Image online: Early adopter behaviour and personal reputation management

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Do Canadian Power-sharing Agreements With First Nations Peoples Hold Lessons For Taiwan?

On 23 September 2010, the government of Taiwan moved closer to establishing a legislative framework for the negotiation of power sharing agreements with the nation's aboriginal groups when the Cabinet decided to approve the Indigenous Peoples Self-Government Act. Although the Act still awaits passage by the Legislature, many stakeholders in aboriginal self-rule are optimistic about this latest move. Others say the legislation lacks teeth. In many of its policy initiatives, the ROC government has looked abroad for a blueprint, and Canada is the Western country that is often promoted as a viable model to follow in this regard. The purpose of this paper is to contrast the historical and cultural influences of each nation's relationship with its indigenous population and, given these variances, identify potential roadblocks to Taiwan's successful implementation of a viable mechanism for deriving aboriginal self-government agreements based on the Canadian example, as well as to propose policy recommendations on what direction relevant legislation should take

Survey of research on East Asian leadership patterns and disaster management

This research paper is focused on the qualities of leadership exhibited by public administrators in the field of emergency management in East Asia, particularly in the Chinese and Japanese cultures, and how they navigate the uncharted waters of this new field in a traditional culture. Beginning with a general examination of the cultural and societal influences on the position of leader and the qualities demanded of that position, the research narrows to the specific field of emergency management and how administration in this realm is accomplished given a) the relative newness of the field itself, and b) the cultural barriers in East Asia to the widespread embrace of such disaster mitigation initiatives. By using a comparative approach, the differences between organizational needs and hence leadership styles is more easily highlighted, and therefore a comparison of leadership in Taiwan, as representative of Chinese culture, with Japanese leadership becomes instructive. How do public administrators in these cultures see their leadership roles, and what are the salient differences in these perceptions? Such research has important implications for the growing field of disaster management studies, practice, and multinational interoperability

Emergency Management Governance: Examining Leadership Styles across Cultures

While Taiwan is a modern culture, it is also a deeply traditional one, and Taiwan’s public administrators often struggle to implement new and innovative disaster response programs in the nation that accommodate these two disparate influences. This research examines leadership styles that are employed in Taiwan with those used in Japan, as well as in the West. Much of the research on leadership styles across cultures is being conducted in the field of business administration, which has value for public administrators as well. In order to understand the qualities required of effective emergency managers in East Asia, particularly Taiwan, and how these qualities differ from those of emergency managers in the West, it is essential to take a culturalist perspective on the issue

Navigating Terra Nullius: The Ababda and the Case for Indigenous Land Rights in Bir Tawil

Located along the border between Egypt and The Sudan, Bir Tawil is the product of a border dispute that goes back over a century, the result of which is that neither country claims it, rendering the 1,290-square-kilometre territory Terra Nullius. Several individuals, misreading the traditional legal ramifications of the designation Terra Nullius, have laid claim to it, though mostly as little more than publicity stunts. Since the discovery of gold in the area, and the extraction operations of the Canadian mining firm Orca Gold Inc. at its Block 14 concession just over the border in Sudan, the local prospectors fear they will lose their livelihood. These locals are primarily made up of members of the Ababda Tribe. This paper provides a brief history of the Ababda’s presence in this area, and then offers a look at the strength of their claim over the land and mineral rights from the perspective of international law

Characterization of Metal Matrix Composites

Experimental methods were developed, adapted, and applied to the characterization of a metal matrix composite system, namely, silicon carbide/aluminim (SCS-2/6061 Al), and its constituents. The silicon carbide fiber was characterized by determining its modulus, strength, and coefficient of thermal expansion. The aluminum matrix was characterized thermomechanically up to 399 C (750 F) at two strain rates. The unidirectional SiC/Al composite was characterized mechanically under longitudinal, transverse, and in-plane shear loading up to 399 C (750 F). Isothermal and non-isothermal creep behavior was also measured. The applicability of a proposed set of multifactor thermoviscoplastic nonlinear constitutive relations and a computer code was investigated. Agreement between predictions and experimental results was shown in a few cases. The elastoplastic thermomechanical behavior of the composite was also described by a number of new analytical models developed or adapted for the material system studied. These models include the rule of mixtures, composite cylinder model with various thermoelastoplastic analyses and a model based on average field theory. In most cases satisfactory agreement was demonstrated between analytical predictions and experimental results for the cases of stress-strain behavior and thermal deformation behavior at different temperatures. In addition, some models yielded detailed three-dimensional stress distributions in the constituents within the composite

Experimental and numerical study on the influence of critical 3D printing processing parameters

In the present work the temperature profile variations generated in rectangular specimens built using the Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) process, at different printing speeds and orientations, were investigated. The temperature recordings were achieved by the integration of temperature sensors throughout the 1st and/or 21st building layer of the specimens. The experimental results show that the temperature values inside the specimen re-main above the glass transition temperature (Tg) even at the end of the fabrica­tion process. Higher values were obtained when increasing the printing speed and decreasing the printing path. The experimental results were compared to the corresponding ones derived by simulation of the thermal diffusion problem via Finite Element Analysis. The calculated maximum temperature values were in good agreement with the experimentally recorded ones

High efficiency supercontinuum generation using ultra-long Raman fiber cavities

Supercontinuum generation in a multi-fiber ultra-long Raman fiber laser cavity is experimentally investigated for the first time. We demonstrate significantly enhanced spectral flatness and supercontinuum generation efficiency using only conventional single mode silica fiber. With a pump power of only 1.63W a ~15dB bandwidth >260 nm wide (from 1440 to >1700nm) supercontinuum source is reported with a flatness of <1dB over 180nm using an optimised hybrid TW/HNLF cavity. We address the dependence of the supercontinuum spectrum on the input pump power and ultra-long Raman cavity

Asian Territorial and Maritime Disputes: A Critical Introduction

This volume is designed to be a practical, yet critical, introduction to the main maritime and territorial disputes in the Indo-Pacific region. It covers the most controversial disputes, including those in the South China Sea, the Senkaku/ Diaoyu Islands, Dokdo/Takeshima, the Kuril Islands, Taiwan, and Sino-India border issues. In addition, the role of the key actors in the region is examined, offering various perspectives on the disputes along with the basic rationales behind claimant nations’ diplomatic approaches. With a team of contributors made up of both senior and early-career scholars, diplomats, and legal specialists, the book provides a wide range of insights that go beyond what is provided in the media

Turbulent broadening of optical spectra in ultralong Raman fiber lasers

We study the properties of radiation generated in ultralong fiber lasers and find an interesting link between these optical systems and the theory of weak wave turbulence. Experimental observations strongly suggest that turbulentlike weak interactions between the multitude of laser cavity modes are responsible for practical characteristics of ultralong fiber lasers such as spectra of the output radiation