Still the Spectre at the Feast: Comparisons between Peacekeeping and Imperialism in Peacekeeping Studies Today

The sheer ambition and scale of UN peacebuilding today inevitably invokes comparison with historic practices of colonialism and imperialism, from critics and supporters of peacebuilding alike. The legitimacy of post-settlement peacebuilding is often seen to hinge on the question of the extent to which it transcends historic practices of imperialism. This article offers a critique of how these comparisons are made in the extant scholarship, and argues that supporters of peacekeeping deploy an under-theorized and historically one-sided view of imperialism. The article argues that the attempt to flatter peacebuilding by comparison with imperialism fails, and that the theory and history of imperialism still provide a rich resource for both the critique and conceptualization of peacekeeping practice. The article concludes by suggesting how new forms of imperial power can be projected through peacebuilding

Basic Income in 1848

This note introduces a virtually unknown social constitution drafted in Brussels in 1848, in which an unconditional basic income figured prominently. We provide details on the historical and intellectual context in which the proposal originated, and briefly compare it with similar proposals of the same period. In the appendix, we present an English translation of the constitution

Fourierist legacies: from the ‘Right to the Minimum’ to ‘Basic Income’

The origins of the idea of a “basic income” remain to be fully explored. An idea with currency mainly in Europe, a basic income is conventionally defined as an income unconditionally granted to all on an individual basis, irrespective of the level of any income from other sources, and without any work requirements. In this article we examine the completely neglected contribution of an elusive Belgian, Joseph Charlier, to the spasmodic history of proposals for a basic income and its cognates

Understanding sustainability through the lens of ecocentric radical-re?exivity : implications for management education

This paper seeks to contribute to the debate around sustainability by proposing the need for an ecocentric stance to sustainability that reflexively embeds humans in—rather than detached from—nature. We argue that this requires a different way of thinking about our relationship with our world, necessitating a (re)engagement with the sociomaterial world in which we live. We develop the notion of ecocentrism by drawing on insights from sociomateriality studies, and show how radical-reflexivity enables us to appreciate our embeddedness and responsibility for sustainability by bringing attention to the interrelationship between values, actions and our social and material world. We examine the implications of an ecocentric radically reflexive approach to sustainability for management education

Polytropes and other spheres in general relativity

Imperial Users onl

Epidemiology of Rotavirus Diarrhoea in Iranian Children

Human rotavirus is the most important cause of severe diarrhoea in infants and young children worldwide. We describe the aetiology of viral diarrhoea and the characteristics of rotavirus infection in Shahrekord, Iran. Two hundred and fifty nine children <5 years old admitted to Hajar Hospital, 245 children with acute diarrhoea attending primary health centres in Shahrekord, and 114 children hospitalised for elective surgery were selected from October 2001 to August 2002. Stool samples were screened for enteric viruses using EM. Rotaviruses were characterised using ELISA, reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR), and electropherotyping. One hundred and eighty six viruses were identified, of which 146 (78) were rotavirus. The second most frequent virus was coronavirus, followed by calicivirus. Rotaviruses exhibited a marked seasonal variation, being most frequently isolated from November to February (50 of rotavirus recovered) and affected mostly children <2 years old. The RT-PCR successfully typed 139 of the 146 (95) rotavirus G types and 124 (85) P types. The most frequent P type was, P8 in 108 (74%), P4 in 16 (11%), and was P non-typeable in 22 (15%). Among the G types, G1 was identified in 120 (82%), G2 in 19 (13%), and was G-non-typeable in 7 (5%). Our results are the first report of rotavirus genotypes affecting Iranian children. The most frequent G and P types (G1, G2, P8, and P4) are similar to those reported from around the world and will be covered by existing rotavirus vaccines targeting G types G1-G4. © 2004 Wiley-Liss, Inc

From ISIS to ICISS: A Critical Return to the Responsibility to Protect Report

In light of the post-intervention crisis in Libya, this article revisits critically the vision of the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) offered in the 2001 report of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty (ICISS) – frequently taken as the conceptual bedrock for R2P doctrine. It is argued that the perverse effect of ICISS doctrine is to replace political responsibility with paternalism. The demand that states be made accountable to the international community ends by making states accountable for their people rather than to their people. The argument is developed across five critical theses. These include claims that R2P changes the burden of justification for intervention; that it usurps popular sovereignty in favour of state power; and that it diffuses post-conflict responsibilities. The article concludes that pre-emptive ‘human protection’ efforts risk crowding out questions of systemic transformation, i.e., what kind of an international order we want to live in