Longer-term perspectives on the yield curve and monetary policy

In the spring of 2004, there was widespread expectation in financial markets that the Federal Reserve would shortly begin the process of raising its federal funds rate target back toward a more normal level. At the time, there was considerable concern that removing policy accommodation could lead to a sharp rise in long-term interest rates that might roil financial markets or slow the economic recovery. Much of this concern was based on the sizable increases in long-term rates that occurred when the Federal Reserve tightened policy in 1994-95 and 1999-2000. In contrast to the conventional wisdom, however, longer-term rates actually declined as the funds rate target rose. Indeed, in August 2005, after the Federal Reserve had raised its federal funds rate target from 1 percent to 3½ percent, the yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note remained below its level at the onset of policy tightening. This surprising behavior of long-term rates has been labeled a “conundrum” by Federal Reserve Chairman Greenspan and many financial market participants, and considerable effort has been made to understand the causes of the conundrum and its implications for monetary policy. Kozicki and Sellon provide a framework for understanding the relationship between monetary policy and the yield curve that can be used to analyze the behavior of long-term rates during periods of monetary policy tightening. The authors use the framework to examine two recent episodes of policy tightening, in 1999-2000 and 2004-05. The analysis reveals that the conundrum period is highly unusual, but it also suggests that the relationship between monetary policy and the yield curve is quite complex and highly variable over time.Monetary policy ; Interest rates ; Federal funds rate

The European Union and Israel’s Occupation: Using Technical Customs Rules as Instruments of Foreign Policy

This article describes the rules of origin dispute between the European Union and Israel, and argues that these technical customs rules are also instruments of foreign policy. Although the rules have had no direct impact on Israel’s industry in the Occupied Territories, they have bolstered the European Union’s self-identification as a “normative power” while constituting an important legal precedent that has served to legitimize other actions against Israel’s occupation

Control of Thermal Conductance is Insignificant to Thermoregulation in Small Reptiles

Five small species of Australian scincid lizard

An Overview of the Main Environmental Issues Affecting Kisumu and Lake Victoria's Winam Gulf

This overview was produced in response to a request from the Mayor of Kisumu, who expressed the urgent need to deal with the deteriorating environment in and around the City and in the Winam Gulf of Lake Victoria. Researched and written by experts at the Earth Institute, the Millennium Cities Initiative (MCI) and the environmental team of the MDG Centre in Nairobi, it describes and analyses the current environmental condition in Kisumu and its surrounding catchment; discusses some of the factors contributing to the ongoing degradation, and proposes a set of recommendations for constructive action

“All about communication" - a perspective on our public involvement practices in the Networked Data Lab in Grampian

Peer reviewe

Representations of Feminist and Lesbian Consciousness and the Use of Subversive Strategies in Selected Poetry of Isabella Jane Blagden

The purpose of this study is to recover and revise the contribution made to women's writing by the English minor novelist and poet, Isabella Jane Blagden (1817-1873), who was the centrifugal force of an influential literary and artistic milieu in Italy, in the mid-nineteenth-century. Key figures in the group were the poets Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Robert Browning and the American writer, Henry James. This study is a revisionist critique which questions the prevailing masculine discourse and conventions which oppressed women in terms of their sexual, political and economic freedom. This, therefore, fits into the Victorian phenomenon of women poets finding their own space and expression against patriarchal norms. My focus on Blagden's poetry, with its scope for liminal/subliminal suggestiveness, enables an exploration of her subversive and transgressive feminist-lesbian poetics. Recent contributions from feminist and lesbian theorists and critics, are examined in order to establish a feminist-lesbian interpretation of gender, sexuality, subversion and transgression.A secondary consideration is Blagden's role in the aesthetic consciousness of others and her apparent inspirational position at the centre of the creative groups of intellectual emigrės in her circle. While most of her friends and acquaintances had a public persona, Blagden did not, and her work has received little discussion and debate. In order to ensure her significance as a feminist-lesbian poet and Muse, this study will focus on her contribution to nineteenth-century women's poetry. As a contribution to literary scholarship my aim is to bring Blagden in from the margins as a poet of non-canonical status, to one whose status is placed firmly within the continuous literary tradition of radical feminist-lesbian women writers in the nineteenth century

Representations of Feminist and Lesbian Consciousness and the Use of Subversive Strategies in Selected Poetry of Isabella Jane Blagden

The purpose of this study is to recover and revise the contribution made to women's writing by the English minor novelist and poet, Isabella Jane Blagden (1817-1873), who was the centrifugal force of an influential literary and artistic milieu in Italy, in the mid-nineteenth-century. Key figures in the group were the poets Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Robert Browning and the American writer, Henry James. This study is a revisionist critique which questions the prevailing masculine discourse and conventions which oppressed women in terms of their sexual, political and economic freedom. This, therefore, fits into the Victorian phenomenon of women poets finding their own space and expression against patriarchal norms. My focus on Blagden's poetry, with its scope for liminal/subliminal suggestiveness, enables an exploration of her subversive and transgressive feminist-lesbian poetics. Recent contributions from feminist and lesbian theorists and critics, are examined in order to establish a feminist-lesbian interpretation of gender, sexuality, subversion and transgression.A secondary consideration is Blagden's role in the aesthetic consciousness of others and her apparent inspirational position at the centre of the creative groups of intellectual emigr?s in her circle. While most of her friends and acquaintances had a public persona, Blagden did not, and her work has received little discussion and debate. In order to ensure her significance as a feminist-lesbian poet and Muse, this study will focus on her contribution to nineteenth-century women's poetry. As a contribution to literary scholarship my aim is to bring Blagden in from the margins as a poet of non-canonical status, to one whose status is placed firmly within the continuous literary tradition of radical feminist-lesbian women writers in the nineteenth century

Commentary : missing targets on drugs-related deaths, and a Scottish paradox

The 10-year drug strategy for England and Wales was published in February 2008. It dropped drugs-related deaths (DRDs) as a key performance indicator. Scotland retained a necessary strong focus on DRDs. Scotland's DRDs numbered 1006 in 2000–02 and 1009 in 2003–05. The previous Scottish administration's claim that its number of current injectors had decreased substantially between 2000 and 2003 implied, paradoxically, that their DRD rate would have to have increased. Worse was to come: Scotland's DRDs had increased to 876 in 2006 + 2007. We analyse UK's DRDs by sex and age-group to reveal temporal trends (2000–02 versus 2003–05 versus 2006 + 2007) with different public health and epidemiological implications. We also address the above Scottish paradox and assess, by age-group, how consistent Scotland's 876 DRDs in 2006 + 2007 are with Scottish injectors’ DRD rate in 2003–05 of around 1 per 100 injector-years. Public health success in the UK in reducing DRDs at younger ages should not be overshadowed by the late consequence in terms of older-age DRDs of UK's injector epidemics; in the early 1980s in Scotland, and late 1980s in England and Wales. Targets for reducing DRDs should pay heed to UK's injector epidemics