The Endurance of Arab Authoritarian Regimes: A Study of Jordan and Algeria

The endurance of Arab authoritarian regimes has been quite daunting, especially with the rise of the Arab Spring. Some Arab regimes have ruled with domination and repression since the nineteenth century. These regimes stand out globally with respect to the number of democratic countries. Even with the recent rebellions, the rise of the Arab Spring, starting in 2011, a number of Arab regimes still continue to thrive and remain intact under authoritarian rule. This includes quite a number of Arab states that have faced uprisings during the Arab Spring, but have not implemented a new democratic system or elected a new leader, such as Syria. With this fascinating reality of Arab authoritarian regimes, I set out to find the reason for the endurance of Arab authoritarian regimes, noting that this was not a simple coincidence. My goal was to find out what exactly allowed Arab authoritarian regimes to remain stable, whether it was political strategies or economic resources, even in the face of the Arab Spring. Overall, I was determined to obtain a grip on one solid and plausible reason as to why Arab authoritarian leaders have endured for so long, or at least a brief number of reasons. Arab authoritarianism has allowed the regimes to endure since the nineteenth century and continue to do so with protests and grievances amongst citizens. I decided to choose the topic of Arab authoritarian endurance because I understood the importance in exposing the backbone of the regimes. I truly believe that learning about the reasons for Arab authoritarian endurance empowers people of all backgrounds with the knowledge of strategies that dictates the lives of people in Arab states. Not only does this topic allow people to understand the power of Arab regimes in being able to rule with a strong fist, but also enables people to comprehend how most Arab authoritarian regimes are able to continue to real with a stable regime even with the recent Arab uprisings. The endurance of Arab authoritarianism is most important in being able to analyze and compare Arab regimes that have fallen to the Arab Spring and the ones that continue to maintain durability. In order to complete this research task, I embarked on extensive research and used various methodologies. My thesis is split into four sections, with two main chapters. My first section is the literature review. I completed this portion by researching a broad range of arguments by a number of different scholars, such as the politicized education system, the condition of the coercive forces, hydrocarbon exports, and so on for the endurance of Arab authoritarian regimes. These arguments included reasons prior to the Arab Spring. The arguments used in my literature review all fall under political, economic, cultural, security, or educational reasons. My two main chapters consist of Jordan and Algeria. I chose these two regimes as my core chapters to create a balanced argument, as Jordan is a constitutional monarchy and Algeria is a semi-presidential republic. My methodologies for these chapters included conducting extensive research on each country with concern to the recent protests, government responses, and theories amongst scholars as to why these regimes continue to endure even after the Arab Spring. I also learned about the structure of each regime, such as its components, government supporters, government opponents, and security forces. I provided the structure of each regime in the beginning of each core chapter. Each of these countries have unique factors specific to their endurance, which helped me produce a compelling thesis

Risky choice in younger versus older adults: Affective context matters

Earlier frameworks have indicated that older adults tend to experience decline in their deliberative decisional capacity, while their affective abilities tend to remain intact (Peters, Hess, Västfjäll, & Auman, 2007). The present study applied this framework to the study of risky decision-making across the lifespan. Two versions of the Columbia Card Task (CCT) were used to trigger either affective decision-making (i.e., the “warm” CCT) or deliberative decision-making (i.e., the “cold” CCT) in a sample of 158 individuals across the lifespan. Overall there were no age differences in risk seeking. However, there was a significant interaction between age and condition, such that older adults were relatively more risk seeking in the cold condition only. In terms of everyday decision-making, context matters and risk propensity may shift within older adults depending upon the context

Matter Effects in Atmospheric Neutrino Oscillations

The Kamiokande II and IMB data on contained events induced by atmospheric neutrinos exhibit too low a ratio of muons to electrons, which has been interpreted as a possible indication of neutrino oscillations. At the same time, the recent data on upward--going muons in underground detectors have shown no evidence for neutrino oscillations, strongly limiting the allowed region of oscillation parameter space. In this paper we confront different types of neutrino oscillation hypotheses with the experimental results. The matter effects in $\nu_\mu \leftrightarrow \nu_e$ and in $\nu_\mu \leftrightarrow \nu_{sterile}$ oscillations are discussed and shown to affect significantly the upward--going muons.Comment: LaTeX, 13 pages, 4 figures (appended as postscript file in the end of the paper, one should cut them and process separately), Roma n. 91

Theorising the value of collage in exploring educational leadership

This article contributes to theorising the value of collage as a methodological approach. It begins with a discussion of the methodological difficulties of exploring hidden meanings and individual experience through the research process. The illuminative potential of arts-based methodologies in qualitative research is then investigated. The article makes the case for the specific advantages of using collage to explore the experience of leadership, through a discussion of two collage-based studies. It proposes a variant of the ‘think aloud’ process, used in conjunction with collage, as a route to producing deep understandings of the multiple ways in which leadership is experienced and understood as a social process. The argument is made that collage enables the accessing and sharing of profound levels of experience not accessible through words alone, and considers the impact of the physicality of collage on its potential to release these profound insights. A five-stage process for the analysis of collage is then set out. The article concludes by offering a theory of the value of collage as a methodological approach to exploring experiences of leadership, through use of the concepts of physicality, wholeness and participant agency.Peer reviewe

Free and smooth boundaries in 2-D finite-difference schemes for transient elastic waves

