bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
A Minimalist theory of feature structure
Authors: Adger David
Published: September 2010

This chapter gives an explicit Minimalist theory of feature structure based on the ideas that (i) Merge is the sole source of structure embedding, (ii) lexical items are composed of features. It follows that features cannot themselves involve structure embedding, contrary to what is assumed in HPSG, LFG, FUG. This is the No Complex Values hypothesis. I show how it restricts the range of analyses available for selectional phenomena.
Features and computational semantics
Authors: Copestake Ann , Flickinger Dan
Published: September 2010

Approaches to compositional semantics for broad‐coverage computational grammars must be compatible with resource and processing limitations. This affects the feature architecture, in particular the interaction between the use of features in syntax and morphology and their potential semantic interpretation. We discuss these issues with respect to the DELPH‐IN grammars, using English morphological plurals as an example.
A General Theory of Domination and Justice
Authors: Lovett Frank
Published: September 2010

In all societies, past and present, many persons and groups have been subject to domination. Properly understood, domination is a great evil, the suffering of which ought to be minimized as far as possible. Surprisingly, however, political and social theorists have failed to provide a detailed analysis of the concept of domination in general. This study aims to redress this lacuna. It argues first that domination should be understood as a condition experienced by persons or groups to the extent that they are dependent on a social relationship in which some other person or group wields arbitrary power over them; this is termed the “arbitrary power conception” of domination. Second, it argues that we should regard it as wrong to perpetrate or permit unnecessary domination and, thus, that as a matter of justice the political and social institutions and practices of any society should be organized so as to minimize avoidable domination; this is termed “justice as minimizing domination (JMD),” a conception of social justice that connects with more familiar civic republican accounts of freedom as nondomination. In developing these arguments, this study employs a variety of methodological techniques — including conceptual analysis, formal modeling, social theory, and moral philosophy; existing accounts of dependency, power, social convention, and so on are clarified, expanded, or revised along the way. While of special interest to contemporary civic republicans, this study should appeal to a broad audience with diverse methodological and substantive interests.
Arbitrariness and Social Conventions
Authors: Lovett Frank
Published: September 2010

This chapter considers and rejects hegemony and other form‐based conceptions of domination. It defends instead an arbitrary power conception, according to which one person or group experienced domination to the extent that it is dependent on a social relationship in which some other person or group wields arbitrary power over them. The idea of arbitrariness is analyzed with the aid of a discussion of social conventions. Democratic and other substantive interpretations of arbitrariness are rejected in favor of a procedural interpretation.
Analysis and Clarity and Distinctness
Authors: Smith Kurt
Published: September 2010

In this chapter it is shown how Descartes's method for arriving at clear and distinct ideas is what he calls analysis. The chapter explores some of the earliest writings of Descartes (unpublished during his lifetime), and extract from them the basics of his method.
A General Theory of Clarity and Distinctness
Authors: Smith Kurt
Published: September 2010

In this chapter a general theory of clarity and distinctness is developed, as it is found in one of the earliest of Descartes's writings, the Rules. Here, the chapter explains that the systematic schema of simple natures, which are the elements of our ideas, is what Descartes calls an enumeration. This, the chapter discovers, is an ancestor to what today is called a logical partition. The method is shown to have utilized equivalence relations, which Descartes calls common notions. It is the Cartesian method of analysis.
The General Theory Continued
Authors: Smith Kurt
Published: September 2010

In this chapter the general theory of clarity and distinctness is further developed. The chapter explains how Descartes's method of analysis (for establishing the schema of clear and distinct ideas) looks to be an ancestor to the sort of constructional system developed by Rudolph Carnap in his Aufbau. Here, the chapter finally arrives at a rigorous statement of the systematic Cartesian concepts of clarity and distinctness, and how these connect to Descartes's concepts of intuition, deduction, and enumeration.
Synthesis and the Principle of Addition
Authors: Smith Kurt
Published: September 2010

This chapter studies the mathematical concept of a group, early ancestors of the concept found in the works of Descartes and Leibniz. Here, it is shown exactly how the four conditions expressed by a group underwrite all of mathematics, in particular the operations of arithmetic.
Metaphysics, Mathematics, and Metaphor
Authors: Smith Kurt
Published: September 2010

This chapter looks specifically at Leibniz's conception of mathematical structure—an ideal structure underlying the very possibility of the actual world. Both his early and late views are considered. The chapter shows how it is that Leibniz employed mathematics as a metaphor aimed at explicating his metaphysical views. The metaphysical concepts of unity and harmony, for example, are made clearer by looking at how Leibniz conceived them via the mathematical concepts of function and determinant.
Empirical Ideality, Reality, and Matter
Authors: Smith Kurt
Published: September 2010

