Rediscovering Civil Society: The European Union and the White Paper on Governance

The concept of 'civil society' has been rediscovered in contemporary discourses concerning the relationship between democracy and governance. This paper analyses this rediscovery in the more specific context of the European Commission's 2001 White Paper on European Governance. However, processes of transnationalisation, governmentalisation and autonomisation may compromise much of the potential of 'European civil society' as an intermediating sphere of social action. By reinforcing these processes, the White Paper undermines the normative claims made for a civil society premised upon the voluntary nature of its associative forms and its distinctive open, communicative and deliberative rationality.     

American National Security and the Death of Space Sanctuary

At the beginning of the space age, the United States relied upon the general acceptance of a sanctuary narrative of outer space in order to help support its reconnaissance activities over the Soviet Union. The notion that space could be a sanctuary thus served as a diplomatic tactic, one designed to thwart Soviet opposition to American overflight. While the Soviets eventually achieved parity—having later acquired the ability to surveil the United States—the notion of sanctuary became untenable once the Soviet Union began to further leverage space power for the aim of attacking American satellites and naval assets. The crucial moment, as revealed in recently declassified documents, occurred in 1976 when the Ford Administration recognized the need for an American anti-satellite capability. Subsequently, while the Carter Administration appeared to pursue comprehensive space arms control, what was really in play was a gambit, one designed to eliminate the Soviet’s co-orbital anti-satellite capability and maintain strategic parity in space.     

A STUDY OF DOMESTIC MEDIATION OUTCOMES WITH INDIGENT PARENTS

This research is a study of domestic mediation outcomes of a group of indigent clients served by a grant awarded to Family Development Services at Fort Hays State University by the Kansas Supreme Court Dispute Resolution Council. The period studied was September 1998 through December 1999. There was a total of 29 mediation cases included in the study. The results demonstrated that domestic mediation with indigent clients is equally as effective as domestic mediation with nonindigent clients. Several dependent variables were examined in respect to positive correlations with mediation outcomes.     

Toxicological investigation of liquid petroleum gas explosion: human model for propane/ethyl mercaptan exposures

Four individuals died as the result of a propane explosion. As with many propane explosions, the question was raised as to the adequacy of the product's odorization after the autopsy studies had been conducted. In most cases, this question leads to litigation. Ethyl mercaptan is a widely used odorant for propane and was used in this instance. Three of the four victims had blood available at autopsy for study. Quantitative analyses of the victims' blood, obtained during autopsy, were performed using gas chromatography/mass spectrometry, without subjecting the samples to hydrolysis. These analyses determined the relative amounts of propane and ethyl mercaptan in the blood to be 90, 63, and 175 mL/m3 headspace, and 0.36, 0.34, and 0.77 microgram/L blood, respectively. Since mercaptans have been reported in human blood as products of metabolism, modeling studies were conducted to establish the validity of the autopsy data and to develop an autopsy toxicology protocol for investigating explosion deaths. When subjects were not exposed to an atmosphere containing ethyl mercaptan, dimethylsulfide was the only mercaptan detectable in their blood without severe hydrolysis prior to analysis. Metabolic ethyl mercaptan is sufficiently bound to be undetectable by the methods used without hydrolysis. Human subjects were exposed to a flammable mixture of air and propane odorized with ethyl mercaptan. The analyses of the blood from these subjects produced results which were comparable with those for the explosion victims, establishing that the question of odorant adequacy can be addressed at the autopsy of propane explosion victims. It is extremely important that the pathologist and toxicologist investigating gas explosion deaths recognize the valuable evidence existing in the victim's blood.     

‘I Insisted I Was Myself’: clergy wives and authentic selfhood in England c. 1960–94

From the 1960s onwards, Anglican clergy wives developed a literature of protest by writing letters, newspaper articles and books about their lived experience. Clergy wives were protesting against their own incorporation into their husband's profession. By revealing aspects of their life histories, clergy wives challenged the broader gender inequalities of the Church. The article draws on recent research emphasising authenticity as an important concept for understanding romantic relationships and religious identities in the mid to late twentieth century. Clergy wives articulated a desire for authentic selfhood, which was often manifested in a need for domestic privacy, but could also underpin vocational ambitions within and without the Church. Though the influence was often implicit, contemporary feminist debates were also relevant to how clergy wives perceived their lives. Whilst the discourse of authenticity drew from liberal secular individualism, it continued to be most commonly framed by Christian ideals.     

Dreams by Day and Night: Kant,Freud and Ella Freeman Sharpe

Abstract: The poet and novelist Mathilde Blind (1841–96) is known to have been influenced by evolutionary theory, particularly in her epic poem The Ascent of Man (1889). However, critics have not yet noted the extent to which her depictions of the courtship plot in her less overtly evolutionary writings are indebted to Darwin's representations of animal mating rituals. Although Darwin's commentary on patterns of relationships in the animal world often reinforced stereotypes of masculine aggression and feminine coyness, feminist writers, including Blind, shifted the focus onto creatures, such as birds and spiders, whose mating behaviour disrupts these stereotypes. This article examines four pieces in which Blind re-imagines the courtship plot by applying imagery of other species to human relationships: her poems ‘The Song of the Willi’ (1871), The Heather on Fire (1886) and ‘The Teamster’ (1889), and her novel Tarantella (1885). By rewriting the courtship plot in this way, Blind contests the idea that middle-class gender relations are sanctioned by the natural world and highlights the variety of possible gender roles found in other species.