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Don’t mention Europe: a study of the Europeanisation of party organisation in the British Labour Party, the French Socialist Party and the German Social Democratic Party.
No full textThis thesis examines how the British Labour Party, the French Socialist Party (PS) and the German Social Democratic Party (SPD) have ‘Europeanised’ their organisations in three different arenas: (1) in the electorate and party system; (2) in central government and parliament; and (3) in their internal procedures and activities. ‘Europeanisation’ is defined as ‘a shorthand term for a complex process whereby national actors (in this case, parties) adapt to, and also seek to shape, the trajectory of European integration in general, and EU policies and processes in particular’ (Bomberg: 2002, 32). The underlying argument is that social democratic parties have to respond to challenges created by the European Single Market, which demands the reduction of state subsidies, and by the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU), which sets limits to public spending. Social democratic parties are expected to react to these challenges by Europeanising their organisations.
This thesis draws on the academic literature, party documents and contemporary newspaper articles, together with insights gained from 70 semi-structured interviews with EU experts at the European and national levels.
The central claim is that Labour, the PS and SPD have not become as Europeanised as might have been supposed for three ostensibly pro-European parties. Whilst successive party leaderships have paid lip service to the increasing importance of European integration, their party organisations have barely been involved in the formulation of European policy. The findings have serious implications for the three parties and domestic politics in Britain, France and Germany, since the memberships lack the enthusiasm and expertise to lead well-informed, critical, Europeanised debates and election campaigns
The Crisis of Political Form
No full textThis thesis examines the role of space in the work of the German legal and political theorist Carl Schmitt (1888-1983). It has two fundamental aims. Firstly, to identify what role spatial concepts play in Schmitt's work. Second, to examine what relevance Schmitt’s spatial thought might have for thinking about the relation between space and politics today. In response to the first question the thesis argues that spatial concepts occupy a structural position throughout Schmitt’s work that has thus far been overlooked. The central claim is that Schmitt understands political order, in the absence of necessary foundations, to be fundamentally grounded upon the division of space. The division of space allows political relations to be managed within a formal framework. However, Schmitt understood this relationship between spatial division and political relations to be in crisis in the twentieth century. The thesis traces Schmitt's various attempts to address this crisis first within the horizon of the state and then on the basis of new global spatial divisions beyond the state form. In answering the second question the thesis argues that in order to assess the contemporary relevance of Schmitt's spatial thought it must be contextualized in relation to both the central concerns of his work as a whole and the political contexts within which it emerged. This is of particular importance in judging how Schmitt's involvement with National Socialism bears on the contemporary value of his thought. In conclusion the thesis argues that whilst a critical awareness of his troubling past is necessary in approaching Schmitt's work it none-the-less raises fundamental questions of enduring relevance
The microsporidian parasites Nosema ceranae and Nosema apis are widespread in honeybee (Apis mellifera) colonies across Scotland
No full textNosema ceranae is spreading into areas where Nosema apis already exists. N. ceranae has been reported to cause an asymptomatic infection that may lead, ultimately, to colony collapse. It is thought that there may be a temperature barrier to its infiltration into countries in colder climates. In this study, 71 colonies from Scottish Beekeeper’s Association members have been screened for the presence of N. apis and N. ceranae across Scotland. We find that only 11 of the 71 colonies tested positive for spores by microscopy. However, 70.4 % of colonies screened by PCR revealed the presence of both N. ceranae and N. apis, with only 4.2 or 7 % having either strain alone and 18.3 % being Nosema free. A range of geographically separated colonies testing positive for N. ceranae were sequenced to confirm their identity. All nine sequences confirmed the presence of N. ceranae and indicated the presence of a single new variant. Furthermore, two of the spore-containing colonies had only N. ceranae present, and these exhibited the presence of smaller spores that could be distinguished from N. apis by the analysis of average spore size. Differential quantification of the PCR product revealed N. ceranae to be the dominant species in all seven samples tested. In conclusion, N. ceranae is widespread in Scotland where it exists in combination with the endemic N. apis. A single variant, identical to that found in France (DQ374655) except for the addition of a single nucleotide polymorphism, is present in Scotland
Exploring the Use of Accounting History in Post-Enron Stories
No full textThis study uses the concept of “popular history” to address the use of accounting history in post-Enron stories on corporate collapse and accounting failure. The study extends the work of Carnegie and Napier (2010), which focuses on how professional accountants and their firms and organizations were portrayed in post-Enron books that were published during the period 2002 to 2005. These books can be characterized as “popular histories”, and the paper illustrates how the scholarly work of academic accounting historians is given little attention by the authors of these post-Enron stories. It points to the largely untapped potential for accounting historians to make their research findings and insights available for a general readership
The impact of audience age and familiarity on children’s drawings of themselves in contrasting affective states.
No full textThe present study was designed to investigate the impact of familiarity and audience age on children’s self presentation in self drawings of happy, sad and neutral figures. Two hundred children (100 girls and 100 boys) with the average age of 8 yrs 2 months, ranging from 6 yrs 3 months to 10 yrs 1 month, formed two age groups and five conditions (n=20). All children completed two counterbalanced sessions. Session 1 consisted of drawing a neutral figure followed by a sad and happy figure in counterbalanced order. The drawing instructions specified the age of the audience (adult Vs. child) and familiarity (familiar Vs. unfamiliar) differently for each condition. Measures of colour preference were taken in Session 2. Certain drawing strategies, such as waving and smiling varied as a function of audience age and familiarity whilst others, such as colour use, did not. The results are discussed in terms of cue dependency and framework theories of children’s drawings and the need to be aware of specific characteristics of who children are drawing for
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