Recovering the History of Modernist Islam

In 1903, Duncan Black Macdonald (1863-1943), a prominent early scholar of Islam in the United States, wrote that Islam does not allow constitutionalism because the caliph 'cannot set up beside himself a constitutional assembly and give it rights against himself. He is the successor of Muhammad and must rule, within [divine] limitations, as an absolute monarch.' Yet within a few years of that statement, some of the leading scholars of the Islamic world were arguing exactly the contrary. Muhammad ' Abduh (Egypt, 1849-1905) - the highest-ranking religious official in Egypt - wrote privately in 1904 that he supported a parliamentary democracy. In 1908, Mehmed Cemaleddin Efendi (Turkey, 1848-1917) - the chief religious authority of the Ottoman Empire, appointed directly by the caliph - said that he too supported constitutionalism. Also in 1908, two senior scholars of Shi'i Islam telegraphed their support at a crucial moment in Iran's Constitutional Revolution: 'We would like to know if it would be possible to execute Islamic provisions without a constitutional regime!

Liberal Islam Not a Contradiction in Terms

Many Westerners, and many Muslims, consider ‘Liberal Islam’ to be a contradiction in terms. This is not the case. The term ‘liberal’ has negative connotations in much of the Islamic world, in part because of the hypocrisy of its introduction to the region by colonialists and imperialists who flouted the liberalism they touted. Yet the Islamic world is witnessing a thriving movement of Muslim thinkers who address ‘liberal’ concerns such as democracy, the separation of Church and State, the rights of women, the rights of minorities, freedom of thought, and the idea of human progress - hardly the only concerns that might be labeled ‘liberal’, but bedrock themes in the liberal tradition

Scholarly attention and the limited internationalization of US social science

What parts of the world does American social science consider worthy of scholarly attention? Analyzing the geographic focus of more than 2 million bibliographic records of journal articles, books, and dissertations, the study finds a weak trend toward internationalization of US social-scientific attention over the past half-century. Moreover, the share of scholarly attention devoted to particular regions has remained surprisingly stable over this period, with Western Europe remaining the primary focus of internationally-oriented work. Shifts in US national security priorities, international trade, student demand, and demographic characteristics account for only a small portion of the variation in the rate of social-scientific publications on world regions, lending credibility to the view that scholarly attention is shaped in large part by inertia that is built into academic institutions and cultures

Understanding complex magnetic order in disordered cobalt hydroxides through analysis of the local structure

In many ostensibly crystalline materials, unit-cell-based descriptions do not always capture the complete physics of the system due to disruption in long-range order. In the series of cobalt hydroxides studied here, Co(OH)$_{2-x}$(Cl)$_x$(H$_2$O)$_{n}$, magnetic Bragg diffraction reveals a fully compensated N\'eel state, yet the materials show significant and open magnetization loops. A detailed analysis of the local structure defines the aperiodic arrangement of cobalt coordination polyhedra. Representation of the structure as a combination of distinct polyhedral motifs explains the existence of locally uncompensated moments and provides a quantitative agreement with bulk magnetic measurements and magnetic Bragg diffraction

Wirtschaftliche Entwicklung und Demokratie: ist Demokratie ein Wohlstandsmotor oder ein Wohlstandsprodukt?

Economically highly developed countries are mostly democratic. But does this association constitute a causal relationship according to which democracy is a determinant of economic development? Or is it, conversely, economic development that paves the way for democratization? This paper gives an overview of the recent empirical literature that has dealt with this question. The empirical evidence raises doubts about the existence of any direct causation. However, there seem to be indirect causal mechanisms. Democracies seem to implement better conditions for the accumulation of human capital, in particular in terms of a rule of law. On the other hand do democracies not simply arise as consequence of economic development, but because of an adequate social environment with little inequality, that may be associated with economic well-being

Correlations and forecast of death tolls in the Syrian conflict

The Syrian armed conflict has been ongoing since 2011 and has already caused thousands of deaths. The analysis of death tolls helps to understand the dynamics of the conflict and to better allocate resources and aid to the affected areas. In this article, we use information on the daily number of deaths to study temporal and spatial correlations in the data, and exploit this information to forecast events of deaths. We found that the number of violent deaths per day in Syria varies more widely than that in England in which non-violent deaths dominate. We have identified strong positive auto-correlations in Syrian cities and non-trivial cross-correlations across some of them. The results indicate synchronization in the number of deaths at different times and locations, suggesting respectively that local attacks are followed by more attacks at subsequent days and that coordinated attacks may also take place across different locations. Thus the analysis of high temporal resolution data across multiple cities makes it possible to infer attack strategies, warn potential occurrence of future events, and hopefully avoid further deaths

Drugs in early clinical development for the treatment of osteosarcoma

Introduction: Osteosarcomas are the main malignant primary bone tumours found in children and young adults. Conventional treatment is based on diagnosis and resection surgery, combined with polychemotherapy. This is a protocol that was established in the 1970s. Unfortunately, this therapeutic approach has reached a plateau of efficacy and the patient survival rate has not improved in the last four decades. New therapeutic approaches are thus required to improve the prognosis for osteosarcoma patients. Areas covered: From the databases available and published scientific literature, the present review gives an overview of the drugs currently in early clinical development for the treatment of osteosarcoma. For each drug, a short description is given of the relevant scientific data supporting its development. Expert opinion: Multidrug targeted approaches are set to emerge, given the heterogeneity of osteosarcoma subtypes and the multitude of therapeutic responses. The key role played by the microenvironment in the disease increases the number of therapeutic targets (such as macrophages or osteoclasts), as well as the master proteins that control cell proliferation or cell death. Ongoing phase I/II trials are important steps, not only for identifying new therapies with greater safety and efficacy, but also for better defining the role played by the microenvironment in the pathogenesis of osteosarcoma