This chapter explores the sense in which Descartes took matter to be empirically real. This requires the chapter to look at the Sixth Meditation proof for the existence of bodies. Here, the chapter carefully studies Descartes's formal‐objective reality distinction and his material‐objective distinction. Within this discussion, two competing interpretations are examined: the traditional representationalist reading and a relatively new direct realist reading.
Empirical Reality and Intelligible Matter
Authors: Smith Kurt
Published: September 2010

In this chapter another new interpretation of Descartes is examined, a view which argues that Descartes took there to be only one body, known as res extensa, to exist independent of mind. This is contrasted with the earlier, traditional reading, which reads Descartes as holding that bodies (plural) exist independent of mind. It is argued that these interpretations are in the end not in competition, but rather track different strains of thought in Descartes concerning the reality of matter. The ‘many bodies’ view is read as tracking Descartes's thinking that matter is empirically real, the ‘one body’ view as tracking his thinking that matter is either transcendentally ideal or transcendentally real.
Transcendental Matter
Authors: Smith Kurt
Published: September 2010

In this chapter two possible transcendental readings of Descartes's view on matter are examined. Here, the sense in which matter was taken by Descartes to be the condition underlying the conceivability of empirically real bodies is established. What is more, it is shown how this conception of matter (as an underlying condition of conceivability) applies to mathematical objects, such as numbers and geometrical figures. Appended to this chapter is the final word: ‘Tying Up the Loose Ends—Closing Remarks.’ In this last section, the chapter reflects on the seventeenth‐century answer to the question, ‘Why matter?’, posed at the beginning of the book.
Apparent Hyper‐raising in Brazilian Portuguese: Agreement with Topics across a Finite CP
Authors: Martins Ana Maria , Nunes Jairo
Published: September 2010

This chapter argues that constructions that apparently involve hyper‐raising with resumption in Brazilian Portuguese actually result from A‐movement of an embedded topic. This chapter accounts for the mixed A/A′‐properties of the matrix subject of these constructions and provides independent evidence for Chomksy's (2001) version of the Phase Impenetrability Condition.
Nested Interrogatives and the Locus ofWh
Authors: Preminger Omer
Published: September 2010

This chapter discusses the behavior of certain wh‐island‐violating (but felicitous) constructions in Hebrew, which exhibit two interesting characteristics: superiority effects, and a sensitivity to the distinction between short vs. long wh‐movement. This chapter proposes an analysis based on the assumption that in Hebrew, the relevant wh‐feature resides on a head lower than C0, but CP is still equipped with a single specifier position that can be utilized for successive‐cyclic wh‐movement. The proposal is supported by the existence of independent cases of A′‐movement to a position below the overt complementizer in Hebrew.
Introduction
Authors: Lubell Noam
Published: September 2010

This introductory chapter sets out the scope of the analysis to be covered in the book, and the definition of the terms to be used. The three primary legal frameworks — the ius ad bellum, humanitarian law, and human rights — are presented in the context of their relevance to non-state actors, and the relationship between them is examined.
The Possibility of Self-Defence Against Non-State Actors
Authors: Lubell Noam
Published: September 2010

This chapter analyses the question of whether self-defence as understood in international law, encompasses the possibility of using extraterritorial force against armed groups abroad. It examines the prohibition on the use of force, and whether the concept of ‘armed attack’ as appears in the rules of self-defence, includes attacks by non-state actors. The chapter also analyses the impact on this issue caused by the potential links between the non-state actor and the state in which the group is located.
Measures Taken Outside the Self-Defence Framework
Authors: Lubell Noam
Published: September 2010

This chapter questions whether extraterritorial use of force against non-state actors might, in certain conditions, not be a breach of international law, even if taken outside the framework of self-defence. The concepts of countermeasures, necessity, hot pursuit, and piracy are examined. In addition, there is an analysis of the possibility of alternative paradigms or interpretations that might be claimed to allow for use of force other than in self-defence, such as ‘extraterritorial law enforcement’.
Force Against Non-State Actors as Armed Conflict
Authors: Lubell Noam
Published: September 2010

This chapter begins the examination of whether international humanitarian law is an appropriate legal framework that can be applied to extraterritorial force against non-state actors. This includes both the possibilities of such measures being categorised as international armed conflict and non-international armed conflict. The notion of non-international conflicts as including extra-territorial circumstances is considered, as are the criteria for determination of such conflicts, including threshold of violence and identification of the parties to the conflict.
The Principal Practices and Primarily Affected Rights
Authors: Lubell Noam
Published: September 2010

