Blackwell Synergy: Development Policy Review, Vol 23, Issue 6, pp. 643-663: Why Do Aid Agencies Exist? (Abstract): aid services suppliers, or, in general, suppliers whose products and
services could be valuable in developing countries, may want to use aid
transfers to enhance their positions on developing country markets (technical
assistance, commercial suppliers, but also academic and research institutes,
laboratories, construction companies, etc.). Here, the aid is instrumental in
bringing about a preference re-alignment in the mind of the recipient – who
gets a subsidy to do something he would otherwise not do, or to do it
differently.
• Last but not least, a donor country government may use aid flows to enhance
political alliances with the recipient country government, to obtain political
goodwill and changes (non-alignment in the original preferences) in the
decisions and policy stance of that government. Donor governments may also
wish to nurture their relationship with particular interest groups in the recipient
country (preferences aligned with those of the donor government) who can be
influential in political and economic decisions of interest to the donor country.

Blackwell Synergy: Development Policy Review, Vol 23, Issue 6, pp. 643-663: Why Do Aid Agencies Exist? (Abstract): Despite these formidable barriers foreign aid has reached unprecedented
historical proportions. At the dawn of the twenty-first century, it has become a full-scale
multinational industry with an annual turnover estimated at nearly US$70 billion
(OECD, 2005). Direct contact between potential donors and recipients would not be
able to achieve such massive transfers. Some sort of organisational set-up is required to
facilitate intermediation between them and reduce ex-ante transaction costs as well as
ex-post uncertainty to an acceptable level.

Blackwell Synergy: Development Policy Review, Vol 23, Issue 6, pp. 643-663: Why Do Aid Agencies Exist? (Abstract)
Aid – income redistribution between humans – is a phenomenon that is deeply
embedded in human behaviour. Indeed, we could not survive without it. For instance,
sharing food and other basic resources in families and kin groups is essential for the
survival of human beings – as essential as it is for most other animals. What
distinguishes humans from other animals, however, is our ability to redistribute and
share resources within a much wider social setting, outside immediate family and kin
groups, even with persons we have never met or will never meet.

United Press International - Hi-Tech - Commentary: Living forever: "Singularity,' John Casti of Nature wrote, is 'a mind expanding account (that) is nothing less than a blueprint for how to shove Homo sapiens off center-stage in evolution's endless play...if you buy into Kurzweil's Law of Accelerating Returns - and all empirical evidence currently available supports it completely - then the replacement of humans by machines as the primary intellectual force on Earth is indeed imminent.' "

United Press International - Hi-Tech - Commentary: Living forever: "Bill Gates praises futurist Kurzweil and his 'Singularity' as 'the best person I know at predicting the future of artificial intelligence.' He has a 20-year track record of accurate predictions. Bill Joy, co-founder and former chief scientist of Sun Microsystems, is filled with foreboding about the perils of humanity's technological future. But Joy still concedes 'The Singularity Is Near' is 'a clear call for a continuing dialogue to address the greater concerns arising from these accelerating possibilities.'
What worries Joy in his book 'Why The Future Doesn't Need Us' is that 'we are being propelled into this new century with no plan, no control, no brakes.'
Joy has a point. There is a growing abyss between the economic, scientific and technological knowledge of the masses and their representatives on the one hand, and, on the other, the knowledge that is required to make logical, rational and moral decisions. "

United Press International - Hi-Tech - Commentary: Living forever: "Kurzweil's latest futuristic tome is the sequel to his last bestseller, 'The Age of Spiritual Machines: When Computers Exceed Human Intelligence,' which posited that the ever-accelerating rate of technological change would lead to computers that would rival the full range of human intelligence. He now takes his readers to the next step in this inexorable evolutionary process: the fusion of human brain and machine. Thus, 'the knowledge and skills embedded in our brains will merge with the vastly greater capacity, speed and knowledge-sharing ability of our own creations.' "

ASU News > Scholars debate whether to limit scientific research: "We have reached a point in human history where some of the scientific research we could do, perhaps we should not do for safety, national security or ethical reasons,� says Gary Marchant, executive director of the center. �We therefore must choose, for the first time, which science should be allowed, and which should not. How, and by whom, such decisions should be made will be the focus of this timely and path-breaking conference.�"

ASU News > Scholars debate whether to limit scientific research:The first day of the conference will provide an overview of the legal and policy questions, plus a discussion about the limitations of the “right” to conduct scientific research. The second day’s events will focus on three case studies involving emerging research controversies in the areas of pathogens and toxins, nanotechnology and cognitive enhancement.

War and disasters aside, 2005 brought world progress | csmonitor.com: "Armed conflict: While the 20th century was the bloodiest in human history, the number of armed conflicts has declined steadily from about 50 in 1990 to less than 30 today - nearly the lowest levels since the end of World War II. The number of men and women in uniform and total world military spending has eased from cold war peaks. Catastrophic wars between major states that pervaded Europe and Asia until the end of World War II have largely been replaced by smaller-scale internal conflicts, primarily in lower-income countries. Progress toward a safer world, however, unlike progress in health, education, and income, can be quickly reversed with the outbreak of a single major conflict. Recent brinkmanship between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan is the most chilling reminder of this danger."

War and disasters aside, 2005 brought world progress | csmonitor.com: "Political and civil rights: Fully one-half of the world's population now lives in countries that have multiparty electoral systems that respect basic human rights - the highest level in history. The breakup of the former Soviet Union in 1991 precipitated a move toward Western system democracies not only within the borders of the former Soviet Union but also within former 'client' states. During the past three decades, more than 80 countries in Central Europe, East Asia, Latin America, and parts of sub-Saharan Africa have all notched gains in political and civil rights and more than 30 military dictatorships have been replaced by civilian governments."

War and disasters aside, 2005 brought world progress | csmonitor.com: "Income: Worldwide incomes are at their highest levels in history and are rising. Since 1960, more than 1 billion people have pulled themselves out of the direst poverty. This trend caused the World Bank to conclude that 'the past two decades have witnessed one of the most rapid reductions in poverty in human history.' This success has been propelled by China, which alone has lifted more than 400 million out of poverty in the past 20 years. Other countries, such as Bangladesh, have made substantial strides in poverty reduction - without China's high rates of economic growth - through progressive government programs focused on improving healthcare and education. The rapid globalization of the world economy and industrialization of many formerly agricultural economies, which has unquestionably brought environmental loss and social upheaval, has raised incomes for billions of people."

War and disasters aside, 2005 brought world progress csmonitor.com: "Judging from the headlines, 2005 was a gloomy year, indeed. Gulf Coast hurricanes, the devastating earthquake in Kashmir, ongoing war in Iraq, civil war in Sudan, renewed famine in central Africa, and the threat of a worldwide pandemic flu darkened the news. These headlines, however, obscure a far brighter underlying trend: On average, people across the planet are living longer, healthier lives, with greater opportunities for education and political freedom than ever before.
We unavoidably view our world through news articles that break up an otherwise overwhelming stream of information into digestible bites. As a result, we often 'lose the forest for the trees' by focusing on sensational short-term stories that impact relatively few people."

Wired 14.01: The 50 Best Robots Ever: ". SPIRIT AND OPPORTUNITY
Some robots sit in labs for researchers to tinker with. These two bots are on frickin' Mars. Expected to last only three months when they touched down on the Red Planet in January 2004, the rovers are still going strong two years later - each sends back 100 megabits of data a day.
02. ASTROBOY
While American kids were daydreaming of Superman, Japanese tykes were worshipping at the altar of Tetsuwan Atom, aka Astroboy. First drawn in 1951, Astroboy has rocket boots, lasers that shoot from his fingertips, and, uh, an ass cannon. The lovable crime-fighting robot was an inspiration to a generation of kids -some of whom went on to become robotics researchers. He's a big reason why Japan is at the forefront of android development today. Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto.
And the #1 Robot of All Time Is...
01. STANLEY
The Stanford Racing Team's autonomous vehicle is a modified Volkswagen Touareg that can scan any terrain and pick out a drivable course to a preset destination. Cup holders optional."

Top 10 tech trends for 2006: "Video -- in the form of your favorite TV dramas or Hollywood hit movies -- will come to the big screen in your living room and to the small screen on your cell phone. Whenever you want it. No need to mess around with time-shifting TV devices or mail-order flicks."

