A Letter of Congratulations from Chairman Wieslaw Klimczak of the Civil Association ＂Polish House＂ to President Zhou Tienong of CAFIU

Warsaw April 29,2011 Your Excellency Mr.President, On behalf of the Civil Association "Polish House",I would like to extend our sincere congratulations and best wishes to the participants of the 2nd Plenary Session of the 10th Executive Council of the Chinese Association for International Understanding(CAFIU) scheduled on April 29,2011.This Session,held at the 30th anniversary of CAFIU,is of special significance and far-reaching influence.As a Polish NGO enjoying sound cooperation with     

Models of Municipal Budget Allocation: Empirical Data from Spanish Municipalities

The present work empirically analyzes diverse budgetary theories (incrementalism, garbage can, rational) in municipal cost programs, paying special attention to the utility of financial information in decision making. The sample analyzed corresponds to a set of Spanish city councils in the period 1996–2004, and the econometric methodology used is a dynamic panel data model. The main conclusion reached is that the budgetary allocation of municipal costs does not follow a random path; incrementalism is of particular importance, together with financial information variables. The utility of budgetary indicators is reflected in the fact that municipal managers adopt rational elements, although incrementalism remains the habitual behavior.     

Silent Racism and Intellectual Superiority in Peru

Abstract — Historically, racism as it is understood in South Africa or in parts of the Southern United States has not existed in Peru. The absence or at least the existence to a lesser degree of this type of tension grants us a superiority over our northern neighbours. In Peru, emancipation of slaves was relatively easy. This is not to say that there do not exist prejudices against Indians, cholos , and blacks, however these prejudices have not been sanctioned by the law and they have, more than a profound racial feeling, an economic, social and cultural character. Colour does not prevent an aborigine, mestizo , or Negroid from occupying high positions if they can accumulate wealth or achieve political success. Notwithstanding these fortunate cases, there is an enormous distance between the pongos [serfs] of a highland hacienda … and those highly cultured and refined Limeños, who routinely travel to Europe. This distance is neither racial, nor based on place of origin, rather it corresponds to what can be termed an historical state of things (Jorge Basadre, 1964:4686).     

From Family Feud to Organised Crime: The Cultural Economy of Cannabis in Northeast Brazil

Abstract — Traditional family feuding and banditry as well as envy-inspired violence associated with capitalised irrigation have been intensified by the introduction of cannabis farming and organised crime in the Sertão of Northeast Brazil to the point that today the cannabis producing zone is one of the most violent places in the world. These three interrelated forms of contemporary violence arose, respectively, in the pre-1940 frontier setting, in the 1940 to 1980 period of rapid Brazilian industrialisation which depressed peasant sectors and stimulated the rise of capitalised irrigation and in the post-1980 period of economic stagnation and social-political crisis in Brazil which depressed consumer markets and induced the State to liberalise foreign trade policy to the detriment of periphery regions like the Northeast.