LETTERS FROM THE RSAA ARCHIVE: SIR AUREL STEIN,COLONEL REGINALD SCHOMBERG AND A SECRET MISSION TO CENTRAL ASIA

In 2004 a collection of thirty-four letters from the Silk Road explorer Sir Aurel Stein was found in the archives of the Royal Society for Asian Affairs and catalogued, although not transcribed or studied. Neither of Stein's biographers, Jeannette Mirsky (published 1977), nor Annabel Walker (published 1995) knew about these letters, and there are no references to them in more recent publications either. What is perhaps even more interesting is that the Society's letters are addressed to a man whose name does not appear in any published works on Stein; a man who remains an elusive figure more than half a century after his death – Colonel Reginald Schomberg D.S.O. (1880-1958), an explorer and spy. This article analyses the contents of the letters, which shed light on a secret mission undertaken by Schomberg in Chinese Central Asia in the early 1930s.     

Offshore gas intermediary companies in Eurasia

Gazprom's utilization of offshore registration – or the moving of money across national boundaries for reasons other than of direct business benefit – has resulted in the creation of a web of subsidiary companies with opaque leadership and financial arrangements. Some of these subsidiary companies operate as intermediaries in the natural gas trade among the former Soviet states. Given that the gas trade within Eurasia has a long history of fixed contracts that move gas through a network of pipelines, why were intermediaries created, and why register them offshore? Using a critical reading of stateness as a space for transnational networks, and supported by mind-mapping software, we analysed the structure and operations of offshore gas intermediary companies between Russia and Central Asia dating from the break-up of the Soviet Union. We conclude that there were several purposes for using intermediary gas companies, from navigating trade among the newly independent states, to asset stripping, monopolizing markets, and obfuscating finance and ownership. However, the usefulness of intermediary companies to Gazprom may have expired, as a confluence of increased competition among suppliers, diversification of export routes, and economic stagnation has led to exporters and importers calling for their end.     

The distribution of individual cabinet positions in coalition governments: A sequential approach

Multiparty government in parliamentary democracies entails bargaining over the payoffs of government participation, in particular the allocation of cabinet positions. While most of the literature deals with the numerical distribution of cabinet seats among government parties, this article explores the distribution of individual portfolios. It argues that coalition negotiations are sequential choice processes that begin with the allocation of those portfolios most important to the bargaining parties. This induces conditionality in the bargaining process as choices of individual cabinet positions are not independent of each other. Linking this sequential logic with party preferences for individual cabinet positions, the authors of the article study the allocation of individual portfolios for 146 coalition governments in Western and Central Eastern Europe. The results suggest that a sequential logic in the bargaining process results in better predictions than assuming mutual independence in the distribution of individual portfolios.     

银行业关联交易法律监管问题研究

近年来对银行业跨行业经营问题有很多讨论,但对银行业关联交易应如何从法律上加以监管还鲜见详细论述。而不正当的关联交易将会给中小股东、债权人甚至给整个社会经济的发展带来不利的影响,如何完善法律加强对其监管是目前亟待解决的一个紧迫问题。     

中亚石油地缘政治与我国陆上能源安全大通道建设

中亚地区被称为“21世纪的战略能源基地”,在中亚围绕着石油为主的地缘政治竞争日趋激烈。积极拓展能源进口渠道,加快能源资源开发建设、建立我国陆上能源安全大通道已成为维护我国能源安全的当务之急。新疆毗邻中亚的区位条件以及辐射扇面宽广的地域几何形态,确立了中国建设陆上能源安全大通道的特殊地缘优势;中哈石油管道的建成标志着中国建设陆上能源安全大通道时代的来临;以上海合作组织为依托的能源合作为建设我国陆上能源安全大通道开创了广阔的前景。     

构建中心城区社区消防管理体系的思考

大城市的中心城区往往火灾多发,是消防管理中的薄弱环节。因此,加强社区消防管理,依靠全社会的力量,构建与中心城区特点相适应的社会消防管理体系,在当前显得十分重要和迫切。     

红军长征落脚点的六次选择

红军长征最后落脚陕北并不是长征一开始就确定了的,而是中共中央依据敌我情况的变化和新获得的信息,不断改变建立根据地的原定设想和计划,才一步一步确立的,期间先后至少有过六次更换,才做出最后的选择。     

小议商周以来楚与中原的文化交流

商周以来,特别是春秋战国时期,楚国与中原交往愈加频繁,在碰撞与融合中,楚国文化既保持了自己的特征,又显示了其与中原文化的亲缘关系。     

Reforming and Performing the Informal Economy: Constitutive Effects of the World Bank's Anti-informality Practices in Kosovo

The World Bank has for over a decade tried to formalize the informal economy in Kosovo. However, local journalists and businessmen among others provide an alternative understanding of informality that problematizes the World Bank’s view and actions. Against this backdrop, the article analyses the constitution and the constitutive effects of the World Bank’s anti-informality operations in Kosovo between 1999 and 2014. Drawing on Pierre Bourdieu’s power analytics, the article claims that the Bank’s agenda, and the economic ideas enacted through it, does structure and shape informal economic practices on the ground. Yet this structuring involves two forms of misrecognition. As a result, informality is paradoxically constituted (in novel ways) and reconstituted through the World Bank’s imposed anti-informality agenda. The article concludes with a discussion of how this underlines the need for policy solutions that depart from liberal peacebuilding’s subject–object distinction to form instead around an acknowledgement of informality as emergent and transforming throughout international interventions.     

A Retrospective Review of Forensic Odontology Reports Written by the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command Central Identification Laboratory for Remains Identified from the Korean War

As of August 2014, the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command has identified the remains of 1980 previously unknown U.S. service members; 280 were from the Korean War. To determine the accuracy and completeness of the available antemortem (AM) dental records, a review of the AM/postmortem (AM/PM) dental record comparisons from 233 Forensic Odontology Reports written in support of remains identified from the Korean War was performed. Seventy‐two AM/PM comparisons resulted in exact dental chartings while 161 contained discrepancies which were explainable. Explainable discrepancies include undocumented treatment (103), incorrectly charted third molars as missing (82), differing opinions of specific molars present/missing (20), and erroneous treatment documentation and/or misidentification of teeth present/missing (22, other than molars). Reassessment has revealed varying levels of completeness for our available AM dental records, the need to thoroughly review our computerized comparisons, adjust our comparisons to include molar pattern variations/third molars, and updating our database comparison program.