Evolution whispers some secrets - Science - Specials - smh.com.auTHIS year, mankind's drive to explore the universe saw spacecraft either on their way, or already at, the moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Saturn, a comet, an asteroid and the very edge of the solar system.

The Globe and Mail: Creating first synthetic life formHaving launched a company called Synthetic Genomics, Dr. Venter believes "the whole world is open" in terms of the commercial applications of being able to build or redesign micro-organisms for specific tasks.

He insists the main goal of his project to build the first synthetic life form, however, is to understand the essence of life, how it evolved and the essential elements that sustain it.

"Here we are trying to understand the human genome with 24,000 some odd genes and 100 trillion cells and we don't know how 300 or 400 genes work together to yield a simple living cell," he said.

The Globe and Mail: Creating first synthetic life form: "The work is an extreme example of a burgeoning new field in science known as synthetic biology. It relies on advances in computer technology that permit the easy assembly of the chemical bits, known as nucleotides, that make up DNA.
Several scientific groups are trying to make genes that do not exist in nature, in hopes of constructing microbes that perform useful tasks, such as producing industrial chemicals, clean energy or drugs. Dr. Venter and his colleagues are pushing the technology to its limits by trying to put together an entirely synthetic genome. "

FUTURIST UPDATE January 2006The next phase of the baby-boom watch will naturally focus on health
care and retirement issues. But throughout their lives, the baby
boomers have adamantly rejected the status quo in the institutions and
industries touching their lives. So some observers believe that,
instead of retiring, baby boomers will retool, retrain, and recareer.

KurzweilAI.net: "A detailed look at human DNA has shown that 1800 genes, or roughly 7 percent of the total in the human genome, have changed under the influence of natural selection within the past 50,000 years, probably in response to aspects of modern human culture such as the emergence of agriculture and the shift towards living in densely populated settlements."

Foreign Affairs - The Decline of America's Soft Power - Joseph S. Nye, Jr.: "Soft power, therefore, is not just a matter of ephemeral popularity; it is a means of obtaining outcomes the United States wants. When Washington discounts the importance of its attractiveness abroad, it pays a steep price. When the United States becomes so unpopular that being pro-American is a kiss of death in other countries' domestic politics, foreign political leaders are unlikely to make helpful concessions (witness the defiance of Chile, Mexico, and Turkey in March 2003). And when U.S. policies lose their legitimacy in the eyes of others, distrust grows, reducing U.S. leverage in international affairs."

Foreign Affairs - The Decline of America's Soft Power - Joseph S. Nye, Jr.: "Anti-Americanism has increased in recent years, and the United States' soft power -- its ability to attract others by the legitimacy of U.S. policies and the values that underlie them -- is in decline as a result. According to Gallup International polls, pluralities in 29 countries say that Washington's policies have had a negative effect on their view of the United States. A Eurobarometer poll found that a majority of Europeans believes that Washington has hindered efforts to fight global poverty, protect the environment, and maintain peace. Such attitudes undercut soft power, reducing the ability of the United States to achieve its goals without resorting to coercion or payment."

Foreign Affairs - The Decline of America's Soft Power - Joseph S. Nye, Jr.: "Summary: The Bush administration may dismiss the relevance of soft power, but it does so at great peril. Success in the war on terrorism depends on Washington's capacity to persuade others without force, and that capacity is in dangerous decline."

Foreign Affairs - America's Imperial Ambition - G. John Ikenberry: "The mainstream of American foreign policy has been defined since the 1940s by two grand strategies that have built the modern international order. One is realist in orientation, organized around containment, deterrence, and the maintenance of the global balance of power. Facing a dangerous and expansive Soviet Union after 1945, the United States stepped forward to fill the vacuum left by a waning British Empire and a collapsing European order to provide a counter-weight to Stalin and his Red Army.
The touchstone of this strategy was containment, which sought to deny the Soviet Union the ability to expand its sphere of influence."

Foreign Affairs - America's Imperial Ambition - G. John Ikenberry: "The twin new realities of our age -- catastrophic terrorism and American unipolar power -- do necessitate a rethinking of the organizing principles of international order. America and the other major states do need a new consensus on terrorist threats, weapons of mass destruction (WMD), the use of force, and the global rules of the game. This imperative requires a better appreciation of the ideas coming out of the administration. But in turn, the administration should understand the virtues of the old order that it wishes to displace."

Foreign Affairs - America's Imperial Ambition - G. John Ikenberry: "At the extreme, these notions form a neoimperial vision in which the United States arrogates to itself the global role of setting standards, determining threats, using force, and meting out justice. It is a vision in which sovereignty becomes more absolute for America even as it becomes more conditional for countries that challenge Washington's standards of internal and external behavior. "

Foreign Affairs - America's Imperial Ambition - G. John Ikenberry: "Summary: The concepts emerging from the Bush administration's war on terrorism form a neoimperial vision in which the United States arrogates to itself the global role of setting standards, determining threats, and using force. These radical ideas could transform today's world order in a way that the end of the Cold War did not. The administration's approach is fraught with peril and likely to fail. If history is any guide, it will trigger resistance that will leave America in a more hostile and divided world."

Foreign Affairs - Understanding China - Kishore Mahbubani: "Summary: The United States has done much to enable China's recent growth, but it has also sent mixed signals that have unnerved Beijing. More consistent engagement is in order, because the course of the twenty-first century will be determined by the relationship between the world's greatest power and the world's greatest emerging power."

Foreign Affairs - Taming American Power - Stephen M. Walt: "To be sure, many governments still value U.S. power and seek to use it to advance their own interests. Yet even Washington's close allies are now looking for ways to tame the United States' might. Many countries fear U.S. influence, and they have devised numerous strategies to manage and limit it. The United States will not and should not exit the world stage anytime soon. But it must make its dominant position acceptable to others -- by using military force sparingly, by fostering greater cooperation with key allies, and, most important of all, by rebuilding its crumbling international image."

Foreign Affairs - Taming American Power - Stephen M. Walt: "How do you deal with American power? This question is one for which every world leader must have an answer. And the response of other states to U.S. power is something Americans must care about as well. Basic security is at issue, as the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks demonstrated. So is the health of the U.S. economy, with the market share of U.S. firms declining in key overseas markets due to anti-American sentiment. The time to worry is now."

Foreign Affairs - Taming American Power - Stephen M. Walt: "Imagine, for a moment, that you are the president of France. You regard U.S. foreign policy as often naive and overweening, and your ideal world order is one in which no single state is dominant. So what do you do about the United States? Now picture yourself as the president of Russia. The only remnants of your country's former superpower status are an aging nuclear arsenal and membership in the UN Security Council. How do you improve Russia's situation in a world dominated by U.S. power? Or perhaps you are the prime minister of India. You face serious regional challenges -- including the rising power of China -- but relations with Washington are sometimes prickly, and the United States' global dominance is disquieting. Can you take advantage of parallel U.S. interests to advance those of India?"

Foreign Affairs - Somebody Else's Civil War - Michael Scott Doran: "Polarizing the Islamic world between the umma and the regimes allied with the United States would help achieve bin Laden's primary goal: furthering the cause of Islamic revolution within the Muslim world itself, in the Arab lands especially and in Saudi Arabia above all. He had no intention of defeating America. War with the United States was not a goal in and of itself but rather an instrument designed to help his brand of extremist Islam survive and flourish among the believers. Americans, in short, have been drawn into somebody else's civil war."

Foreign Affairs - Somebody Else's Civil War - Michael Scott Doran: "Bin Laden produced a piece of high political theater he hoped would reach the audience that concerned him the most: the umma, or universal Islamic community. The script was obvious: America, cast as the villain, was supposed to use its military might like a cartoon character trying to kill a fly with a shotgun. The media would see to it that any use of force against the civilian population of Afghanistan was broadcast around the world, and the umma would find it shocking how Americans nonchalantly caused Muslims to suffer and die. The ensuing outrage would open a chasm between state and society in the Middle East, and the governments allied with the West -- many of which are repressive, corrupt, and illegitimate -- would find themselves adrift."

Foreign Affairs - Somebody Else's Civil War - Michael Scott Doran: "Summary: Osama bin Laden's attacks on the United States were aimed at another audience: the entire Muslim world. Hoping that U.S. retaliation would unite the faithful against the West, bin Laden sought to spark revolutions in Arab nations and elsewhere. War with America was never his end; it was just a means to promote radical Islam. The sooner Washington understands this, the better its chances of winning the wider struggle."