This chapter examines the human rights primarily affected by extraterritorial force against non-state actors. Extraterritorial forcible measures used by states against individuals often include state agents (acting outside their own sovereign territory) being responsible for one or more of: lethal or potentially lethal force, ill-treatment of persons in their custody, abduction, and deprivation of liberty. These are examined in turn, as is the possibility of restricting or derogating from these rights.
Concluding Chapter
Authors: Lubell Noam
Published: September 2010

This chapter utilises the analysis conducted throughout the book, and applies it in the context of two cases. The first is the conflict between Israel and the Hezbollah in the summer of 2006. The second is the targeted killings conducted by the US in Yemen and Pakistan. The rules of the ius ad bellum are examined, as are the rules regulating the use of force, whether human rights law or international humanitarian law. The chapter concludes with a summary of the analysis and identification of the challenges yet to be resolved.
The Nature and Value of Knowledge
Authors: Pritchard Duncan , Millar Alan , Haddock Adrian
Published: September 2010

The three parts of the book comprise three distinct investigations under a common theme: enquiry into inter-relationships between issues about the nature of knowledge and issues about the value of knowledge. The first investigation provides an analysis of problems concerning the value of knowledge and a critical examination of responses to these by virtue epistemologists. The book finds virtue-theoretic accounts wanting and argues that there is a cognitive state — understanding — which is similar to, but different from knowledge, and which has final value. In the second investigation the book presents accounts of perceptual knowledge, knowledge from indicator phenomena, and knowledge from testimony, in each of which recognitional abilities feature prominently. Consideration of these abilities, the book claims, enables us to reach a better understanding of knowledge and its value. The third investigation focuses on the relationship between perceptual knowledge and knowledge of our own intentional actions. The book argues for an account of knowledge and justification to which a certain kind of second-order knowledge is central and applies this both to perceptual knowledge, and knowledge of our own intentional actions, with a view to explaining ways in which knowledge is of value.
Perceptual Knowledge and Recognitional Abilities
Authors: Millar Alan
Published: September 2010

This chapter gives an account of perceptual knowledge in which perceptual-recognitional abilities are central. These abilities are nothing less than knowledge-acquisition abilities. They include abilities to tell of certain things from their appearances to some sensory modality that they are of some kind or have some property. Emphasis is placed on the following ideas: that perceptual-recognitional abilities are abilities with respect to favourable environments — ones in which the things in question have distinctive appearances; and that the notion of the exercise of such an ability is a success notion. Against this background a perspective on barn examples is given and the incorporated conception of abilities is contrasted with that which figures in the virtue-theoretic approach developed by Ernest Sosa. It is argued that reductive accounts of cognitive abilities do not reflect the order of our ordinary understanding of knowledge. Issues concerning justified belief, closure, and doxastic responsibility are explored.
Knowledge from Indicators
Authors: Millar Alan
Published: September 2010

This chapter develops an account of clinching evidence in relation to knowledge from indicators, such as knowing that it has rained recently from the wetness of outdoor surfaces. A standard way of understanding such cases, in terms of reliance on a covering generalization, is resisted. An alternative view is presented in terms of abilities to recognize the significance of the indicator phenomenon in question. These abilities are found to be closely analogous to perceptual-recognitional abilities as discussed in the previous chapter. An account is given of detached standing knowledge — standing knowledge of, e.g., geographical facts, on the part of subjects who have lost touch with the source of information from which they acquired the knowledge. It is argued that our recognitional abilities are informed by understandings but that not all the elements of these understandings have the status of knowledge; this is not taken to be problematic.
The Social Transmission of Knowledge
Authors: Millar Alan
Published: September 2010

This chapter argues that the goal of enquiry is reflective knowledge. Reflective knowledge is knowledge along with knowledge of how we know, or at least knowledge that we know. Recently discussed puzzlement about the value of knowledge is circumvented. The social transmission of knowledge is explored via a discussion of straightforward cases of testimony. An account of those cases is developed, drawing on the account of knowledge from indicators in the previous chapter but also invoking the idea that there is a practice of informing others by telling them things. A practice is taken to be a cluster of essentially rule-governed activities. It is argued that the account of practices does not suffice to explain the straightforward cases. We need to make sense of how we can recognize trustworthiness on the matter in hand.
Second‐Order Knowledge
Authors: Haddock Adrian
Published: September 2010

