Dance of Orientalisms and waves of catastrophes: culturalism and pragmatism in imperial approaches to Islam and the Middle East

This article focuses on a seeming contradiction between ‘Islamophobic’ and ‘Islamophilic’ approaches in contemporary Western policies and discourses on the Middle East. While Islamophobia continues to shape some domestic policies of Western states and provide ideological justification for the wars they wage abroad, ‘Islamophilic’ tendencies in foreign policy have also emerged, especially in responses to the ‘Arab Spring’. Not clearly noted in Western public discourse, this represents a historical continuation of Western support for Islamism common during the Cold War, but is also a shift from the Islamophobic discourse of the post-cold war period, especially since 9/11. While Islamophobic and Islamophilic discourses may appear to be opposites, the paper argues that they represent two sides of the Orientalist logic, continuing to reduce understanding of Middle Eastern societies and politics to a culturalist dimension. Unlike traditional Orientalism, they treat Middle Eastern people as political subjects, but approach them as defined by their culture and religion. They define ‘moderate’ Islamism as the typical (and preferred) politics of the people of the region. Focusing on specific recent developments, the paper suggests that, rather than paving the way to more peaceful relations with the region or to internal peace and stability there, the Islamophilic shift in Western policy may rather lead to new waves of catastrophes by further destabilising and fragmenting the region, threatening to evoke new waves of Islamophobia in the West.     

影响我国碳金融发展的原因分析

与西方发达国家较为完善的碳金融发展相比,我国碳金融发展相对比较滞后,造成这种状况的原因主要有：一是对碳金融的认识有待深化;二是碳金融的综合配套政策不完备;三是碳金融市场分割现象严重;四是中介服务机构发育不完善。对这些原因进行深入分析,有利于排除碳金融发展的障碍,开创我国碳金融发展的光明前景。     

论修改《环境保护法》的几个问题

贯彻"十八大"关于"大力推进生态文明建设"的精神,将1989年《环境保护法》修改成对我国今后环境资源生态保护工作具有基础指导作用、长期引导作用、全面激励作用的综合性法律、政策性法律。修改后的法律应该是将生态文明建设摆在国家"五位一体建设总布局"突出位置、具有生态法特征的综合性法律;应该申明、宣示和规定环境法的基本理念、基本原则;明确规定公民的基本环境权利和义务,公民有享用清洁、健康的环境的权利,有保护环境的义务;明确规定环境公益诉讼;明确政府的环境责任,健全政府环境责任问责制;规定基本的环境法律制度和重要的环境法律措施,规定政策环境影响评价。     

Structural Funding in the Management of Cultural Heritage in Poland

ABSTRACT

This article concerns structural funding for Polish cultural heritage for the years 2007–13, focusing on the largest operational program, “Infrastructure and Environment,” financed by the European Regional Development Fund. It presents the results of empirical research based on a questionnaire study of a specifically selected group of projects funded under this program. The objective of the study was to analyze the outcomes of this funding upon completion of the financial perspective, presenting tangible and intangible results as well as potential external effects. The empirical data allowed the development of conclusions and recommendations, stressing the importance of the continuing improvement and development of the funding scheme.     

Cultural Policies and Local Planning Strategies: What Is the Role of Culture in Local Sustainable Development?

The authors draw a strategic framework for cultural planning at the local level. The concepts of industrial district and cluster have strengthened the role of space—in terms of external economies of localization and agglomeration—in economic development. The recent debate concerning contemporary development processes has underlined the increasing role of the cultural dimension for local development and has focused on different paths of clustering around cultural investment. The authors review the latest literature on cultural districts and illustrate some key cases around the postindustrialized world in which culture played a critical role by acting as a catalyst for major economic and social renewal. The authors present a strategic model of a progressive cultural district based on an asset-action matrix that intersects cultural policy drivers with capital resources. The authors define a new model of cultural district—the system-wide cultural district—as an emergent, self-organized model of cultural supply that displays significant strategic complementaries with other production chains with a typical, postindustrial characterization.     