Foreign Affairs - China's "Peaceful Rise" to Great-Power Status - Zheng Bijian: "Since starting to open up and reform its economy in 1978, China has averaged 9.4 percent annual GDP growth, one of the highest growth rates in the world. In 1978, it accounted for less than one percent of the world economy, and its total foreign trade was worth $20.6 billion. Today, it accounts for four percent of the world economy and has foreign trade worth $851 billion -- the third-largest national total in the world. China has also attracted hundreds of billions of dollars of foreign investment and more than a trillion dollars of domestic nonpublic investment. A dozen years ago, China barely had mobile telecommunications services. Now it claims more than 300 million mobile-phone subscribers, more than any other nation. As of June 2004, nearly 100 million people there had access to the Internet."

Foreign Affairs - China's "Peaceful Rise" to Great-Power Status - Zheng Bijian: "Despite widespread fears about China's growing economic clout and political stature, Beijing remains committed to a 'peaceful rise': bringing its people out of poverty by embracing economic globalization and improving relations with the rest of the world. As it emerges as a great power, China knows that its continued development depends on world peace -- a peace that its development will in turn reinforce."

Foreign Affairs - China's Global Hunt for Energy - David Zweig and Bi Jianhai: "China's resources hunt has been a boon to some states, especially developing countries, as it has allowed them to exploit as yet untapped resources or gain leverage to negotiate better deals with older customers. But for other states, particularly the United States and Japan, China's insatiability is causing concern. Some governments worry as Beijing enters their spheres of influence or strikes deals with states they have tried to marginalize. "

Foreign Affairs - China's Global Hunt for Energy - David Zweig and Bi Jianhai: "Partly on these people's advice, Beijing has been encouraging representatives of state-controlled companies to secure exploration and supply agreements with states that produce oil, gas, and other resources. Meanwhile, it has been courting the governments of these states aggressively, building goodwill by strengthening bilateral trade relations, awarding aid, forgiving national debt, and helping build roads, bridges, stadiums, and harbors. In return, China has won access to key resources, from gold in Bolivia and coal in the Philippines to oil in Ecuador and natural gas in Australia."

Foreign Affairs - China's Global Hunt for Energy - David Zweig and Bi Jianhai: "Twenty years ago, China was East Asia's largest oil exporter. Now it is the world's second-largest importer; last year, it alone accounted for 31 percent of global growth in oil demand. Now that China is the workshop of the world, its hunger for electricity and industrial resources has soared. China's combined share of the world's consumption of aluminum, copper, nickel, and iron ore more than doubled within only ten years, from 7 percent in 1990 to 15 percent in 2000; it has now reached about 20 percent and is likely to double again by the end of the decade. Despite calls by Prime Minister Wen Jiabao and other politicians to cut consumption of energy and other resources, there is little sign of this appetite abating. Justin Yifu Lin, director of the China Center for Economic Research at Peking University, in Beijing, says the country's economy could grow at 9 percent per year for the next 20 years."

Foreign Affairs - China's Global Hunt for Energy - David Zweig and Bi Jianhai: "Chinese foreign policy is now driven by China's unprecendented need for resources. In exchange for access to oil and other raw materials to fuel its booming economy, Beijing has boosted its bilateral relations with resource-rich states, sometimes striking deals with rogue governments or treading on U.S. turf. Beijing's hunger may worry some in Washington, but it also creates new grounds for cooperation."

Foreign Affairs - Understanding Madrasahs - Alexander Evans: "The Western consensus on madrasahs assumes that some of them produce terrorists and many others contribute to radicalization in less direct ways. But the evidence of a direct link to terrorism remains weak. Indeed, according to Marc Sageman's recent study Understanding Terror Networks, two-thirds of contemporary al Qaeda-affiliated terrorists went to state or Western-style colleges. Like the terrorist Ahmed Sheikh (who was a contemporary of mine at the London School of Economics), terrorists today are more likely to have gone through the regular educational system. Many are newly religious rebels rather than regular ulama "

Vital Signs Facts: Coal, China, and India: A Deadly Combination for Air Pollution?: "The rapid growth in coal use in China and India, where pollution controls are minimal, is adding to local and long-distance pollution. More than 80 percent of Chinese cities in a recent World Bank survey had sulfur dioxide or nitrogen dioxide emissions above the World Health Organization's threshold. "

Member states of the UN cannot agree on what constitutes terrorism, human rights abuse or even armed confl ict. In many parts of the world, the claim that ‘one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fi ghter’ still resonates. And defi ning armed confl ict can be just as controversial. Some governments ar-
gue that violent political opposition to their rule is simply criminal violence.

The me-
dia focused on the new wars—largely ignoring those that were ending.

First, the world’s media pay more attention to new eruptions of political violence than to wars that end quietly. Between 1989 and 2002, some 100 armed conflicts came to an end.2 Very few of these endings were widely reported.

This misperception is not restricted to the media or the general public. A surprising number of government offi - cials and scholars are also unaware of the decline. Some, indeed, believe that political violence has increased.1 In fact, in terms of battle-deaths, the 1990s was the least violent decade since the end of World War II. By the beginning of the 21st century, the probability of any coun- try being embroiled in an armed confl ict was lower than at any time since the early 1950s.

The trend in international terrorist attacks is much less clear. Several datasets suggest that the number of terrorist attacks of all kinds has declined over the past 20 years, but the most recent data from the US government indicate a significant increase in both the number of attacks and casualties in 2004.

The UK, France and the US have the dubious distinction of having fought more international wars since World War II than any other countries.

War The data also show that the overwhelming majority of today’s armed confl icts are fought within, not between, states and that most take place in the poorest parts of the world.

In the past decade and a half, the UN has been more successful in reaching this goal than many critics allow. Since the end of the Cold War, armed confl icts around the world have declined dramatically.

New Scientist Breaking News - Did humans colonise north Europe earlier than thought?: "Humans may have colonised northern Europe 200,000 years earlier than previously thought. Stone tools found in eastern England suggest that humans were there at least 700,000 years ago.
'We don't know for sure what species it was,' says team member Chris Stringer of the Natural History Museum in London, 'but my bet is it's an early form of Homo heidelbergensis or Homo antecessor.'"

The Power and Interest News Report (PINR): "The December 15 elections will do little to halt the trend toward the regionalization, and potential fragmentation, of Iraq. The Kurdish north and religious Shi'a in the south seem inclined to force the disintegration of Iraq's central government by shifting power to the regions that they control. "

The Power and Interest News Report (PINR): "The removal of Saddam Hussein's secular establishment and the empowerment of the Iraqi Shi'a were developments welcomed by Iran, and Tehran will no doubt look to exploit its newfound influence in the country. Indeed, there is always the concern that Iran hopes to one day incorporate, either officially or unofficially, southern Iraq and its rich oilfields into the Iranian state, a development that would greatly increase Iran's power in the region. Nevertheless, even without this development, Iran stands to gain the most from the empowerment of the Shi'a in southern Iran."

The Power and Interest News Report (PINR): "Additionally, with reduced U.S. oversight in the cities of Iraq, militant groups that consider themselves part of the Islamic revolutionary movement may have more opportunity to plan attacks against U.S. and related targets. The recent attacks in Aqaba and Amman may be the preludes to more Islamist military operations in the region that emanate from Iraq. Just as Afghanistan provided sanctuary for Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda network, Iraq already provides sanctuary -- due to the lack of central government oversight -- to various militant groups; a withdrawal of U.S. troops may advance this development. "

The Power and Interest News Report (PINR): "In order to handle this mission, Washington has relied heavily on the Army's Reserves and National Guard units, and this has had an effect on the U.S. military's ability to recruit new soldiers since all new recruits know that they will likely serve a tour of duty in Iraq -- a commitment many potential recruits are unwilling to make. Both the Reserves and the Active Duty forces are behind their recruiting goals for 2005. These series of issues make Washington's present troop commitment to Iraq unsustainable over the long term."

