstrate a strong positive relationship between exports and GDP growth. By showing that these same tests support the ‘promotion’ of all major components of GDP, this note argues that these tests have no bearing at all on the export‐promotion/import‐substitution controversy.     

State–Community Synergies in Community-Driven Development

States can do much to tap community-level energies and resources for development if they seek to interact more synergistically with local communities. The broader spin-off is the creation of a developmental society and polity. Using case studies from Asia and Latin America, we illustrate how: (1) state efforts to bring about land reform, tenancy reform, and expanding non-crop sources of income can broaden the distribution of power in rural communities, laying the basis for more effective community-driven collective action; and (2) higher levels of government can form alliances with communities, putting pressure on local authorities from above and below to improve development outcomes at the local level. These alliances can also be very effective in catalysing collective action at community level, and reducing ‘local capture’ by vested interests. There are several encouraging points that emerge from these case studies. First, powerful institutional changes do not necessarily take long to generate. Second, they can be achieved in a diversity of settings: tightly knit or open communities; war-ravaged or relatively stable; democratic or authoritarian; with land reform or (if carefully managed) even without. Third, there are strong political pay-offs in terms of legitimacy and popular support for those who support such developmental action.     

Transformationstheorie auf neuen Pfaden?

The article explores the theoretical debates on postcommunist transformations since 1998 with a focus on substantial reorientations and innovations. After identifying important novel or discursively strengthened approaches, three of them are presented and critically discussed in more detail: the post-communism approach, the steering or governance approach, and the Europeanization approach. The examination leads to the result that, indeed, a ??second generation?? has emerged. It has largely overcome universalistic assumptions and gained explanatory power by more complex theoretical architectures as well as systematic time-space-embeddings or contextualizations. The new generation also demonstrates an intensive exchange with the field of general theories of social change. A final consideration makes the case for interdisciplinary and general theories of societal transformations as a necessary step in the advancement of the theoretical debate.     

Taking the bait: Maoists and the democratic lure in Nepal

After leading a tumultuous revolutionary people's war for a decade, the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) has slithered into a peace process and is being egged on to put the revolution to the vote. Maoists themselves are sending mixed signals about whether or not they are going to take the democratic bait to save the “beautiful” democratic, peace process from the “beastly” people's war, urban insurrection and revolution. My contention is that unless the lie of the liberal political process is identified in its most democratic, free and fair forms and not just in its secret, conspiratorial underside, the Maoists might be lured into an unbalanced democratic game. The article argues that the Maoists were not just pushed into this political process by force of circumstance, as the best possible option, “given the international and national situation,” but it seems to follow from their flawed understanding that the present political process constitutes a progressive phase in the path to a New Democratic society. The Maoists are, of course, not abandoning the revolution as such but they are possibly metamorphosing from revolution-embodied to speaking in the name of the revolution – perhaps with the added risk of transforming the revolution itself to just a name.     

Educational Space Settlement: Mantavya

The goal of the Educational Space Settlement proposed herein, which is called Mantavya (Hindi for “to prepare the preliminary sketch”), is to act as an all-encompassing education and training hub in space. The structure is designed with an awareness of the physiological, psychological, and aesthetic needs of future colonists in space to offer an almost Earth-like environment. There are six segments of the settlement serving educational, residential, and agricultural needs, which are built up around a central axis. These segments will be used to provide education in various research and development areas, which include study of agriculture, communication, life support systems, robotics, medical sciences, material sciences, and astronomy. The variable gravity at different locations will provide new horizons of research for the inhabitants. An unpressurized region below the segmented parts of the hub will provide a microgravity training zone for space walks and disaster management.