A global environmental right

The development of an international substantive environmental right on a global level has long been a contested issue. To a limited extent environmental rights have developed in a fragmented way through different legal regimes. This book examines the potential for the development of a global environmental right that would create legal duties for all types of decision-makers and provide the bedrock for a new system of international environmental governance. Taking a problem solving approach, the book seeks to demonstrate how straightforward and logical changes to the existing global legal architecture would address some of the fundamental root causes of environmental degradation. It puts forward a draft global environmental right that would integrate duties for both state and non-state actors within reformed systems of environmental governance and a rational framework for business and industry to adhere to in order that those systems could be made operational. It also examines the failures of the existing international climate change regime and explains how the draft global environmental right could remedy existing deficits. This innovative and interdisciplinary book will be of great interest to policy-makers, students and researchers in international environmental law, climate change, environmental politics and global environmental governance as well as those studying the WTO, international trade law, human rights law, constitutional law and corporate law

CUSTARD (Cranfield University Space Technology Advanced Research Demonstrator) - A Micro-System Technology Demonstrator Nanosatellite. Summary of the Group Design Project MSc in Astronautics and Space Engineering. 1999-2000, Cranfield University

CUSTARD (Cranfield University Space Technology And Research Demonstrator) was the group design project for students of the MSc in Astronautics and Space Engineering for the Academic Year 1999/2000 at Cranfield University. The project involved the initial design of a nanosatellite to be used as a technology demonstrator for microsystem technology (MST) in space. The students worked together as one group (organised into several subgroups, e.g. system, mechanical), with each student responsible for a set of work packages. The nanosatellite designed had a mass of 4 kg, lifetime of 3 months in low Earth orbit, coarse 3-axis attitude control (no orbit control), and was capable of carrying up to 1 kg of payload. The electrical power available was 18 W (peak). Assuming a single X-band ground station at RAL (UK), a data rate of up to 1 M bit s-1 for about 3000 s per day is possible. The payloads proposed are a microgravity laboratory and a formation flying experiment. The report summarises the results of the project and includes executive summaries from all team members. Further information and summaries of the full reports are available from the College of Aeronautics, Cranfield University

''Sex Changes'? Paradigm Shifts in 'Sex' and 'Gender' Following the Gender Recognition Act?'

Gender transformations are normatively understood as somatic, based on surgical reassignment, where the sexed body is aligned with the gender identity of the individual through genital surgery – hence the common lexicon \'sex change surgery\'. We suggest that the UK Gender Recognition Act 2004 challenges what constitutes a \'sex change\' through the Act\'s definitions and also the conditions within which legal \'recognition\' is permitted. The sex/gender distinction, (where sex normatively refers to the sexed body, and gender, to social identity) is demobilised both literally and legally. This paper discusses the history of medico-socio-legal definitions of sex have been developed through decision making processes when courts have been faced with people with gender variance and , in particular, the implications of the Gender Recognition Act for our contemporary legal understanding of sex. We ask, and attempt to answer, has \'sex\' changed?Transgender; Transsexual; Sex; Gender; Sex Change; Gender Identity; Legal Identities

Evaluation Summary of the Teagle Foundation's College -Community Connections Initiative

Established in 2005 by the Teagle Foundation, the College?Community Connections (CCC) initiative funds partnerships between New York City community?based organizations and New York City metropolitan area colleges and universities to help talented and underserved high school students prepare for and succeed in college by engaging them in academically ambitious programs.  Exhibit 1 provides an overview of the CCC partnerships. 

Discrimination in Metropolitan Housing Markets: Phase 3 - Native Americans

This paper documents the results of a pilot paired testing program to examine the treatment of Native Americans by real estate agents in rental housing markets in three states and owner-occupied housing markets in one state. The study finds that the level of discrimination experienced by Native Americans in rental markets exceed those experienced by Hispanics, Blacks, and Asian-Americans.

Discrimination in Metropolitan Housing Markets Phase II: Asians and Pacific Islanders

This report documents the results of a an 11-city paired testing study by the Department of Housing and Urban Development of housing discrimination against Asian- Americans and Pacific Islanders. The study shows that one out of every five Asians and Pacific Islanders attempting to buy or rent a home are discriminated against, a rate similar to that of African Americans and Hispanics.

The hydrological summary for the UK: national hydrological monitoring programme

The National Hydrological Monitoring Programme (NHMP) aims to provide a respected and influential review of hydrological conditions across the United Kingdom. The programme is undertaken jointly by the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology and the British Geographical Survey and aims to conduct a wide range of analysis of National River Flow Archive (NRFA) data in order to document, identify and interpret current and past hydrological conditions. One method the NHMP uses to accomplish its aims is the Hydrological Summary. This is a regular monthly report that describes the preceding month's conditions analysing four main areas; rainfall, river flows, reservoir levels and groundwater. In order to do this a wide range of information and data from a variety of sources needs to be quality and sense checked, analysed and interpreted so it can be summarised into a clear and accessible report. The Summary is used by a variety of academic, commercial, and media audiences as well as appealing to wider public interests. The Summary is deemed to be of use to many decision makers at many levels but is most notably referred to in times of flood and drought. As well as the data being shown in the report, a commentary is produced which examines any notable hydrological events for that period and summarises the national hydrological status in the UK. The poster's aim is to describe the Hydrological Summary production processes, mapping the various data sources, processing, and analysis used in order to produce the report. The outputs of the Hydrological Summary are also discussed in terms of what data is chosen to feature and how the data is condensed into an accessible, and informative report every month

The Continued Relevance of Weber’s Philosophy of Social Science

Only a few writers have attempted to construct a comprehensive philosophy of social science, and of these Weber is the most relevant to the present. The structure of his conception places him in a close relationship to Donald Davidson. The basic reasoning of Davidson on action explanation, anomalous monism, and the impossibility of a “serious science” of psychology is paralleled in Weber. There are apparent differences with respect to their treatment of the status of the model of rational action and the problem of other cultures, as well as the problem of the objectivity of values, but on examination, these turn out to be less dramatic. Weber’s use of the notion of ideal-types, though it is not paralleled as directly in Davidson, allows him to make parallel conclusions about the relation of truth and interpretation: both make the problem of intelligibility rather than correspondence with some sort of external reality central, and each addresses, though in different ways, the dependence of considerations of intelligibility on normativity and the impossibility of a theory of meaning without idealization