Explaining Final Term Changes in US Congressional Foreign Travel

Recent scholarship demonstrates US legislators acquire human capital (that is, contacts, knowledge, and skills) in Congress that maximises post-elective earnings because they anticipate re-entering the labour market after leaving office. This literature has not, however, addressed how legislators’ expectations of entering specific professions affect their in-office activities. This article examines this question within the context of final term, employment-particular changes in House members’ foreign travel. Representatives entering the private sector are predicted to travel more in the last period to augment their human capital in foreign affairs and signal their expertise to prospective employers, while retiring legislators are expected to travel less because they lack incentives to maintain productivity levels. Analysis supports the former but not the latter prediction.     

Japan's military research and development: A high technology deterrent

Abstract

This article examines the increased linkage between domestic and foreign policy that has been a consequence of democratization and globalization in Korea. It argues that while prior to 1987 foreign policy-making saw very little public input, and while democratization did not lead to a weakening of domestic political institutions nor a rise in nationalism, it did open up domestic political space where foreign policy-making increasingly became part of the contentious electoral competition. The globalization policy, initiated with the purpose of raising Korea's international status, which has remained a goal of succeeding administrations, created a complex interdependency which led to a breakdown in the separation between the domestic and international, and that often brought with it a domestic backlash. As a consequence foreign policy-making, in the absence of a tradition of political compromise, increasingly runs the risk of either inconsistency, or even deadlock.     

China's ‘charm offensive’ in the Pacific and Australia's regional order

Abstract

In recent years, a perception has emerged among many policymakers and commentators that the deepening of the People's Republic of China engagement in the Pacific Islands Region, predominantly through its expanding foreign aid programme, threatens to undermine the existing regional order, in which Australia is dominant. In this article, it is argued that China's apparent ‘charm offensive’ in the Pacific is mainly driven by commercial, not political, imperatives and is far more fragmented and incoherent than is often assumed. Hence, its (real) political effects hinge, not on any Chinese strategic designs for regional domination, or even a more limited resource security agenda, but on the intent and capacity of Pacific governments to harness deepening aid, investment and trade relations with China towards their own foreign and domestic policy objectives, which include limiting Australian interference in the internal governance processes of Pacific states. This argument is demonstrated by the case of Fiji after the December 2006 military coup.     

China and Europe: engagement,multipolarity and strategy

Abstract

Ever closer relations between China and Europe over the last decade have sparked speculation about an emerging axis or balance of power vis-à-vis the United States. China, the European Union and its key member states have expressed a preference for a more balanced international order based on multilateral institutions. Despite a rapid and extensive expansion in economic and political relations between China and the European Union, there is no evidence for balancing against the United States in strategic areas. Rather, the variations in the positions of China, the European Union and the United States can more accurately be seen as policy or interest bargaining. Because the European Union does not share US security interests in the Asia-Pacific region, the European Union and its key member states can seem at variance with the US position on China. Bargaining over the failed attempt to lift the European Union's arms embargo against China shows that the European Union and the United States are not so far apart on strategic issues in the Asia-Pacific.     

Chinese and Japanese investment in Southeast and South Asia: case studies of the electronics and automobile industries

Abstract

This article uses extensive fieldwork data to focus on the question of how Chinese and Japanese companies are competing in neighboring countries of Asia, and what economic forces will shape their future growth in the region. It begins by briefly discussing the history of Chinese and Japanese investment in the South and Southeast Asian regions. It traces the development of Japanese overseas investment policies, as well as China's more recent ‘Going Out’ government program to encourage overseas flows of capital. It then builds on prior political economy work as it uses case study focuses, with primary data based on the author's fieldwork research in several nations of Southeast Asia and in India, of the two key sectors of automobiles and electronics. It compares and contrasts the investment strategies of companies from each country, as well as the successes and failures of investments in the industries. It finds that Japanese companies’ advantages lie in industries utilizing advanced technology and management skills. Though the Japanese continue to lead in many areas, including automobiles, they have begun to face competition and potentially reduced profits in vital manufacturing areas. Meanwhile, Chinese overseas companies have made significant advances in the consumer electronics sector, using low prices and good quality, though overseas automobile investments have gained little traction. The article concludes that, if the Chinese can improve their product quality, capitalize on improving managerial skills and a deeper level of experience in the region, and establish brands they can sell with reliable distribution networks, Japanese companies could face losses to their Asian neighbor in these important parts of the continent they have dominated for decades.