Kenneth B. Keating to John D. Feerick

Letter from Senator Kenneth B. Keating to Dean John D. Feerick, regarding his scholarly article on presidential inability.https://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/twentyfifth_amendment_correspondence/1015/thumbnail.jp

Intermediate wave-function statistics

We calculate statistical properties of the eigenfunctions of two quantum systems that exhibit intermediate spectral statistics: star graphs and Seba billiards. First, we show that these eigenfunctions are not quantum ergodic, and calculate the corresponding limit distribution. Second, we find that they can be strongly scarred by short periodic orbits, and construct sequences of states which have such a limit. Our results are illustrated by numerical computations.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures. Final versio

Value distribution of the eigenfunctions and spectral determinants of quantum star graphs

We compute the value distributions of the eigenfunctions and spectral determinant of the Schrodinger operator on families of star graphs. The values of the spectral determinant are shown to have a Cauchy distribution with respect both to averages over bond lengths in the limit as the wavenumber tends to infinity and to averages over wavenumber when the bond lengths are fixed and not rationally related. This is in contrast to the spectral determinants of random matrices, for which the logarithm is known to satisfy a Gaussian limit distribution. The value distribution of the eigenfunctions also differs from the corresponding random matrix result. We argue that the value distributions of the spectral determinant and of the eigenfunctions should coincide with those of Seba-type billiards.Comment: 32 pages, 9 figures. Final version incorporating referee's comments. Typos corrected, appendix adde

No quantum ergodicity for star graphs

We investigate statistical properties of the eigenfunctions of the Schrodinger operator on families of star graphs with incommensurate bond lengths. We show that these eigenfunctions are not quantum ergodic in the limit as the number of bonds tends to infinity by finding an observable for which the quantum matrix elements do not converge to the classical average. We further show that for a given fixed graph there are subsequences of eigenfunctions which localise on pairs of bonds. We describe how to construct such subsequences explicitly. These constructions are analogous to scars on short unstable periodic orbits.Comment: 26 pages, 5 figure

Getting peasants organised : peasants, the Communist-party and village organisations in Northwest China, 1934-45

Organising peasants was a Chinese Communist strategy for 'democratising' rural China. In the view of most western historians, the Communists’ grassroots organisations have been the means through which a hegemonising Partystate penetrated rural society to an extent that no state power in China has done before. This paper argues that, if 'democracy' is understood as community activism arising from a measure of local autonomy, there is not necessarily a contradiction between the goals of democratisation and overall state control at the national level. The paper makes a close study of the Communists’ rural organisational work in northwest China in the early 1940s for the purpose of demonstrating the dynamic interplay between the two goals. And it draws three broad conclusions: first, that getting peasants organised was very difficult, and many of the early grassroots organisations failed; second, that local conditions largely determined whether village democracy ever made it to the starter’s block; and third, that farmer mutualaid teams in districts close to Yan’an city serve as the best examples of the autonomycontrol dynamic at work

A Computer-Based Strategy to Facilitate Organizational Learning Process

This research investigated the development of Organizational Learning Process (OLP) through the application of a computer-based strategy in an organizational setting. OLP is developed from the organizational learning literature as an integration of similar concepts of organizational processes of inquiry essential to organizational learning. These concepts included: organizational dialectic (Argyris and Schon 1978), surfacing and testing mental models (Senge 1990a,1990b), and interpretation process (Daft and Weick 1984). A qualitative research methodology was developed within a participatory action research framework (Whyte 1989). A six phase research project, designed as a computer-based strategy to generate OLP, was applied in an organizational setting. The research project was conducted in a major healthcare system in the southeastern United States and involved 17 senior executives. The participants represented diverse units, services, and geographic locations within the health system. The participants were separated into two groups and the project was completed over a 6 month period. For Phase I the context for the research project was established. In Phase II, individual interviews, based on Schein\u27s (1985) organizational culture concept of internal integration, were conducted. Interview results were used to construct an organizational profile and computer-based exercise for each group. For Phase III, participants anonymously assessed the organizational profile during the first of two computer-based exercises. During Phase IV, participants individually examined group assessments during the second computer-based exercise. In Phase V, participants engaged in a group discussion and joint examination of profile assessments. Finally, in Phase VI group interviews were conducted to assess the research project. Data was collected through: (1) individual interviews, conducted in phases II-IV and VI, (2) organizational profile assessment results from the Phase III and IV computer exercises, and (3) the Phase VI group interviews. Qualitative data analyses were performed on interview data (Strauss and Corbin 1990; Patton 1980) at the individual, organizational, and strategy levels. Categories defining the results of the strategy deployment were subsequently developed. The research findings demonstrated the strategy capability to: (1) generate OLP at the individual level, reducing exposure to organizational defenses, (2) generate OLP at the organizational level, and (3) generate participatory strategy redesign guidance. In addition, the research generated an exploratory framework for OLP generated by the strategy. Research implications are also developed for the local organization, the organizational learning phenomenon, and the management of organizations. Directions for further research are also outlined

The Woburn Case: Is There a Better Way?

This essay suggests that the intense public interest in the best selling novel, A Civil Action, and the subsequent film should be directed less to Academy Awards nominations and more toward ways to improve the methods that our legal system employs to resolve complex and important disputes