This chapter argues that the regress of justifications can be satisfactorily avoided by seeing the second-order knowledge of the justification involved in visual knowledge as knowledge of a transparent fact, which constitutes an entitlement, but not a justification to the belief this second-order knowledge involves. The disjunctive conception of visual experience is employed to shed light on the idea of a transparent fact. This account can seem to be vulnerable to two powerful arguments: first, Williamson's argument against luminosity; and secondly, a version of McKinsey's argument against the idea of non-empirical knowledge of ‘broad’ mental states. It is suggested that the first argument does not affect the present account, and that the second argument can be avoided with the help of a distinction between the entitlements to, and the presuppositions of, the beliefs which knowledge involves. The upshot is an account of the second-order knowledge which visual knowledge involves as non-empirical knowledge, and hence as a species of privileged self-knowledge.
Punishing the Dead?
Authors: Houston R. A.
Published: September 2010

Suicide, that most personal of acts, has considerable public import. Drawing ideas from a range of disciplines including law, philosophy, social sciences and literary studies as well as history, this book offers comprehensive analyses of how suicide was seen by the living in pre‐modern Britain and how they dealt with its aftermath. Suicide was a crime which could incur financial and corporal penalties, yet attitudes were often humane and pragmatic.
Conclusion: National, Regional, and Local Histories
Authors: Houston R. A.
Published: September 2010

The main purpose of the conclusion is to draw attention to the importance of regions in British history, using different patterns of punishment as a comparative grid. It also stresses continuities in attitudes towards suicide over long periods of time, arguing that suicide has never been considered the right way to die.
Chapter 2 The OECD's Global Role: Agenda‐setting and Policy Diffusion
Authors: Ougaard Morten
Published: September 2010

Chapter 2 analyzes the OECD's roles in global governance. The organization is a network of trans‐governmental networks linking government bureaucracies in member and (increasingly also) non‐member states, emerging economies in particular. Its institutional advantages are its broad and select member‐ship, and its ability to work with practically all policy areas. In a highly variable and flexible in‐stitutional geometry, the OECD is the site for a range of governance activities pertaining to agenda setting, soft harmonization of national policies across multiple policy areas, and hard regulation in the form of conventions and other instruments where the OECD represents a forum for inter‐state decision making as well as policy implementation. Morten Ougaard argues that the OECD facilitates the development of joint responses to common challenges and consensus on broad contours of strategic direction setting in macro‐economic and other policy areas. It is a forum and force for soft and gradual political integration among members.
Chapter 4 Tax Policy in the OECD: Soft Governance Gets Harder
Authors: Kudrle Robert T.
Published: September 2010

Chapter 4 deals with tax policy in the OECD. Although the OECD has worked on many problems related to national fiscal systems, its achievements in sorting out international corporate tax practices are most well known. The model international corporate tax treaty, derived from US precedents and developed in the interwar period, has been continually refined to deal with difficult issues such as transfer pricing and electronic commerce. But corporate tax avoidance, particularly by US firms, has propelled a possible new approach — formula apportionment — that could test the OECD's capacity to find common ground for its members and other important states. Moreover, the OECD's recent confrontation with the tax havens suggests an ambivalent posture towards non‐members, even as some of them play an ever‐larger role in OECD deliberations. The chapter argues that the OECD now practices a kind of global governance in the taxation area, but its legitimacy and competence will be greatly challenged in the years ahead.
Chapter 5 The OECD and Global Finance: The Governance of New Issues, New Actors, and New Financial Frontiers
Authors: Porter Tony
Published: September 2010

Chapter 5 assesses the OECD's role in global finance. Most studies of the governance of global finance have considered the OECD as irrelevant. A great deal of attention has been devoted to other international organizations, whereas the OECD has generally been treated either as a passive research body or as a relatively unremarkable part of a much larger set of mechanisms through which transnationally powerful actors reinforce their dominance. This chapter argues in contrast that the OECD plays a distinctive and important role at three frontiers: addressing emerging financial policy issues; the extension of OECD practices to non‐OECD countries; and the frontier between financial practices and non‐financial ones. It is also distinctive in its use of knowledge to constitute new practices or modify established ones and in its ability to integrate across multidimensional policy fields and jurisdictions. Accordingly, it can offset or complement a wider tendency towards differentiation and specialization in global governance.
Chapter 7 The OECD and Crime: The Fight against Corruption and Money Laundering
Authors: Jakobi Anja P.
Published: September 2010

