A Privileged Source of Information
 
 

The “New Approach” to the Readmission of Illegal Persons: Operability versus Transparency

“No one knows the numbers who have died trying to get to Europe. No one knows the number of people who have died after seeking and being denied asylum at the borders of Europe. No one knows the numbers who have died at the hands of officials of their own countries on being returned as rejected asylum-seekers from Europe.”(Abell Albuquerque, Nazaré -1999)

DEVELOPING COUNTRIES IN THE WAKE OF LIBERALISATION: BIG CHALLENGES AHEAD

During the 1990’s liberalisation took the planet by storm. Following Thatcher’s privatisation and Reagan’s deregulation – economic policy reversals that flourished in the 80’s – countries around the globe rushed to sell off state-owned companies, induce competition and deregulate business. For most, the goal was to shed unnecessary assets and trim down the bureaucratic tasks burdening a mammoth state.

Singing Out of Tune: Public Policies, Social Rights, and the Judiciary

Read the constitution of any country and it will describe a State which bears little resemblance to reality. Have a look at the constitutions of Latin American countries and you will get the impression that nowhere in the world is the welfare state so highly developed. Pick up the constitutions of Germany, the United States or Norway and you get the opposite impression.

Rapprochement and Interdependence between Former Enemies – The Case of Japan and the United States

Japan and the United States, the product of very different cultures, clashed bitterly in the past, but their eventual rapprochement and interdependence – which could be described as a process of ‘tuning in’ with each other – may be relevant to the current clash between Muslim and Christian cultures.

Indigenous Self-Determination and Crime: Out of Tune and Out of Time

Processes of Australian colonisation deeply entrenched imperial power. They proceeded from the British landing in now-called New South Wales in 1788, through to the 1920s when northern Australia was conquered. The absolute supremacy of imperial culture was projected through a prevailing ideology of terra nullius, which maintained that Australia was uninhabited prior to British occupation. This provided a rationale for dispossessing Indigenous people of their land and sovereignty. However, that was just the beginning.

Transparency in central banking – the benefits of attuned economic agents

Since I have become a central banker I have learned to mumble with great incoherence. If I seem unduly clear to you, you must have misunderstood what I said.” Alan Greenspan, 1987

 

Some years later ...

Overcoming the past without forgetting

Victims and the relatives of Moroccan citizens who suffered torture, involuntary disappearances and selective assassination during the reign of the Alaouite monarch Hassan II appeared at the official invitation of the son of the man who had destroyed their lives, and listened to his address. Before them, King Mohammed VI barely lifted his eyes from the prepared speech with which he informed his subjects of the results of two years of work by the Moroccan Equity and Reconciliation Commission (IER).?

AJEG BALI or how to drive away evil spirits

Touring Bali’s beaches and villages, travelling the island’s roads, one realises that this part of the Indonesian archipelago is becoming more and more… Balinese.

Much has been written, and said, about kebalian or “being Balinese”. This concept encompasses aspects of religion …

Deleting Civility: Uncivil Society in Indonesian New Democracy

Since the revelation of the “Third Wave of Democratization” in the early 1990s, much attention has been focused on the gravity of civil society as the promoter of democracy. Defined as the realm of organized social life that is open, voluntary and self-generating, transition theorists believe that…

 

WHEN IS MAN A ‘STATE SUBJECT’ AND A WOMAN NOT?

The changing rights of women in Jammu and Kashmir in the era of globalization

 

Jammu and Kashmir enjoys a special status within the federation of India. It is the only state that has its own constitution and can therefore enact...

 

THE POST-EARTHQUAKE SITUATION IN JAMMU AND KASHMIR

It has been over three months since one of the worst ever earthquakes rocked Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) on 8 October 2005. The tragedy was unimaginable and the loss of life and property unprecedented. The damage control agencies did...

 

LINKS BETWEEN CONSTITUTIONAL CONTROL AND POLITICAL CONTROL: THE CASE OF COLOMBIA

One of the most extraordinary changes of the state since the Second World War is the spread of judicial review and the creation of Constitutional Courts in many countries. The idea that norms and state actions should be according...