Back to the factory: the continuing salience of industrial workplace history

ABSTRACT

Factories remain significant sites of employment, crucial to capitalism. In the twentieth century, scholars registered achievements in documenting their history, but since the late 1980s, and for a generation, the field lost impetus within labour history although insights continued to accumulate through work in adjacent disciplines. The factory has not featured on the agenda of ‘transnational’ and ‘global’ labour history, but we suggest that it can and should contribute to that broader global project, reinvigorating labour history, not least by contributing a dimension close to workers’ everyday experience.     

Global Britain and the Narrative of Empire

Since 2016, the UK government has outlined plans for ‘Global Britain’ as a framework for post‐Brexit foreign policy. Some criticise the idea as a vision of ‘Empire 2.0’, but it is rarely made clear exactly what form it takes or what its wider political implications are. This article argues that Global Britain constitutes not just an idea or a slogan, but a foreign policy narrative and, more specifically, the narrative of empire. Indeed, to appear reasonable its grand ambitions require pre‐existing knowledges of past imperial ‘successes’ and accepting images of empire among the British public. Yet Global Britain lacks efficacy: as a domestic rather than an international narrative, by being inherently regressive in its worldview, and for contradicting the preferences of international partners on which the UK heavily relies. These narrative flaws, it is argued, make Global Britain an actively problematic, rather than merely ineffective, component of UK foreign policy.     

Distributed Generation of Electricity: The Role of Academic Research and Advice in California’s “Clean DG” Policy Network

Deregulation and the combined threats of energy crises and global warming concern nations around the world, yet these issues continue to be addressed more directly by domestic regulatory systems than by international institutions. The present analyses of the integration of distributed sources of power generation (DG) into California’s electric utility system suggests that domestic environmental dilemmas with international repercussions provide an obvious entrée for global environmental policy specialists into the practice of environmental policy-making and law. Here I review current scholarship on policy networks that illuminates the contributions that technical and policy experts can make to such networks surrounding environmental issues. I then introduce the key members of California’s “clean DG” policy network that emphasizes the role of academic experts in this influential political system, and discuss how my own research has impacted the development of the state’s DG policy. I conclude that scholars are well positioned to observe and engage domestic and international environmental policy networks, and thereby also to influence environmental politics and law.     

论金融危机背景下出口信用保险对中小外贸企业的促进作用

2009年中国总体出口形势严峻，中小企业作为出口企业的主力军更是承受巨大压力，就目前来看，收汇风险增大和融资困难是阻碍其发展的两个重要原因。出口信用险结合其项下的商业银行贸易融资项目，可以同时解决中小企业的收汇和融资难题。在新的经济形势下，国家应加大对出口信用险的扶持和推广力度，深化贸易融资创新，协助和引导中小型外贸企业走上可持续发展的道路。     

Against Global Parliament

Experimentation is often thought to be a key quality of any legitimate democratic system. Employing global parliamentary proposals as a heuristic, this article suggests that top‐down models for global democratization – proffered by liberal cosmopolitans and world government scholars – may create path‐dependencies which foreclose options for experimenting with alternative institutional designs in the future. Drawing upon historical institutionalism, the structure, sequence, and setting of top‐down proposals are outlined to show how experimentation with other forms of democracy may be constrained in problematic ways. Following this assessment, the article suggests that striving for democratic values under a pluralist arrangement of global governance may facilitate incremental institutional development and promote experimentation over time.     

东南亚的中国文化消费

文化产品和文化服务已经成为现代国际文化交流的主要表现形式。东南亚地区曾受到中国文化的深刻影响,形成了中国文化消费的传统和群体。本文以2000年至今中国文化产品和文化服务输入东南亚的情况为基础,分析利用文化消费的形式扩大中国文化影响的可能性。笔者认为,中国文化产品在强调传统文化特点的同时,应该充分考虑东南亚民众文化消费的取向,兼顾文化宣传和娱乐受众的目的,从而达到扩大中国文化影响力的目标。     

DEFENDING ThEGloBAl ENvIRoNMENT

正With the UN lima Climate Change Conference underway,China shows its sincerity to fight global warming Lima,capital and the largest city of Peru,has welcomed government leaders,scholars as well as representatives of the business and NGO circles from more than 200countries and regions this December.They will stay in the South American city for a battle of words at the United Nations Lima Climate     

LETTERS

正Many of us assume that life on Earth will continue to fl ourish for eons to come.But this is a misguided belief.Scientifi c research has shown that the Earth’s environment was too harsh to support any life form for four billion years.So what we take for granted is actually very precious and vulnerable.It took around three billion years of evolution on Earth for complicated animal and human organisms to come into existence.Nobody wants them to die out as a result of pollution-induced global warming.We should instead cherish and     

新时代中国参与中东安全治理的理念与实践

进入新时代以来,中国始终坚持共同、综合、合作、可持续的安全观,倡导构建中东安全新架构。在参与中东传统安全治理、化解地区冲突方面,中国始终推动对话协商,致力于公正合理解决中东热点问题,构筑兼顾各方合理关切的集体安全架构。在改善地区安全环境方面,中国抓住中东地区主要安全矛盾,顺应地区国家寻求缓和与发展的时代潮流,取得了促成沙特与伊朗复交的重大成果。在参与非传统安全治理方面,中国与中东国家共同提高应对非传统安全威胁的能力,共同维护发展中国家的权益。在参与中东安全治理的过程中,中国形成了以共同安全破解独享安全、以综合安全破解分割安全、以合作安全破解竞争安全等理念和经验,在中东安全事务中发挥了重要的建设性作用。     

全球卫生公共产品供给:中国角色与路径

卫生议题正处在当前全球治理的突出位置,其核心是如何更有效地实现全球卫生公共产品供给。作为新兴负责任大国,中国秉持人类命运共同体理念,积极参与全球卫生治理体系变革,成为日益重要的引领者与公共产品供给者。中国通过多边、区域、双边等多元路径实现供给,国内与国际逻辑趋于统一,逐渐形成了自己的鲜明特色;但在供给体制、产品结构等方面也存在一些不足。新时代中国卫生外交需着眼于全球治理趋势,立足于自身实力与责任,通过提供更多全球卫生公共产品来推动全球卫生领域的良好治理,为构建人类卫生健康共同体作出应有贡献。