Chapter 7 analyzes OECD activities in the field of crime control, focusing on corruption and money laundering. Both aspects have witnessed growing international concern during the 1990s, and various international activities have been started to criminalize and prosecute corruption and money laundering across countries. While each of these crimes seriously impact both politics and the economy, the political solutions found in the context of the OECD have been very different: Corruption has been tackled by an OECD convention and emerged as a core issue of OECD activities and publications, while money laundering has been treated by the Financial Action Taskforce (FATF), a semi‐autonomous agency that is formally independent of the OECD but is based in the organization's building and has a widely overlapping membership. The chapter reconstructs the political process that led to the emergence of both models, showing how different conditions on the input side resulted in different models of fighting financial crime.
Chapter 11 The OECD as Ideas Diffuser: The Growth of the Global Biotechnology Industry
Authors: Centrone Monique
Published: September 2010

Chapter 11 deals with the OECD and biotechnology. The OECD has taken a clear lead in the industry's development. It has done so by generating an industry discourse starting in 1980. The chapter addresses the role of the OECD in the historical construction of the concept of biotechnology. After having observed developments in biology in several western nations during the 1970s, the OECD started to promote a new vision of the industry as an enabling technology, one that had the power to create long‐term economic growth. This was considered an important response to the problem of global economic decline during that period. In consideration of the political and scientific conversation surrounding the term biotechnology, this chapter evaluates the discursive work that provided a new biotechnology framework and how it legitimized national investments and policies that helped to build the industry.
Justifying Retributivism
Authors: Moore Michael
Published: September 2010

This chapter mulls over the justificatory apparatus of the preceding chapter. A secondary literature critical of that apparatus has developed, and the main arguments of that literature are considered. These include charges of circularity, lack of deductive strength, failures of explanatory superiority, over- emotionality, and under- and over-breadth directed against my mode of justifying retributivism. None of these are found to be convincing.
Mind, Brain, and the Unconscious
Authors: Moore Michael
Published: September 2010

The chapter explores the general nature of mental states such as belief, desire, and intentions, and their relation to brain states It does this through an extended analysis of the Freudian theory of the unconscious. Rightly conceived, the Freudian unconscious is seen as functionally characterized, sub-personal states of the brain that underlie the mental states of whole persons. The folk psychology on which the criminal law’s culpability discriminations are built, is thus seen to be secure against the insights of a progressive, scientific psychology, be it Freudian, behaviourist, cognitive, neuroscientific, or other.
Intentions andMens Rea
Authors: Moore Michael
Published: September 2010

No one just intends – they intend that something be the case. Intentions take objects, they have content, they exhibit Intentionality. This fact about the psychology of intentions becomes important because the gradations in culpability explored in chapter 9 depend on there being some non-arbitrary way to individuate intentions by their objects. Three views of these objects – in terms of real world objects, sentences, or propositions – are considered. A moral test (in terms of non-identical in fact but equivalent in morality intentions) that would bypass these thorny metaphysical issues is also considered but rejected.
Choice, Character, and Excuse
Authors: Moore Michael
Published: September 2010

Having rejected the causal theory of excuse in chapter 12, it remains to ascertain what would be a good theory of the excuses. Two such theories are examined, the choice theory and the character theory. Both theories of excuse depend on deeper theories about the true desert basis for responsibility. The choice theory regards choice as the touchstone of culpability, so that excuses have the function of filtering out when either diminished capacity or limited opportunity render otherwise culpable choices non-blameworthy. The character theory regards character as the touchstone of culpability, so that excuses have the function of filtering out those actions not expressive of bad character and exempting those actors from blame. Reasons are given to prefer the choice theory of excuse.
Torture and the Balance of Evils
Authors: Moore Michael
Published: September 2010

If (as the last chapter argues) criminal legislation should prima facie aim at prohibiting all and only moral wrongdoing, then the actual reach of the criminal law will depend on the nature of moral wrongdoing. Is it deontological or consequentialist in nature, for example? The general shape of our moral obligations and thus of their breach, wrongdoing, is approached in this chapter through what is known in criminal law as the issue of general justification, sometimes called ‘necessity’ or ‘balance of evils.’ This justification exists whenever the evil prevented by the doing of some act is greater than the evil of doing that act, considered by itself. The contours of this most general form of justification is taken to reveal the general shape of the wrongs that can be thus justified. A complex deontological form for moral wrongdoing is elucidated in this way, a form allowing thresholds over which consequences govern, exceptions, and limited scope, to moral ‘absolutes’ such as, ‘never torture.’
The Doctrinal Unity of the Act Requirement
Authors: Moore Michael S.
Published: September 2010