Guardian Unlimited Books | News | Art, truth and politics: " have said earlier that the United States is now totally frank about putting its cards on the table. That is the case. Its official declared policy is now defined as 'full spectrum dominance'. That is not my term, it is theirs. 'Full spectrum dominance' means control of land, sea, air and space and all attendant resources.
The United States now occupies 702 military installations throughout the world in 132 countries, with the honourable exception of Sweden, of course. We don't quite know how they got there but they are there all right.
The United States possesses 8,000 active and operational nuclear warheads. Two thousand are on hair trigger alert, ready to be launched with 15 minutes warning. It is developing new systems of nuclear force, known as bunker busters."

EFMN - European Foresight Monitoring Network - MISSION: "The EFMN is a NETWORK of policy professionals, foresight experts and practitioners as well as analysts of Science, Technology and Innovation related issues. The EFMN develops foresight related CONTENT, analyzed in an annual WORKSHOP and disseminated via a WEBSITE and MAILING LIST. Membership of the network is free"

People's Daily Online -- China publishes first international trade risk report: "According to the report, China's most important trade partners, like the United States, Japan, Singapore, Germany and the Netherlands, are graded to have the lowest risk in international trade.
On the contrary, some new overseas trading markets, including countries from Asia, Africa, the Latin America and the east Europe, are graded at a higher risk level when trading with China, for the cases of their economic development and industry structure, said the handbook.
The 1.568 million-words Handbook of Country Risk was written by the China Export and Credit Insurance Corporation (SINOSURE), China's only state-owned export credit insurance company which helps Chinese exporters avoid international trade risk. "

People's Daily Online -- Gates launches talent hunt for smart techies in India: "Microsoft chief Bill Gates Friday launched a nationwide talent hunt in Bangalore to pick the best tech students who will work with him at the global firm's headquarters in Redmond, Seattle.
Titled 'Code 4 Bill,' the contest will provide the best pre- final and final year student technologists an opportunity to showcase their talent and join Gates' technical assistants team for a year.
'India is the first country where students will get this opportunity to learn about cutting-edge product development and innovations that are powering the world by working directly with our product development and research teams,' Indo-Asian News Service quoted Gates, at the 'Bill Gates Live -- Ready 2005' event, as saying. "

News - Press ReviewsAfter the collapse of communism, millions moved abroad for political reasons: Jews to Israel, ethnic Germans home from the Soviet Union, Russians back to Russia. Others were refugees from wars, or migrated illegally. But, says Ali Mansoor, a World Bank economist working on a study of post-communist migration due to be published next year, this one is different: driven by economics not politics, and largely legal not illegal. One of his biggest problems is measuring the scale of the new migration.
For a start, the era of migration is likely to be temporary. “We have ten years before the demographics kick in,” says Mansoor, “after which there just won't be the young people to emigrate.” That is not wholly good news: most central and east European countries face the nasty combination of a rich-country age structure with a poor-country economy. But it highlights the biggest cause of migration now: a big pool of unemployed, underpaid or under-appreciated people for whom going abroad makes a lot of sense.

automates-intelligents-html@kiosqueist.com: "'Vast government contracts have corrupted the American university system, turning off the fountainhead of unfettered ideas and scientific discovery. Multibillion-dollar federal R&D budgets have replaced the solitary inventor with veritable armies of scientists and engineers in laboratories across the country. Public policy itself has become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.' "

Jerusalem Post | Breaking News from Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish World: "Nothing is harder than diamond, right? Wrong. Scientists from Bar-Ilan University and the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology say that using nanotechnology, they have discovered a material 40 times harder. Professors Eli Altus, Harold Basch and Shmaryahu Hoz, with doctoral student Lior Itzhaki have published their findings in the Internet edition of the world's most influential chemistry journal, Angewdte Chemie. "

Philosophy of Nonviolence: The Inevitability of Conflict (Nonviolence.org): "Gandhian philosophy assumes that the ?reality? we see is transitory, that change and struggle is the rule, not the exception"

: "KOSIMO is the name of a database containing (at this time) 693 political conflicts from 1945 to 1999. Each conflict is coded with 28 variables. "

People's Daily Online -- US research restrictions spark controversy: "The news that the US Government proposes to prevent Chinese and other nations' citizens participating in advanced scientific projects in the United States has prompted an outcry among overseas Chinese students and scholars in the United States, according to a Xinhua report.
The proposal is, for the so-called sake of US national security, aimed at the prevention of the theft of technical secrets by foreign spies, said Xinhua, quoting relevant reports. "

People's Daily Online -- Greenspan warns of possible "painful" adjustment for world economy: "Addressing a meeting of Group of Seven (G7) economic powers in London, Greenspan said the rise of the US current account deficit over the past decade appears to have coincided with a pronounced new phase of globalization.
He mentioned that so far the United States has had no problem financing its current account trade deficit, which last year hit record high 668 billion US dollars, because of the flexibility of the American economy.
But he also expressed concerns about the possibility that US debts grow to unsustainable levels and the move to open global markets is halted. "

Wired News: Science Makes Sex Obsolete: "It gets even more interesting when you learn what Brinster did with sperm stem cells in 2001. In that study, he and his team changed the genetic program of SSCs. Because these are sex cells, any changes scientists might introduce to their genes will be carried from generation to generation. This is called a 'germ line' change, and it's a line that the majority of bioethicists agree should not be crossed, because it raises the specter of DNA eugenics. "

Wired News: Science Makes Sex Obsolete: "The idea of 'designer babies' is one of those concepts that is fun to discuss over a pitcher of Mojitos, but the practical reality is sobering.
Designer babies have already been born. Well over 1,000 children have been screened as embryos by preimplantation genetic diagnosis, or PGD. In PGD, a cell taken from an embryo is analyzed to see if the chromosomes or genes are normal. Families use PGD to weed out genetic diseases and to make a baby who will be immunologically compatible with an existing sibling in need of a blood or bone-marrow donation. More controversially, it can be, and has been, used to select the sex of babies. "

Sloan-News: The 2005 Survey of Online Learning concludes that the breadth of online college courses may soon rival traditional face-to-face offerings. Survey results show more than three out of five institutions offering face-to-face undergraduate (63%) or graduate (65%) level courses also offer courses at the same level online.

In addition, larger percentages (56%) of chief academic officers agree that online education is critical to their long-term strategy. ?Colleges and universities are starting to understand that online courses help increase enrollment and improve diversity without the need for additional classrooms,? said Frank Mayadas, president, Sloan-C and program director, Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. ?It also helps address professors? needs for workplace flexibility, among other issues challenging academia.?

Sloan News: The 2005 Survey of Online Learning concludes that the breadth of online college courses may soon rival traditional face-to-face offerings. Survey results show more than three out of five institutions offering face-to-face undergraduate (63%) or graduate (65%) level courses also offer courses at the same level online.

In addition, larger percentages (56%) of chief academic officers agree that online education is critical to their long-term strategy. ?Colleges and universities are starting to understand that online courses help increase enrollment and improve diversity without the need for additional classrooms,? said Frank Mayadas, president, Sloan-C and program director, Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. ?It also helps address professors? needs for workplace flexibility, among other issues challenging academia.?

The first big test of the international community?s capacity to
manage scarcity may come with oil or it could come with grain.
If the latter is the case, this could occur when China?whose
grain harvest fell by 34 million tons, or 9 percent, between 1998
and 2005?turns to the world market for massive imports of 30
million, 50 million, or possibly even 100 million tons of grain
per year. Demand on this scale could quickly overwhelm world
grain markets. When this happens, China will have to look to
the United States, which controls the world?s grain exports of
over 40 percent of some 200 million tons.32
This will pose a fascinating geopolitical situation. More
than 1.3 billion Chinese consumers, who had an estimated
$160-billion trade surplus with the United States in 2004?
enough to buy the entire U.S. grain harvest twice?will be competing
with Americans for U.S. grain, driving up U.S. food
prices.

