Restoring the reformation: British evangelicalism and the 'reveil' at Geneva 1816-1849

The foreign missionary impetus generated by Britain's eighteenth century Evangelical Revival included a concern for Francophone Europe. Seeds of this concern had been sown by the influx to Britain of Huguenot refugees after 1685, royalist sympathizers after 1789 and prisoners captured in conflicts with Napoleonic France. ^ British supporters of agencies for Gospel extension, whether missionary, tract or Bible societies, viewed Francophone Europe as blighted successively by political absolutism, Enlightenment scepticism and Revolutionary upheaval. Viewing its indigenous Christianity as downtrodden and largely nominal, they embarked on schemes to renovate Francophone Christianity.In these initiatives, some British persons and agencies mistakenly proceeded on the assumption that their own efforts were the solitary reliable efforts underway in pursuit of evangelical renewal. In fact, a considerable segment of Francophone Protestantism, aided by Pietism and Moravianism, had retained a vital Christianity; spiritual awakening was in progress in advance of any British initiatives. The failure of some British individuals and agencies to accept this reality ensured that a substantial portion of their endeavour would tend to sectarianism.While the outflow of British aid to Francophone Christianity in the period 1816-1849 was massive, British Christianity itself received the impress of a renewed Francophone Protestantism. Preachers, dogmaticians and historians from within France and Switzerland became highly influential voices in Britain's Victorian era

Federalism and Federation in Europe: A Comparative Study of The Germanic Tradition

Merged with duplicate record 10026.1/1656 on 27.02.2017 by CS (TIS)This thesis defines "federation" as a set of structures and techniques, by means of which the constituent members of a union are given guaranteed access to and are accommodated within the decision-procedure of the centre. Meanwhile, "federalism" is taken to signify the philosophical, or ideological prescription, or promotion, of such a union. The thesis commences by identifying the major shortcomings of the Anglo-Saxon academic literature on federation for a comparative analysis of federalism and federation in Austria, Switzerland and Germany. The two main aims of the thesis are then outlined. These are first, to identify the nature of the tradition of federalism in Austria, Switzerland and Germany. The second is to illustrate, by reference to the period immediately preceding the crystallisation of the party systems of those countries, the use of federalism as a political ideology. These aims are fulfiled in Parts 2 & 3 of the thesis. By means of its systematic, comparative analysis of federalism in Austria, Switzerland and Germany from the early sixteenth century until 1850, the thesis develops a typology of federalism, which permits it to identify the six “dimensions" of a distinctive, "Germanic”, tradition of federalism. Second, the detailed analysis in the thesis of the use of federalism during the first half of the nineteenth century shows how, within existing federations, a wide range of political groupings constituting the antecedents of modern political parties availed themselves of federalism for the promotion of their political aims. Amongst the conclusions of Part 4 of the thesis is that more attention should be devoted to the study of the interaction of federalism and federation and in particular, to how federalism is utilised by politial parties, both to legitimate and to reform federations.University of Leicester, Dept. of Politic

Getting the Family Together Again: Restoring the Midlevel Connections in Northwest Yearly Meeting of Friends

Historically Friends (Quakers) have had a polity that reflected the denomination\u27s strong sense of community with a structure and traditions that enabled practical caring for one another and accountability to one another. This community extended beyond local congregations to include Friends in other places. In the last half of the 201 h century the American group of Quakers known as Northwest Yearly Meeting of Friends made structural changes to their midlevel connections, the Quarterly Meeting, that were intended to help the church operate more efficiently. Unfortunately, a related and unintended consequence was to reduce communication and connection between and among their congregations. These changes, taking place concurrently with broader cultural trends in America of localism and devaluation of denominations, have resulted in a mindset among many evangelical Friends in the Pacific Northwest that can be described as de facto congregationalism. The problem for which this dissertation pursues some resolution is how to restore meaningful connection among the congregations of Northwest Yearly Meeting in order to enable a healthy extended family, and faithfulness to a Friends understanding of the Church. The narrative of Chapter 1 establishes the context of the problem both for Friends in Northwest Yearly Meeting and in the broader culture. The chapter also includes a section on vocabulary and acronyms peculiar to Friends in general and this specific group of Friends. Chapter 2 explores New Testament images of the church and specifically the community and relational aspects of the church, showing that the isolated and individualistic Christianity of some 21st century North Americans is far removed from the New Testament view of the church. Chapter 3 describes the beginnings of the Friends movement in 1 ih century England with special attention to the concept of the church that George Fox and other early Friends held, showing a pattern of accountability and caring across local group boundaries. Chapter 4 documents the changes made in NWYM in recent decades that altered the structure and consequently the polity of this group of Friends. Chapter 5 explores Presbyterians in the U.S. as a kind of control group to compare polity and practice. Chapter 6 offers specific proposals, both informal and formal, for restoring meaningful connection between the congregations o fNWYM of Friends

The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child in postmodernity : a grounded systemic analysis of children's rights educational policies in Scotland and Canada

As a contribution towards the UN Decade for Human Rights Education (1995-2004), this qualitative, comparative policy study investigated the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) within the Scottish and Canadian educational systems. The researcher adopted an inductive, grounded methodology which is argued to be most congruent when building theory is the chief aim (Glaser and Strauss, 1967; Glaser, 2005). During 20 months of fieldwork, 50 key informant interviews were obtained in Geneva, New York, Scotland and Canada. The author contends that postmodern thinking has contributed much towards contemporary childhood research, yet an underlying deconstruction of the CRC constrains theoretical development. To address this breakdown of overarching leitmotifs within the social sciences (Esping-Andersen, 2000), the sociology of human rights is utilised as a conceptual framework (Luhmann, 1965, 1982, 1997; Q'Byrne, 2003; Verschraegen, 2002). Furthermore, through the integration of grounded and autopoietic coding (Glaser, 2005), the interview texts revealed six thematic categories that contradict dominant theoretical approaches in the child rights literature. While descriptive and comparative analyses revealed the study's core category of participation, an interpretive analysis further yielded its core distinction of power. The author argues that Scottish efforts to implement the CRC within educational policies are more widespread than any of those currently underway within Canadian jurisdictions (Mitchell, 2002, 2003a, b). Finally, a grounded systemic child rights model developed from the study's methodological and epistemological integration illustrates how CRC knowledge and power are balanced within and across educational systems (Mitchell, 2005)

An Analysis of the International City Status and Ambitions of Lyon

"The primacy of Paris inhibits the regional sphere of activity of second-ranking French cities. Lyon is particularly disadvantaged in that to the west lies the low population density Massif Central, to the south is the city-port of Marseille with direct international maritime connections, to the east, Grenoble is a dynamic and, to some extent, rival pole while to the north-east Geneva has a well-established international role. To combat the primacy of Paris, and the competition of neighbouring cities, Lyon is justifiably attempting to develop an international and trans-national role to enhance its economic, political and demographic base". The objective of this thesis is to test the above hypothesis through reference to objective empirical data and subjective qualitative methods. An examination of Lyon's status in the context of a theoretical model of an "International City", an empirical ranking of 165 European cities and Lyon's own long-range planning policy provide the framework for this study. Lyon's demographic strength, political situation, physical facilitators, (transportation, tourism and other infrastructure) and Lyon's international economic position will help place Lyon within the domestic and European urban hierarchy. Finally, an examination of Lyon's relations within the Rhone-Alpes Region will provide a clearer picture of Lyon's status and potential trans-national role