Are there crimes of mental state or mental action, status, omission, or possession in Anglo-American criminal law, and do (or would) the existence of any such crimes belie the existence of any voluntary act requirement in that law? Are there one, four, or many, act requirement(s) in that law? Is the act requirement vacuous because it does not specify the time at which the accused must perform a voluntary act? These three forms of scepticism about the existence and coherence of a unitary act requirement in Anglo-American criminal law are rebutted.
The Metaphysics of Complex Actions I: The Dependence of Complex Actions on Basic Acts
Authors: Moore Michael S.
Published: September 2010

The metaphysical question asked in this chapter is preliminary to the metaphysical question addressed in the succeeding chapter 11. In the latter chapter the issue is whether every complex action is (identical with) some basic action of willed bodily movement. In this chapter, the preliminary issue is whether every complex action at least ‘involves’ (in some way or other) some willed bodily movement by the actor. Discussed are three classes of cases: first, cases where there are bodily movements causative of some harm, but these movements are not willed; second, cases where there is no apparent bodily movement but there is agency (in mental acts and in intentional omissions) and there is an apparent causal connection (sometimes reconstrued to be only a relation of counterfactual dependence) between that agency and some real world harm; and third, cases where there is neither willing nor bodily movement, as in states of a person and unintentional omissions. The conclusion reached about all such cases is that there is human action only when there is a willed bodily movement.
The Metaphysics of Complex Actions II: The Identity of Complex Actions With Basic Acts
Authors: Moore Michael S.
Published: September 2010

The reason all complex actions ‘involve’ some basic act (see chapter 10, preceding), is because all complex actions simply are such basic actions of willed bodily movements. The chapter thus defends the Nineteenth Century views of Austin and Holmes, that human actions are always willed bodily movements, ‘and nothing else.’ On the merits this metaphysical view is defended against the many ordinary language oddities that it seemingly produces.
The Doctrinal and Normative Basis of the Double-Jeopardy Requirement
Authors: Moore Michael S.
Published: September 2010

Anglo-American constitutional law prohibits a person from being twice put in jeopardy for ‘the same offense.’ In the United States this seemingly simple requirement has generated a doctrinal thicket about what is and what is not ‘the same offense,’ leading many legal theorists to give up on there being a coherent double jeopardy doctrine. This chapter seeks to bring order to this doctrinal thicket. It does so by: separating the several distinct prohibitions making up the double jeopardy ban; examining the policies behind such prohibitions; relating the extant legal tests for ‘same offense’ to each other and to such policies; separating the question of ‘same offense’ into two distinct questions, one about when two putatively distinct types of actions should be considered the same, and the other about when particular act-token(s) are one or several. These two questions are allocated, respectively, to the ‘overlapping statutes’ problem and to the ‘unit of offense’ problem.
SynBioWave—a real-time communication platform for molecular and synthetic biology
Authors: Staab Paul R. , Walossek Jörg , Nellessen David , Grünberg Raik , Arndt Katja M. , Müller Kristian M.
Published: September 2010

Summary: Synthetic Biology is advanced by many users and relies on the assembly of genetic elements to devices, systems and finally genomes. SynBioWave is a software suite that enables multiple distributed users to analyze and construct genetic parts in real-time collaboration. It builds on Google Wave and provides an extensible robot–robot–user communication framework, a menu driven user interface, biological data handling including DAS and an internal database communication. We demonstrate its use by implementing robots for gene–data retrieval, manipulation and display. The initial development of SynBioWave demonstrates the power of the underlying Google Wave protocol for Synthetic Biology and lays the foundation for continuous and user-friendly extensions. Specialized wave-robots with a manageable set of capabilities will divide and conquer the complex task of creating a genome in silico.

Availability: The robot is available at SynBioWave@appspot.com, the source code at http://synbiowave.sourceforge.net

Contact:  kristian@biologie.uni-freiburg.de

Supplementary information:  Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online and at http://www.synbiowave.org.
Constitution
Authors: Russell Peter H.
Published: September 2010

