The Middle Way: East Asian masters students’ perceptions of critical argumentation in U.K. universities.

The paper explores the learning experiences of East Asian masters students in dealing with Western academic norms of critical thinking in classroom debate and assignment writing. The research takes a cultural approach, and employs grounded theory and case study methodology, the aims being for students to explain their perceptions of their personal learning journeys. The data suggest that the majority of students interviewed rejected full academic acculturation into Western norms of argumentation. They instead opted for a ‘Middle Way’ that synergizes the traditional cultural academic values held by many East Asian students with those elements of Western academic norms that are perceived to be aligned with these. This is a relatively new area of research which represents a challenge for British lecturers and students

Measurement of the B0-anti-B0-Oscillation Frequency with Inclusive Dilepton Events

The $B^0$-$\bar B^0$ oscillation frequency has been measured with a sample of 23 million \B\bar B pairs collected with the BABAR detector at the PEP-II asymmetric B Factory at SLAC. In this sample, we select events in which both B mesons decay semileptonically and use the charge of the leptons to identify the flavor of each B meson. A simultaneous fit to the decay time difference distributions for opposite- and same-sign dilepton events gives $\Delta m_d = 0.493 \pm 0.012{(stat)}\pm 0.009{(syst)}$ ps$^{-1}$.Comment: 7 pages, 1 figure, submitted to Physical Review Letter

Resource mobilization in farmer managed irrigation systems: Needs and lessons

In FAO. Land and Water Development Division; USAID. Water Management Synthesis II Project Technical papers from the Expert Consultation on Irrigation Water Charges, Volume I, Rome, 22-26 September 1986. Rome, Italy: FA

Water scarcity, property regimes and irrigation management in Sonjo, Tanzania

This article explores the dynamics of property rights in irrigation water in Sonjo, Tanzania. It analyses an unsuccessful attempt by the ruling political group to change the institutional arrangements of water control, to serve better their private goals. This example shows that not all internal institutional innovations in the field of utilising natural resources lead to increased efficiency of the system from the point of view of the whole community. We draw on New Institutional Economics (NIE) and Common Property Resource Management (CPRM) theory to analyse the way in which it was possible that those few within Sonjo society who are formally/nominally 'the owners' of water sought to privatise de facto collective use rights of all community members. We consider why this was done in some, but not all, Sonjo communities, and we describe why this process has eventually failed.