Quark masses in QCD: a progress report

Recent progress on QCD sum rule determinations of the light and heavy quark masses is reported. In the light quark sector a major breakthrough has been made recently in connection with the historical systematic uncertainties due to a lack of experimental information on the pseudoscalar resonance spectral functions. It is now possible to suppress this contribution to the 1% level by using suitable integration kernels in Finite Energy QCD sum rules. This allows to determine the up-, down-, and strange-quark masses with an unprecedented precision of some 8-10%. Further reduction of this uncertainty will be possible with improved accuracy in the strong coupling, now the main source of error. In the heavy quark sector, the availability of experimental data in the vector channel, and the use of suitable multipurpose integration kernels allows to increase the accuracy of the charm- and bottom-quarks masses to the 1% level.Comment: Invited review paper to be published in Modern Physics Letters

Corrections to the SU(3)×SU(3){\bf SU(3)\times SU(3)} Gell-Mann-Oakes-Renner relation and chiral couplings L8rL^r_8 and H2rH^r_2

Next to leading order corrections to the $SU(3) \times SU(3)$ Gell-Mann-Oakes-Renner relation (GMOR) are obtained using weighted QCD Finite Energy Sum Rules (FESR) involving the pseudoscalar current correlator. Two types of integration kernels in the FESR are used to suppress the contribution of the kaon radial excitations to the hadronic spectral function, one with local and the other with global constraints. The result for the pseudoscalar current correlator at zero momentum is $\psi_5(0) = (2.8 \pm 0.3) \times 10^{-3} GeV^{4}$, leading to the chiral corrections to GMOR: $\delta_K = (55 \pm 5)$. The resulting uncertainties are mostly due to variations in the upper limit of integration in the FESR, within the stability regions, and to a much lesser extent due to the uncertainties in the strong coupling and the strange quark mass. Higher order quark mass corrections, vacuum condensates, and the hadronic resonance sector play a negligible role in this determination. These results confirm an independent determination from chiral perturbation theory giving also very large corrections, i.e. roughly an order of magnitude larger than the corresponding corrections in chiral $SU(2) \times SU(2)$. Combining these results with our previous determination of the corrections to GMOR in chiral $SU(2) \times SU(2)$, $\delta_\pi$, we are able to determine two low energy constants of chiral perturbation theory, i.e. $L^r_8 = (1.0 \pm 0.3) \times 10^{-3}$, and $H^r_2 = - (4.7 \pm 0.6) \times 10^{-3}$, both at the scale of the $\rho$-meson mass.Comment: Revised version with minor correction

Collective Action Frames and Policy Windows: The Case of the Project to Export Liquefied Natural Gas from Bolivia to California

How and why can a political mobilisation prevent what appears to be an economically rational and beneficial government investment? The present paper explores the ways in which both public policy and contentious politics theories can be potentially bridged to answer this question. It suggests ways in which concepts used by public policy theorists such as 'policy windows' (Kingdon, 1984) or 'advocacy coalitions' (Sabatier, 1999) may be useful to understand the emergence of political opportunities or the construction of collective action frames. The case study to be used is the project to export liquefied gas from Bolivia to California, which was promoted by the administration of Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada in 2002 and was cancelled after civil society groups not only mobilise to resist it, but to demand the resignation of the president.

Agenda-setting and The Political Ecology of Large Infrastructure Projects in Latin America

This paper analyses the complex interplay between the environmental acceptability of large infrastructure projects and other normative values that may influence policy decisions, such as 'social justice' and 'economic growth'. It explores how historical changes in policy ideas may determine if a project survives on the policy agenda, if it is moved up to the decision-agenda; and whether and how it is finally implemented. Two case studies are presented with more detail: the project for a new international airport in Mexico City (1964-2000) and the Misicuni Multipurpose Project, aimed at solving the problems of water scarcity in Cochabamba, Bolivia (1952-2000).

Social Movements, Public Policy, and Democratic Consolidation in Latin America

This work studies how different social mobilisation processes have influenced policy processes in Latin America (2000-2003) and vice versa. Studying these interrelations includes three issues of empirical and theoretical importance. First, it explores under what conditions an investment project or policy initiative that is strongly supported by a democratically elected government on the basis of economic and technical arguments may trigger the emergence of a social movement; and under what conditions a social movement may successfully preclude the implementation of such project or policy initiative. Second, this work explores if these social movements have actually compensated for the absence of channels of participation and representation that work to influence the institutional policy process. Third and final, it studies if the influence and impact of these social movements have contributed to improve the design and implementation of public policies in the medium term and to promote the democratic consolidation in the region. Although the work is based on evidence from many countries in the region, there are mainly two case studies presented with more detail: the 'Water War' in Cochabamba, Bolivia (2001-2002) and the conflict triggered by the project to build a new airport in Mexico City (2001-2002). The 'Gas War' of Bolivia (2003) is also explored with less detail.

Discourses and Conditions of Possibility in Latin American Social Movements: The Cases of the Bolivian 'Water War' and the Movement of Opposition against the New Airport in Mexico City

This work presents a comparative analysis of two Latin American social movements. The first case is the movement of opposition against the privatisation of water and sanitation services (WSS) in Cochabamba, Bolivia and the second case is the movement of opposition against the project for a new international airport in Mexico City. Both case studies are used to illustrate how the study of collective discourses or collective action frames (CAFs) and the study of collective identities from a new social movement (NSM) perspective can be linked to improve our understanding of contemporary social movements. For these purposes, the work proposes the concept of conditions of possibility, defined as the contextual and organisational conditions that allow the resonance between constructed discourses and collective identities during the visible and the non-visible stages of a social movement.