For many years environmentalists have pointed to the United
States as the world?s leading consumer, noting that 5 percent of
the world?s people were consuming nearly a third of the earth?s
resources. Although that was true for some time, it no longer is.
China has replaced the United States as the leading consumer of
basic commodities.11
Among the five basic food, energy, and industrial commodities?
grain and meat, oil and coal, and steel?consumption in
China has eclipsed that of the United States in all but oil. China
has opened a wide lead with grain, consuming 380 million tons
in 2005 versus 260 million tons in the United States. Among the
big three grains, China leads in the consumption of both wheat
and rice and trails the United States only in corn.12

The world is facing the emergence of a geopolitics of scarcity,
which is already highly visible in the efforts by China, India, and
other developing countries to ensure their access to oil supplies.
In the future, the issue will be who gets access to not only Middle
Eastern oil but also Brazilian ethanol and North American grain.
Pressures on land and water resources, already excessive in most
of the world, will intensify further as the demand for biofuels
climbs. This geopolitics of scarcity is an early manifestation of
civilization in an overshoot-and-collapse mode,

In this new world, the price of oil begins to set the price of
food, not so much because of rising fuel costs for farmers and
food processors but more because almost everything we eat can
be converted into fuel for cars. In this new world of high oil
prices, supermarkets and service stations will compete in commodity
markets for basic food commodities such as wheat, corn,
soybeans, and sugarcane.

As of 2005, some 42 countries have populations that are
stable or declining slightly in size as a result of falling birth
rates. But now for the first time ever, demographers are
projecting population declines in some countries because of
rising death rates, among them Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia,
and Swaziland.

Resources that accumulated over eons of geological time are
being consumed in a single human lifespan. We are crossing
natural thresholds that we cannot see and violating deadlines
that we do not recognize. These deadlines, determined by
nature, are not politically negotiable.

Fortunately, there is a consensus emerging among scientists
on the broad outlines of the changes needed. If economic
progress is to be sustained, we need to replace the fossil-fuelbased,
automobile-centered, throwaway economy with a new
economic model. Instead of being based on fossil fuels, the new
economy will be powered by abundant sources of renewable
energy: wind, solar, geothermal, hydropower, and biofuels.
Instead of being centered around automobiles, future transportation
systems will be far more diverse, widely employing
light rail, buses, and bicycles as well as cars. The goal will be to
maximize mobility, not automobile ownership.
The throwaway economy will be replaced by a comprehensive
reuse/recycle economy. Consumer products from cars to computers
will be designed so that they can be disassembled into their
component parts and completely recycled. Throwaway products
such as single-use beverage containers will be phased out.

As a result, we are consuming renewable resources faster than they can regenerate. Forests are shrinking, grasslands are deteriorating, water tables are falling, fisheries are collapsing, and soils are eroding. We are using up oil at a pace that leaves little time to plan beyond peak oil. And we are discharging greenhouse gases into the atmosphere faster than nature can absorb them, setting the stage for a rise in the earth?s temperature well above any since agriculture began. Our twenty-first century civilization is not the first to move onto an economic path that was environmentally unsustainable.

Our global economy is outgrowing the capacity of the earth to support it, moving our early twenty-first century civilization ever closer to decline and possible collapse. In our preoccupation with quarterly earnings reports and year-to-year economic growth, we have lost sight of how large the human enterprise has become relative to the earth?s resources. A century ago, annual growth in the world economy was measured in billions of dollars. Today it is measured in trillions.

The Power and Interest News Report (PINR): "Washington's problem is that it has relied on authoritarian regimes in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Yemen and North Africa to partner with it in its 'war on terrorism,' to moderate regional hostility toward Israel and -- in the case of Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf principalities -- to provide reliable energy supplies to the West and Japan. Washington does not desire precipitous regime change in allied states on which it is dependent, yet it believes that regime transformation is ultimately in its interest. As a result, Washington is constrained to walk a fine line between pressuring allied authoritarian regimes to reform and making sure that it does not alienate them so much that they resist cooperation in the pursuit of its vital strategic aims."

International migration, ... | Aideffectiveness | Development Gateway: "The labor forces in many developed countries are expected to peak around 2010, and decline by around 5 percent in the following two decades, accompanied by a rapid increase in dependency ratios. Conversely, the labor forces in many developing countries are expanding rapidly, resulting in declines in dependency ratios. This imbalance is likely to create strong demand for workers in developed countries' labor markets, especially for numerous service sectors that can only be supplied locally. There are large north-south wage gaps, however, especially for unskilled and semiskilled labor. "

KurzweilAI.net: "A new biofuel production method converts biomass (organic leftovers) into a fuel called 'syngas' that outperforms both petroleum and plant oil-based biodiesel.
It also produces 85 to 90 percent less climate-changing carbon dioxide than motoring on fossil diesel, and generates less soot and smog because the fuel contains none of the sulfur found in conventional diesel and few aromatic hydrocarbons such as benzene. "

EETimes.com - Computer R&D rocks on: "We've moved from a community of experts using machines in glass rooms to an environment where the technology is at everyone's fingertips"

People's Daily Online -- Potential risks in world economy cannot be neglected, report: "The report believes that these potential risks mainly lie in the continuously rising oil price, imbalance in global economy, real estate bubble and intensified international trade protectionism.
In 2006 the world economy will still grow at a fast pace with robust oil demand on the international market, the report said. But oil supply, vulnerable to many factors such as refining capacity and geopolitics, is subject to great uncertainty. Besides, speculation capital will significantly magnify the short of supply. As a result, there will still be high possibility of huge fluctuations in oil price in 2006, which will increase the risk of development for various economies and particularly affect developing countries. "

Guardian Unlimited | Science | Geneticists claim ageing breakthrough but immortality will have to wait: "A genetic experiment to unlock the secrets of the ageing process has created organisms that live six times their usual lifespan, raising hopes that it might be possible to slow ageing in humans."

World Bank - - Global Economic Prospects 2006: Migration can deliver welfare gains, reduce poverty; Remittances reach $232 billion: "Officially recorded remittances worldwide exceeded $232 billion in 2005. Of this, developing countries received $167 billion, more than twice the level of development aid from all sources. The GEP authors suggest that remittances sent through informal channels could add at least 50 percent to the official estimate, making remittances the largest source of external capital in many developing countries."

World Bank - - Global Economic Prospects 2006: Migration can deliver welfare gains, reduce poverty; Remittances reach $232 billion: "One of the risks to the outlook investigated in the report is the possibility of a disruption in oil supply that could send oil prices even higher, potentially reducing global output by 1.5 percent for several years. A second uncertainty arises from persistent global imbalances and rising public debt in high-income countries. This, the report cautions, could cause long-term interest rates to rise much faster than expected, and dampen growth prospects"

World Bank - - Global Economic Prospects 2006: Migration can deliver welfare gains, reduce poverty; Remittances reach $232 billion: "High oil prices, capacity constraints and gradually rising interest rates are the key factors that have been dampening the global expansion. ?Until recently, strong global demand and rising non-oil commodity prices have mitigated the impact of rising oil prices on oil-importing developing countries,? said Andrew Burns, one of the chapter authors of the report. ?However, the increase in the oil price since 2004 is expected to generate substantial economic costs for oil-importing poor economies that are not fully captured in the GDP numbers.? "

The Law of Accelerating Returns: "In the eighteenth century, we added a few days every year to human longevity; during the nineteenth century we added a couple of weeks each year; and now we're adding almost a half a year every year. With the revolutions in genomics, proteomics, rational drug design, therapeutic cloning of our own organs and tissues, and related developments in bio-information sciences, we will be adding more than a year every year within ten years. "

Are U.S. Innovators Losing Their Competitive Edge? - New York Times: "The Industrial Research Institute, an organization in Arlington, Va., that represents some of the nation's largest corporations, is also concerned that the academic and financial support for scientific innovation is lagging in the United States. The group's most recent data indicate that from 1986 to 2001, China, Taiwan, South Korea and Japan all awarded more doctoral degrees in science and engineering than did the United States. Between 1991 and 2003, research and development spending in America trailed that of China, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan - in China's case by billions of dollars."

Are U.S. Innovators Losing Their Competitive Edge? - New York Times: "'The scientific and technical building blocks of our economic leadership are eroding at a time when many other nations are gathering strength,' the National Academy of Sciences observed in a report released last month. 'Although many people assume that the United States will always be a world leader in science and technology, this may not continue to be the case inasmuch as great minds and ideas exist throughout the world. We fear the abruptness with which a lead in science and technology can be lost - and the difficulty of recovering a lead once lost, if indeed it can be regained at all.'"