Canada is one of the oldest constitutional democracies in the world. Its founding Constitution, the British North America Act (BNA Act) was enacted by the British Parliament in 1867. While the name, status, and method of amending the Constitution have changed and additions have been made to the Canadian Constitution, the substantive provisions of the original Constitution have changed very little since 1867. Although there has been little change to the founding Constitution, it does not mean that Canada's constitutional system has been frozen in time. This article discusses the evolution, patriation, and developments of the Canadian Constitution. The evolution of the Canadian Constitution has been have been affected not by formal constitutional amendments, but rather by less-formal instruments of constitutional change. These changes include “unwritten” constitutional conventions, changes in political practice, judicial decisions interpreting the constitutional text, and ordinary legislation establishing institutions and regulating governmental practice. These informal changes produced an independent and continental federation Canada that its founding fathers would barely recognize.
Intergovernmental Fiscal Relations: Workhorse of the Federation
Authors: Lazar Harvey
Published: September 2010

During World War II, the Dominion developed plans to meet the public's demand for a state that would play a greater role in the development of the welfare state. As a result, “executive federalism” was born as an instrumental response to the democratic will of the people. The federal–provincial arena brought together federal spending power, provincial jurisdiction, and new program ideas. It also brought revenue sharing, tax harmonization, a welfare state, and fiscal decentralization. While the federation of Canada moved to the intergovernmental fiscal arena, where the provinces operate within a framework of broad interdependence, the provinces eventually became autonomous. They declined to negotiate lower transfers, and the federal government eventually acted unilaterally in its adjustments to fiscal arrangements. This article discusses intergovernmental fiscal relations within the Canadian federation. It discusses the relevant constitutional provisions on intergovernmental fiscal relations and intergovernmental relations over four historical periods since World War II.
Local Government
Authors: Sancton Andrew
Published: September 2010

The term local government does not appear in the Constitution Act of 1867. The closest reference is in section 92 (8), where the authority to make laws relating to “Municipal Institutions in the Province” is placed under the jurisdiction of provincial legislatures. All Canadian provinces have enacted laws that provide for the existence of municipalities. In its Fiscal Management System, Statistics Canada defines “local government” as including both municipalities and their associated “autonomous boards, commissions, funds and school boards.” Although commonly accepted, the definition is nonetheless precise. This article discusses local government in Canada. It discusses the functions of local government and the provincial controls on such government. The article also discusses special-purpose bodies and two-tier urban systems. Municipal elections, local political leaders, and municipal finance are also examined.
Parliament and Legislatures: Central to Canadian Democracy?
Authors: Thomas Paul G.
Published: September 2010

This article discusses the role of legislatures as a central institution of Canadian democracy. While there is a negative stereotype of parliamentary reform as futile and of marginal value, the legislatures are, in contrast, not powerless and irrelevant: they remain a vital link between the citizens and their governments, and as a source of support and legitimacy of government actions. They are forums for public discussion and a source of democratic accountability. Legislatures benefit governments, which nowadays face a deficit in terms of public trust and confidence. The four sections of this article are devoted to legislatures. The first discusses the explicit and implicit functions attributed to legislatures in the literature, and how these relate to the main formal roles of legislatures within the Canadian political system. The second section discusses the decline of legislatures. The third focuses on the organizational arrangement, procedures, and activities through which legislatures accomplish their formal constitutional responsibilities and perform some informal functions within the Canadian political system. The last section discusses the potential for reforms that would allow legislatures to cope with the challenges of today and the future.
First Ministers, Cabinet, and the Public Service
Authors: Savoie Donald J.
Published: September 2010

This article explores how the relationship among the prime minister, the cabinet, and public service has evolved and developed in the recent years. It also aims to identify the forces that have shaped and molded these transformations. The article begins by examining the growing power of the prime minister and central agencies, specifically the Prime Minister's Office (MPO). It then proceeds to discuss the cabinet, how it has transformed into more than a focus group, and why it no longer directs the work of the government. The article concludes with a discussion on public service and the transformations in the role of public service.
Political Parties and the Electoral System
Authors: Johnston Richard
Published: September 2010

This article discusses political parties and the electoral system in Canada. It provides a literature that outlines the controversies of the party system of the nation. The article discusses the one-party dominance in Canadian politics, the volatility of political parties, the policy differences among parties, the weak social foundations that result in weak policy differences, the archaic divisions, the class basis, geography, federal–provincial gaps, and multipartism. It also discusses the fractionalization of the electorate, the polarized pluralism within the cultural dimension of the nation, the weakness of NDP, class politics, and the federal–provincial divergences within the province.
The Deliberative and Adversarial Attitudes of Interest Groups
Authors: Montpetit Éric
Published: September 2010