A method is proposed for accurately describing arbitrary-shaped free boundaries in single-grid finite-difference schemes for elastodynamics, in a time-domain velocity-stress framework. The basic idea is as follows: fictitious values of the solution are built in vacuum, and injected into the numerical integration scheme near boundaries. The most original feature of this method is the way in which these fictitious values are calculated. They are based on boundary conditions and compatibility conditions satisfied by the successive spatial derivatives of the solution, up to a given order that depends on the spatial accuracy of the integration scheme adopted. Since the work is mostly done during the preprocessing step, the extra computational cost is negligible. Stress-free conditions can be designed at any arbitrary order without any numerical instability, as numerically checked. Using 10 grid nodes per minimal S-wavelength with a propagation distance of 50 wavelengths yields highly accurate results. With 5 grid nodes per minimal S-wavelength, the solution is less accurate but still acceptable. A subcell resolution of the boundary inside the Cartesian meshing is obtained, and the spurious diffractions induced by staircase descriptions of boundaries are avoided. Contrary to what occurs with the vacuum method, the quality of the numerical solution obtained with this method is almost independent of the angle between the free boundary and the Cartesian meshing.Comment: accepted and to be published in Geophys. J. In

Evidence for Low Extinction in Actively Star Forming Galaxies at z>>6.5

We present a search for the [CII] 158micron fine structure line (a main cooling line of the interstellar medium) and the underlying far-infrared (FIR) continuum in three high-redshift (6.6<z<8.2) star-forming galaxies using the IRAM Plateau de Bure interferometer. We targeted two Lyman-Alpha-selected galaxies (Lyman-Alpha-Emitters, LAEs) with moderate UV-based star formation rates (SFR~20 M_sun/yr; Himiko at z=6.6 and IOK-1 at z=7.0) and a Gamma Ray Burst (GRB) host galaxy (GRB 090423 at z~8.2). Based on our 3 sigma rest-frame FIR continuum limits, previous (rest-frame) UV continuum measurements and spectral energy distribution (SED) fitting, we rule out SED shapes similar to highly obscured galaxies (e.g. Arp220, M82) and less extreme dust-rich nearby spiral galaxies (e.g. M51) for the LAEs. Conservatively assuming a SED shape typical of local spiral galaxies we derive upper limits for the FIR-based star formation rates (SFRs) of ~70 M_sun/yr, ~50 M_sun/yr and ~40 M_sun/yr for Himiko, IOK-1 and GRB 090423, respectively. For the LAEs these limits are only a factor ~3 higher than the published UV-based SFRs (uncorrected for extinction). This indicates that the dust obscuration in the z>6 LAEs studied here is lower by a factor of a few than what has recently been found in some LAEs at lower redshift (2<z<3.5) with similar UV-based SFRs. A low obscuration in our z>6 LAE sample is consistent with recent rest-frame UV studies of z~7 Lyman-Break-Galaxies (LBGs).Comment: Accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journa

Flagships and tumbleweed: A history of the politics of gender justice work in Oxfam GB 1986–2015

This article contributes to scholarship on the political nature of feminists’ work in international development NGOs. The case study of Oxfam GB (OGB) is contemporary history, based on compiling a brief history of gender justice work between 1986 and 2014 and 18 months of part-time participant-observation fieldwork during 2014–15. I describe funding pressures and imperatives, contestations of meaning and power struggles within OGB and argue that gender justice becomes entangled in both internal and the external politics of international development. This is part of a wider research programme about how ideas on gender equality norms travel between and around development organizations, so I finally draw conclusions about how norms are contested and embodied. The shapeshifting political nature of feminist work challenges prevailing theories about how norms and ideas travel and take hold within organizations

Evangelical Christianity and Women’s Changing Lives

Women have outnumbered men as followers of Christianity at least since the transition to industrial capitalist modernity in the West. Yet developments in women's lives in relation to employment, family and feminist values are challenging their Christian religiosity. Building on a new strand of gender analysis in the sociology of religion, this article argues that gender is central to patterns of religiosity and secularization in the West. It then offers a case study of evangelical Christianity in England to illustrate how changes in women's lives are affecting their religiosity. Specifically, it argues that evangelical Christianity continues to be important among women occupying more traditional social positions (as wives and mothers), but adherence is declining among the growing number whose lives do not fit this older model

Comparing and contrasting the νμ→ντ\nu_{\mu} \to \nu_{\tau} and νμ→νs\nu_{\mu} \to \nu_s solutions to the atmospheric neutrino problem with SuperKamiokande data

The $\nu_{\mu} \to \nu_{\tau}$ and $\nu_{\mu} \to \nu_s$ solutions to the atmospheric neutrino problem are compared with SuperKamiokande data. The differences between these solutions due to matter effects in the Earth are calculated for the ratio of $\mu$-like to $e$-like events and for up-down flux asymmetries. These quantities are chosen because they are relatively insensitive to theoretical uncertainties in the overall neutrino flux normalisation and detection cross-sections and efficiencies. A $\chi^2$ analysis using these quantities is performed yielding $3\sigma$ ranges which are approximately given by $(0.725 - 1.0, 4 \times 10^{-4} - 2 \times 10^{-2} eV^2)$ and $(0.74 - 1.0, 1 \times 10^{-3} - 2 \times 10^{-2} eV^2)$ for $(\sin^2 2\theta,\Delta m^2)$ for the $\nu_{\mu} \to \nu_{\tau}$ and $\nu_{\mu} \to \nu_s$ solutions, respectively. Values of $\Delta m^2$ smaller than about $2 \times 10^{-3}$ eV$^2$ are disfavoured for the $\nu_{\mu} \to \nu_s$ solution, suggesting that future long baseline experiments should see a positive signal if this scenario is the correct one.Comment: revtex, 22 pages, 12 figure