The Collapse of Globalism: and the Rebirth of Nationalism - Globalization - Global Policy Forum: "History will eventually give all of these contradictory signals a shape. But history is neither for nor against. It just is. And there is no such thing as a prolonged vacuum in geopolitics. It is always filled. This is what happens every few decades. The world turns, shifts, takes a new tack, or retries an old one. Civilization rushes around one of those blind corners filled with uncertainties. Then, abruptly, the opportunities present themselves to those who move with skill and commitment. "

The Collapse of Globalism: and the Rebirth of Nationalism - Globalization - Global Policy Forum: "Ideology, like theater, is dependent on the willing suspension of disbelief. At the core of every ideology lies the worship of a bright new future, with only failure in the immediate past. But once the suspension goes, willingness converts into suspicion--the suspicion of the betrayed. "

The Collapse of Globalism: and the Rebirth of Nationalism - Globalization - Global Policy Forum: "Soon people began to notice other contradictions in the Global orthodoxy. How could the same ideology promise a planetary growth in democracy and yet a decline in the power of the nation-state? Democracy exists only inside countries. Weaken the nation-state and you weaken democracy. "

The Collapse of Globalism: and the Rebirth of Nationalism - Globalization - Global Policy Forum: "With economic power denationalized and transnationals using the new unregulated debt and currency systems to accumulate a financial worth greater than that of most nation-states, the next logical step was to think of those transnationals as new nations unto themselves--virtual nations, freed of the limitations of geography and citizens, freed of local obligations, empowered with the mobility of money and goods. Better in every way. "

The Collapse of Globalism: and the Rebirth of Nationalism - Globalization - Global Policy Forum: "For 250 years the painful job of building the modern nation-state had depended on a continual rebalancing of binding rules for both the public good and self-interest. Now this balance was tipped violently one way by simply shifting much of our economic power out into the global marketplace. "

The Collapse of Globalism: and the Rebirth of Nationalism - Globalization - Global Policy Forum: "Of course grand ideologies rarely disappear overnight. Fashions, whether in clothes or food or economics, tend to peter out. Thousands of people have done well out of their belief in Globalization, and their professional survival is dependent on our continued shared devotion to the cause. So is their personal sense of self-worth. They will be in positions of power for a few more years, and so they will make their case for a few more years. But the signs of decline are clear, and since 1995 those signs have multiplied, building on one another, turning a confused situation into a collapse. "

The Global Crisis of Legitimacy of Liberal Democracy - Social and Economic Policy - Global Policy Forum: "Then there is the challenge of how to restore equality as one of the key dimensions of democracy. We can no longer pretend that a functioning democracy can be sustained when there is a formal equality of citizens but there are very real and large inequalities of wealth among them. We have seen both in the United States and in the developing world the systematic perversion of democracy at every turn by money and wealth. "

The Global Crisis of Legitimacy of Liberal Democracy - Social and Economic Policy - Global Policy Forum: "At the turn of the 20th century, Max Weber referred to the 'iron cage' of bureaucratization and Robert Michels called attention to the 'iron law of oligarchy.' Today, the 'iron cage' is being forged by a number of forces: bureaucratic centralization that has run out of control, the drive of a national security establishment playing on terrorist fears, corporate concentration and control of production and markets. In the case of the third world, one must add to this brew the draconian policies of powerful multilateral institutions and the systematic subversion of democratic mechanisms by local elites to gain a comprehensive picture of the threats that are strangling democracy globally. "

The Global Crisis of Legitimacy of Liberal Democracy - Social and Economic Policy - Global Policy Forum: "I think that one key reason for the crisis of democracy in the developing world is that electoral democracies of the kind favored by the West have been extraordinarily vulnerable to being hijacked by elites. The system of democracy reestablished in the Philippines after the ouster of the Marcos dictatorship in 1986 illustrates the problem. It is one that encourages maximum factional competition among the elite while allowing them to close ranks against any change in the social and economic structure. "

The Global Crisis of Legitimacy of Liberal Democracy - Social and Economic Policy - Global Policy Forum: "Protection for US corporate interests and free trade for the rest of the world- this is the operational dictum of Washington, one that is now on display in the US's adamant refusal to abide by the NAFTA ruling on Canadian softwood imports. Given this nationalist-protectionist posture on the part of Washington, it is not surprising that the WTO talks leading to the Sixth Ministerial in Hong Kong are in danger of collapse. "

The Global Crisis of Legitimacy of Liberal Democracy - Social and Economic Policy - Global Policy Forum: "In my book, Dilemmas of Domination, I identify three dimensions of this crisis. The first is the crisis of overextension, or the growing gap between imperial reach and imperial grasp, the most striking example of which is the US's being drawn into a quagmire in Iraq. This has led to an erosion of its strategic position globally and made the threat of the employment of US military force to discipline recalcitrant governments and forces throughout the world less credible than it was three years ago. Hugo Chavez' scintillating defiance of American power would not be possible without the Iraqi resistance's successfully pinning down US interventionist forces in a war without end. The second is the crisis of overproduction, overaccumulation, or overcapacity. This refers to the growing gap between the tremendous productive capacity of the global capitalist system and the limited global demand for the commodities produced by this system."

IC Publications: "The report also highlights a trend that has been growing, almost unnoticed, over the past decade ? the internationalisation (or globalisation if you prefer that term) of Research and Development (R&D). Taken individually, each of these trends could be explained as cyclic phenomena; taken together, they appear to point to an almost inevitable shifting of the centre of gravity of world economics. If indeed the global economic tectonic plates are moving, they are doing so slowly and the full impact of this movement will not be noticeable for at least two decades. "

IC Publications: "The United Nations? latest report on Foreign Direct Investment global trends shows that FDI flows into Africa in 2004 stood still, exactly equalling 2003 inflows. However, there has been a seismic change elsewhere, with a massive tilt in favour of developing countries like China and a reduction of inflows to the developed world. What does this portend? Is the global centre of gravity shifting away from the developed to the developing world? "

The Power and Interest News Report (PINR): "The failure of Washington's self-imposed test caused defense planners to rethink their strategy. Facing a Sunni-led insurgency in Iraq, Washington no longer had the military resources necessary to make its unilateralist strategy credible. A shift in policy was necessary to protect U.S. interests and it was made through 2005 without the publicity attending the National Security Strategy. Nonetheless, the new strategy has been declared openly and frequently since it was put into place in March."
At the core of Washington's new geostrategy is the explicit acknowledgment that its enemy is not "terrorism" in general, but "Islamic extremism." In order to fight that enemy with any effectiveness, Major General Douglas Lute, director of operations for the U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM), which has military responsibility for the entire arc, said in August that the U.S. has embarked on a "long war" that -- all else being equal -- will become the dominant U.S. military engagement once -- as Washington hopes -- Afghanistan and Iraq are stabilized.

The Power and Interest News Report (PINR): "After Washington's initial response to 9/11 of invading Afghanistan and overthrowing the Taliban regime, it set out on a course of effectively unilateral action, outlined in its 2002 National Security Strategy, which announced that the U.S. was committed to maintaining global military supremacy and was ready to fight preemptive wars against states that threatened its vital interests by harboring 'terrorists' or developing weapons of mass destruction. The generally multilateral approach of previous U.S. administrations was abandoned in favor of organizing 'coalitions of the willing' under Washington's leadership."

The Power and Interest News Report (PINR): "Washington's overriding interests in the arc of instability are to contain and suppress Islamic revolutionary movements in order to secure strategic resources and prevent further attacks on U.S. soil, and to cultivate stable and friendly governments in the area that will serve broader U.S. aims in its competition with the power centers of China, Russia and India."

Efforts at innovation Efforts at innovation are carried out by actors who perceive that,through the changes,they can realize net gains, solve particular problems, or better satisfy their own needs or those of others (Davis and North, 1971). Typically, these various motives can only be distinguished analytically.

In sum, the establishment and development of new technological systems will require actors with social power, knowledge and motivation to bring about the necessary changes in material, cultural, and social organizational conditions. Otherwise, there will be no new appropriate technology systems!

No technological innovation will be introduced or incorporated into production, distribution, and use systems (PDU systems) if there are no actors ? entrepreneurs and change agents ? who are motivated and push for its introduction and development. These actors, in addition to their motivation or interests, must possess or mobilize the social powers to bring about the necessary socio-technical restructuring.