In general, interest groups are perceived to have a bad reputation in modern democracies. They are seen as “special interests” capable of obtaining underserved benefits from the government. Interest groups are also often perceived as distortions to the normal functioning of the democratic systems and as adversarial political systems. In spite of the negative impression made by interest groups, they nevertheless contribute to policy debates and deliberations. They can improve the quality of deliberations over collective problems and solutions, thereby improving policy choices regardless of the nature of their representations. Interest groups can have a legitimate role in democratic policy-making systems. This article discusses the adversarial and deliberative perspectives of interest groups and the legitimate attitudes expected of these groups in a democracy. It also provides a survey that assesses: the deliberative and adversarial attitudes of interest groups, the opinion change on policy issues relevant to the biotechnology sector, and the unwarranted bad reputation of interest groups.
Politics and the Media: Culture, Technology, and Regulation
Authors: Rose Jonathan , Nesbitt‐Larking Paul
Published: September 2010

Media and communication in Canada are intrinsic to the very construction and reproduction of Canada itself and to the possibility of Canada. For this reason, communication and media theory stand as Canada's most distinctive and profound contributions. Analysis of communication is important as it gives an understanding of Canada itself. This article presents familiar dialectics of Canadian communication that have deep roots in Canadian media theory. It also discusses how these media theories give shape to the political economies, the regulatory regimes, and the dominant ideas that dominate politics and media in Canada. Furthermore, the article discusses the globalization of the Canadian media and how the Canadian media experience can become universal.
Canada–United States Relations
Authors: Brooks Stephen
Published: September 2010

Canada and the U.S. emerged as close military allies in World War II, a partnership that was deepened and institutionalized during the Cold War years of the 1950s. This was the era of the special relationship. Joined at the hip by geography, history, and economics, relations between the two nations were marked by quiet diplomacy that was founded on close personal contacts and shared understandings. This special relationship was nurtured by the intimacy of a vast network of linkages across the Canada–U.S. border, but it turned out to be a short moment for the history of Canada–U.S. relations. The asymmetry to the supposed bilateral relationship of the nations, wherein the U.S. took a more dominant stance and the ambivalence of many Canadians paved the way for criticisms on the special relationship and quiet diplomacy between the two nations. “Close but not too close”: this has been the predominant view of Canadians to their partner. This article discusses the historical and cultural background of the Canada–U.S. relationship, which is characterized by intimacy, asymmetry, and ambivalence. The article ends with a discussion on the possible future directions of Canada–U.S. relations.
Continuities and Change in the Design of Canada's Social Architecture
Authors: Jenson Jane
Published: September 2010

This article discusses Canada's social architecture. It considers intergovernmental relations as it illustrates the shifting intersections of institutional arrangements in four key welfare-producing sectors: the state, the family, the market, and the community. The article discusses the policy instruments and the program designs: both serve as a yardstick against which to measure the content of social policy. Special attention is accorded to the income security instruments and programs of social policy of Canada after 1945, the main goal of which was to increase the social security of all categories of the population so as to redistribute income from rich to poor.
National Security and Public Anxiety: Our Changing Perceptions
Authors: Dearlove Sir Richard
Published: September 2010

This article discusses the changing perceptions on national security and civic anxiety. During the Cold War and its aftermath, security was rather a simple and straightforward issue. The countries knew their enemies, where they are and the threats they presented. On the event that, the enemies's secrets were unknown, probing techniques were employed to determine the weaknesses of the enemy. This formulaic situation which seeped through in to the twenty-first century left little room for innovation. In fact, in some countries, security maintained at the Cold War levels despite criticisms that new and emerging national security threats should be addressed at a new level. Of the powerful nations, America maintained the role of a world policeman and adapted its national security priorities according to its perception of a new series of strategic threats; however these new security strategies were without a sense of urgency. However, the perception of global threats and national security radically changed in the event of the 9/11 attack. The sleeping national security priorities of America came to a full force which affected the national security priorities of other nations as well. In the twenty-first globalized world, no conflict remains a regional clash. The reverberations of the Russian military action in Georgia, the Israeli intervention in Gaza, and the results of the attacks in Mumbai resonates loudly and rapidly through the wider international security system. While today, nations continue to seek new methods for addressing new security threats, the paradox of the national security policy is that nation-states have lost their exclusive grip of their own security at a time when the private citizens are assailed by increased fears for their own security and demand a more enhanced safety from the state. Nation-states have been much safer from large-scale violence, however there exists a strong sense of anxiety about the lack of security in the face of multiplicity of threats. Nations have been largely dependent on international coordinated action to achieve their important national security objectives. National policies and security theory lack precision. In addition, the internationalization of national security has eroded the distinction between domestic and foreign security. These blurring lines suggest that the understanding of national security is still at the height of transformations.