48,887 research outputs found
Estonia: a model for interwar Europe?
While Estonia’s 1925 Law on Cultural Self-Government for National Minorities is often cited as a rare functioning example of Renner and Bauer’s non-territorial autonomy scheme, there has until recently been comparatively little research on how the law operated in practice. This article analyses the institutions of German and Jewish minority self-government established in inter-war Estonia, arguing that (prior to the eclipse of democracy in 1934, at least) these possessed considerable depth and authoritative competence in the area of cultural and educational policy. Cultural autonomy did not resolve all outstanding points of division between state, majority and (in particular) Baltic German minority; nevertheless, it played a positive role in the regulation of ethnonational tensions. Even less well-known is the international resonance of this unique law, which transnational minority activists argued should serve as a general model for the regulation of minority disputes. The League of Nations rightly questioned this claim, and the non-territorial autonomy model was scarcely applied beyond the Baltic region during the 1920s. However, it is still instructive to revisit the 1925 law today, at a time when several post-communist states have adopted minority rights legislation based on similar principles
Biological Fluid Mechanics Under the Microscope: A Tribute to John Blake
John Blake (1947--2016) was a leader in fluid mechanics, his two principal
areas of expertise being biological fluid mechanics on microscopic scales and
bubble dynamics. He produced leading research and mentored others in both
Australia, his home country, and the UK, his adopted home. This article reviews
John Blake's contributions in biological fluid mechanics, as well as giving the
author's personal viewpoint as one of the many graduate students and
researchers who benefitted from his supervision, guidance and inspiration. The
key topics from biological mechanics discussed are: `squirmer' models of
protozoa, the method of images in Stokes flow and the `blakelet' solution,
discrete cilia modelling via slender body theory, physiological flows in
respiration and reproduction, blinking stokeslets in microorganism feeding,
human sperm motility, and embryonic nodal cilia.Comment: 23 pages, 11 figures. Submitted versio
NTA as political strategy in Eastern Europe
Although non-territorial autonomy (NTA) has become an increasingly salient feature of minority politics in Central and Eastern Europe over the past two decades, there has been surprisingly little research exploring the origins of NTA arrangements and the underlying understanding of statehood, state-minority relations, and minority rights that they bring to bear. After a brief introduction to the original Renner and Bauer model, this chapter analyses contemporary NTA debates and practices in Estonia, Hungary, Romania, and Russia, linking the discussion to broader agendas that have informed approaches to minority issues in the region following the fall of communism and the demise of the USSR. In each case, attention is given to the varying perspectives of both state and minority actors with regard to NTA and the extent to which it can be seen as a viable model for addressing varying claims advanced across different political contexts
Transethnic coalition-building: definitions, practices and possibilities
No abstract available
The ACademic DireCtory - AC/DC
AC/DC (See URL http://acdc.hensa.ac.uk) is an experimental, collaborative research project that indexes and allows searches over all public academic WWW servers in the UK. This report describes why AC/DC was created, how it is built from existing software, the collaborative process used to collect and index the data and future activities
Territorial-Administrative Decentralisation and Ethnocultural Diversity in Ukraine: Addressing Hungarian Autonomy Claims in Zakarpattya
The paper argues firstly that, since there is no obvious separatist movement within
Zakarpattya, the Ukrainian state should seek as far as possible to accommodate Hungarian
identity claims within the region (and those of other smaller minority communities living
within the state) as part of a normative and instrumental strategy of promoting ‘unity in
diversity’. Secondly, it argues that Ukraine’s current concept of decentralization offers
space to realise the non-territorial vision of cultural autonomy, provided that sufficient
attention is also given to maintaining pre-existing territorially-based provisions with
regard to minority language use and political representation for Hungarians at both
regional and national level
Exotic Decays of Heavy B quarks
Heavy vector-like quarks of charge , , have been searched for at the
LHC through the decays . In models where the
quark also carries charge under a new gauge group, new decay channels may
dominate. We focus on the case where the is charged under a
and describe simple models where the dominant decay mode is . With the inclusion of dark matter such
models can explain the excess of gamma rays from the Galactic center. We
develop a search strategy for this decay chain and estimate that with
integrated luminosity of 300 fb the LHC will have the potential to
discover both the and the for quarks with mass below
TeV, for a broad range of masses. A high-luminosity run can extend this
reach to TeV.Comment: 28 pages, 10 figures, 3 table
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