Bruland and Mowery (2005) single out two other innovations ? on the institutional level ? that played a key role in the First Industrial Revolution: The development of new forms of company law and finance that supported the growth of corporate firms, and the rise of managerial control of production which transformed workplace organization and scale. This is the basis of the subsequent growth in factory production. ?Managers of ?early industrial enterprises confronted serious challenges in the assembly and maintenance of a suitable workforce, the control of work, and the adoption of new techniques and organizational structures for production activities by a restructured workforce?.two distinct, though clearly overlapping difficulties: the aversion of workers to entering the new large enterprises with their unaccustomed rules and discipline and the shortage of skilled and reliable labour.? ?The emergence of rule-based disciplinary methods, the laborious construction of supervisory systems, and the habituation of workers to an organized and controlled working day emerged slowly but were central developments of early industrialization.

A type of ?Industrial Enlightenment included the surveying and codification of artisanal techniques in published manuals, handbooks, textbooks and pamphlets on industrial practices. Patterns of collective learning and knowledge accumulation during the Industrial Revolution were facilitated as more and more learning was codified, accelerating the diffusion of industrially relevant knowledge across sectors.

Brewing and milling were the first sectors to deploy large, professional managed enterprises with national distribution systems.

Among others, Rogers (1995) in his comprehensive overview of the diffusion of innovations, has identified key factors that influence the potential adopters of an innovation: (1) the relative advantage of the innovation; (2) its compatibility, with the potential adopter?s way of doing things and with established social norms; (3) the complexityof the innovation; (4) Trialability, the ease with which the innovation can b tested by a potential adopter; observability, the ease with which the innovation can be evaluated after trial.

Every new innovation consists of a complex of existing ideas, capabilities, skills, resources, etc. This implies that the greater the variety of these factors within a given system, the greater the scope for them to be combined in different ways, producing new innovations which will be both more complex and more sophisticated.

The process approach to innovation and technological development is one of those most established in the social sciences. Often these models were developed identifying different stages or phases (see below). Basic research -->applied research--->development--->testing/evaluation--> manufacturing/packaging--->marketing/dissemination

The breadth and complexity of knowledge bases for many areas of innovation today mean that even large firms cannot rely simply on their own innovative capacity. Often the reason for buying up other companies is not precisely because of their promise of profitability but because of the need to gain access to particular areas of knowledge.

Organizations are formally and intentionally constructed systems and have explicit goals or purposes and means/production processes to achieve them. Organizations operate as agents or collective actors.

Numerous studies focusing on explaining differences in economic Numerous studies focusing on explaining differences in economic growth across countries and regions at different levels of development ( Faberberg, 2005). Fagerberg (1987, 1988) identified three factors affecting differential growth rates across countries: innovation, imitation, and other efforts related to the commercial exploitation of technology.

However, as Fagerberg (2005) points out, ?Different, and to some extent competing, perspectives should not always be seen as a problem: many social phenomena are too complex to be analyzed properly from a single disciplinary perspective.?

In many instances, particular interest groups and social agents are threatened by the developments associated with the innovations. They may resist the developments and succeed in reorienting or blocking them.

The problem is that the "new" has to grow within the framework of the "old" socio-technical systems and institutional framework. The "new" cannot be clearly perceived and is created based on our experience with the "old." Social actors ?private and public, individual and collective? play the roles of entrepreneurs and change agents pushing new products and establishing and developing new systems.

Innovations of the ?breakthrough? or ?systemic? nature are increasingly dependent upon bridging science and technology in new ways. The dynamic interplay between science and technology, and amongst many other elements comprising the environment of innovation, has changed throughout history and is changing rapidly today

Socio-technical systems are exemplified by transport systems, water systems, communication systems all made up, as suggested above, of complexes of components.

Other components are the particular human agents (persons and groups) who have the skills and know-how to use and maintain the technology. Technology is then only one component linked to a number of other components in a social system designed to accomplish tasks and to solve problems.

Technologies extend human capabilities.

Product innovations are new or better material goods as well as services. Process innovations are new or better ways of producing goods and services. The innovations may be technological, technical, or organizational in character.

Technologieare artifacts (physical and non-physical human constructions) used in social action to solve certain problems, to produce certain products, or to earn income and consume. This definition encompasses the more conventional notion that technology is any tool or physical equipment but includes techniques and methods of doing or making.

It is often claimed that that science focuses on knowing ?why?, that is comprehending phenomena and the principles underlying them, while technology is concerned with ?knowing how? to make or produce things; it may be referred to as ?know-how?. Often enough there is a ?reciprocity?, movement back and forth. In general, the boundaries are highly fuzzy and shifting.

science and technology In a social science perspective, science and technology are particular bodies of knowledge, including the knowledge of the means by which new knowledge is obtained

People's Daily Online -- Senior CPC theorist: three trends mark China's development in 21st century: "Zheng said the population of China will reach 1.5 billion in the 2030s or 2040s and it will be the top priority for China to solve the subsistence and development issues for such a huge population, or one fifth of the world's total.
'The Chinese people will be busy with their own affairs for generations to come and there is no need at all for the country to threaten anybody or any nation, ' Zheng said.
The senior theorist said China will unswervingly take part in the economic globalization and deepen co-existence and cooperation with all relevant countries worldwide in a bid to achieve win-win results.
China will blaze new trails in developing industries and an energy-saving society and rely mainly on its own to solve the issues in development, he said. "

FUTUREdition Volume 8, Number 16One-Fifth of Human Genes Have Been Patented -- (National Geographic -- October 20, 2005) .
A new study shows that 20% of human genes have been patented in the United States, primarily by private firms and universities. The study marks the first time that a detailed map has been created to match patents to specific physical locations on the human genome. Researchers can patent genes because they are potentially valuable research tools, useful in diagnostic tests or to discover and produce new drugs.

KurzweilAI.net: "In the evolution of life-forms, the purpose is to survive. In an evolutionary algorithm (a computer program that simulates evolution to solve a problem) applied to, say, investing in the stock market, the purpose is to make money. Simply having more information does not necessarily result in a better fit. A superior solution for a purpose may very well involve less data.
The concept of 'complexity' is often used to describe the nature of the information created by an evolutionary process. Complexity is a close fit to the concept of order "

KurzweilAI.net: "Evolution applies positive feedback in that the more capable methods resulting from one stage of evolutionary progress are used to create the next stage. Each epoch of evolution has progressed more rapidly by building on the products of the previous stage. "

KurzweilAI.net: "Evolution applies positive feedback in that the more capable methods resulting from one stage of evolutionary progress are used to create the next stage. Each epoch of evolution has progressed more rapidly by building on the products of the previous stage. "

KurzweilAI.net: "Evolution works through indirection: evolution created humans, humans created technology, humans are now working with increasingly advanced technology to create new generations of technology. As a result, the rate of progress of an evolutionary process increases exponentially over time. "

From Wall Street to Beijing: Global Finance Has New Rules, New Players - Knowledge@Wharton: "�Throughout the 1980s, the U.S. was the driver of the world economy, and the world focused on exporting to it. The reality is that in the last two, three or four years the real growth engines are India and China,� with Japan now beginning to emerge as well, said James R. Birle, Jr., managing director and head of global equity capital markets at Merrill Lynch."

From Wall Street to Beijing: Global Finance Has New Rules, New Players - Knowledge@Wharton: "The rising power of hedge funds and private equity investment, continued sharp competition among Wall Street firms, and growth in China and India are the key drivers of global finance today, according to industry leaders at a recent Wharton Finance Conference whose theme was From Wall Street to Beijing: Thriving in a Changing Environment."

BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Millions 'will flee degradation': "Millions 'will flee degradation'
There will be as many as 50 million environmental refugees in the world in five years' time. "

Scientific publishing | The paperless library | Economist.com: "This is now changing. According to the OECD report, some 75% of scholarly journals are now online. Entirely new business models are emerging; three main ones were identified by the report's authors. There is the so-called big deal, where institutional subscribers pay for access to a collection of online journal titles through site-licensing agreements. There is open-access publishing, typically supported by asking the author (or his employer) to pay for the paper to be published. Finally, there are open-access archives, where organisations such as universities or international laboratories support institutional repositories. Other models exist that are hybrids of these three, such as delayed open-access, where journals allow only subscribers to read a paper for the first six months, before making it freely available to everyone who wishes to see it."

Ray Kurzweil deciphers a brave new world | Newsmakers | CNET News.comBut the condensed version goes like this: Thanks to Moore's Law and other exponential growth rates, by 2030 a $1 computer will be as powerful as the human brain. Information technology's exponential curve will fuel advances in biology, robotics, nanotechnology and artificial intelligence- with world-shattering results including radical life extension and practically omniscient and omnipotent abilities for humans who elect self-augmentation.

Futures PresentationsFutures Links:

Institute of the Future, Anne Arundel CC, Maryland: http://www.aacc.edu/future/default.cfm

World Future Society: http://www.wfs.org/

Prof. Roger Caldwell, Univ of Arizona, Class Website: http://cals.arizona.edu/futures/

Hawaii Center for Futures Studies: http://www.futures.hawaii.edu/

Bruce’s Strategy Page: http://staffwww.fullcoll.edu/bcordell/strategy.htm

Futures Links: "Futures Links:
Futures Research and the Strategic Planning Process
World Future Society
Plausible Futures Newsletter
Institute for the Future
Shaping Tomorrow: anticipate the future
World Futures Studies Federation
Institute for Alternative Futures"

Newsletter UK 9/2005: "Futures studies usually focus on the new that will come, and not so much on the old that will disappear. We are going to remedy that on this theme meeting about the 'living dead' categories that haunt our heads and control our view of realities, even though they already have gone or in actuality have lived out their time. Many of the products we use in our everyday lives will be gone in 15 years - e.g. the fixed line phone. Many of the systems, regulations and institutions by which we organize ourselves today will also likely disappear: counties, shopping hours legislation, and perhaps also office hours and homes for senior citizens. The development creates so many new things that it becomes increasingly important to clear out the old stuff. We will provide an argued candidate list of 'zombies'. "

Robert Fisk: War Is the "Total Failure of the Human Spirit" - Security Council - Global Policy Forum: "It's strange because if you have a crime in Santa Fe, the cops come along. First thing they do is look for the motive. When you have an international crime against humanity on the scale of September 11, 2001. The one thing you're not allowed to do is look for the motive for the crime. And I think that by and large for many months Americans were prevented from looking for the motive. By the time they could look for the motive, we were bombing Afghanistan and saying there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq."

Robert Fisk: War Is the "Total Failure of the Human Spirit" - Security Council - Global Policy Forum: "I think you have a big problem with the lobby groups. I don�t mean just the Israeli lobby, I mean the gun lobby and so on. I think you have a major problem with lobby groups in Washington and every president comes along saying he's going to clean that out but he never does. Actually, Bush didn't say that, not George W., anyway. But I think you have a much bigger problem in the United States where on issues like the Middle East, for example, your voice is simply not heard unless it is pro- Israeli, pro-American policy in the Middle East, etcetera, up on the hill. You'll get a few brave souls, Paul Finley. Look what happened to him. But basically you won't get represented on these critical issues. "

Robert Fisk: War Is the "Total Failure of the Human Spirit" - Security Council - Global Policy Forum: "You have a bigger problem in the United States in that, as I understand it -- well, I'll quote a U.S. Marine who said to me in San Diego a few months ago, 'Our problem is we have this kind of false democracy,' he said, 'We vote for our senators and congressman for what they say they'll give us and they give us something and say something completely different. "

Modeling of long-term fossil fuel consumption shows 14.5 degree hike in temperature: "If humans continue to use fossil fuels in a business as usual manner for the next several centuries, the polar ice caps will be depleted, ocean sea levels will rise by seven meters and median air temperatures will soar 14.5 degrees warmer than current day. "

People's Daily Online -- US tops the world with 2,267,800 in jail: "US tops the world with 2,267,800 in jail. The number of American prison inmates tops the world at 2,267,800 and continues to grow, according to a report released Oct. 23 by the statistics authority of the US Department of Justice. "

People's Daily Online -- French scholar: The world needs China: "In today's world, various dangers and crises, such as global warming, epidemic, poverty, terrorism, control over new science and technology, and fragile financial system, constitute the common challenges that all countries must face. "

People's Daily Online -- China replaces US to be Australia's biggest source of imports: "China has replaced the United States to become Australia's biggest source of imports.
In the year to September, China, which includes Hong Kong, accounted for 14.3 percent of Australian imports, Australian Associated Press (AAP) quoted new figures released Friday as reporting.
This compared to 13.9 percent which the United States accounted of Australian imports in the same period. "

People's Daily Online -- China becomes major victim of trade protectionism: "China became one of the major victims of trade protectionism in the past nine months or so, suffering from a wide range of trade barriers including anti-dumping, safeguard measures, subsidies and countervailing measures and special safeguard measures.
According to the China's Foreign Trade Report (fall, 2005) released on Friday by the Ministry of Commerce, in the first three quarters of this year, China incurred trade frictions involving 8.9 billion US dollars, a growth of more than 700 percent over the year-earlier level. "

The work has also been about trying to understand how the key bureaucratic components that are responsible for executing the states’ monopoly of force and coercion—the military—were organised, financed, equipped, deployed, controlled and managed then and since. The next challenge must be focused on moving the agenda forward, motivating for a second phase that addresses the conceptual suggestions of a regional security sector project based on national security interests, inherent capacities, and geophysical and strategic advantages.

Most military assistance was to support the colonial and settler project against the nationalist armed struggle project, until full decolonisation in 1994. Thereafter, support switched to the independent
states in different forms. The most interesting example of this was Britain’s support of the Mozambican Armed Forces after the Rome Treaty of 1992, hosted in eastern Zimbabwe.

SPACE.com -- U.S. Military Wants to Own the Weather: "While efforts to tame storms have so far been clouded by failure, some researchers aren�t willing to give up the fight. And even if changing the weather proves overly challenging, residents and disaster officials can do a better job planning and reacting.
In fact, military officials and weather modification experts could be on the verge of joining forces to better gauge, react to, and possibly nullify future hostile forces churned out by Mother Nature.
While some consider the idea farfetched, some military tacticians have already pondered ways to turn weather into a weapon."

People's Daily Online -- Expert says China to become world's No. 1 automaker by 2020: "An economist has said China's auto industry is to experience rapid growth in the coming 15 years and the country will become the world's largest automaker by 2020.
'China's per capita GDP has topped 1,000 US dollars, which means a growing number of Chinese citizens will be able to afford private cars and the auto industry will outgrow the country's GDP, ' said Dr. Feng Fei, an economist with the Development Research Center of the State Council, the Chinese cabinet. "

Reuters Business Channel | Reuters.com: "Global goods trade will grow slightly more in 2006 than this year, World Trade Organization economists predicted on Thursday, but the WTO chief voiced concern at an overall trend toward lower growth."

Media and Natural Disasters - Global Issues: "what world news from a media outlet really is: is it coverage of events occurring around the world, or is it selective coverage of events occurring around the world, presented in a framework that meets other, local needs, interests, and demands?"

Foreign Affairs - Who Will Control the Internet? - Kenneth Neil Cukier: "Power, before it comes from arms or wealth, emanates from ideas. The Internet has emerged as a piece of critical information infrastructure for every nation. Developed countries increasingly rely on it for their economic livelihood and basic communications; developing nations recognize it as a way of linking people together, enabling commercial relationships, and generating the transparency and civic dialogue that undergird democratic governance. Information technology can also strengthen the hand of authoritarian regimes, but there seems little doubt that in its current form the Internet's general influence is progressive rather than regressive."

The Observer | UK News | 2050 - and immortality is within our grasp: "Philips, the electronics giant, is developing the world's first rollable display which is just a millimetre thick and has a 12.5cm screen which can be wrapped around the arm. It expects to start production within two years. "

The Observer | UK News | 2050 - and immortality is within our grasp: "He believes that today's youngsters may never have to die, and points to the rapid advances in computing power demonstrated last week, when Sony released the first details of its PlayStation 3. It is 35 times more powerful than previous games consoles. 'The new PlayStation is 1 per cent as powerful as a human brain,' he said. 'It is into supercomputer status compared to 10 years ago. PlayStation 5 will probably be as powerful as the human brain.' "

Numerous countries are providing models of the different components of Plan B. Denmark, for example, today gets 20 percent of its electricity from wind and has plans to push this to 50 percent by 2030. Similarly, Brazil is on its way to automotive fuel self-sufficiency. With highly efficient sugarcane-based ethanol supplying 40 percent of its automotive fuel in 2005, it could phase out gasoline within a matter of years.39

The dysfunctional global economy The central challenge, the key to building the new economy, is getting the market to tell the ecological truth. The dysfunctional global economy of today has been shaped by distorted market prices that do not incorporate environmental costs.