This article investigates how the demand for energy services has changed since the
Industrial Revolution. It presents evidence on the income and price elasticities of demand
for domestic heating, ...passenger transport, and lighting in the United Kingdom over the
last two hundred years. As the economy developed and energy service prices fell, income
elasticities have generally followed an inverse U-shape curve, and price elasticities have
generally followed a U-shape curve. However, these general trends also appear to have been
affected by energy and technological transitions, which boosted demand (by either
encouraging poorer consumers to fully enter the market or offering new attributes of value
to wealthier consumers). The evidence presented offers insights that will be helpful for
identifying likely future trends in energy use and carbon dioxide emissions, and for
developing long-term climate policies. (JEL: Q41, N73, N74, D12)
We hypothesise that the timing of the fertility transition is an important determinant of comparative physiological development. In support, we provide a model of long-run growth that elucidates the ...links between population size, average body size and income during development. Industrialisation is shown to be accompanied by a reduction in family size and an intensification of nutrition per child. Early transition countries are therefore expected to be more developed today, economically and physiologically. Empirically, the timing of the fertility transition is strongly correlated with average body size across countries.
How does cooperation emerge in a condition of international anarchy? Michael Tomz sheds new light on this fundamental question through a study of international debt across three centuries. Tomz ...develops a reputational theory of cooperation between sovereign governments and foreign investors. He explains how governments acquire reputations in the eyes of investors, and argues that concerns about reputation sustain international lending and repayment.
Im Zentrum des Bandes steht die Frage nach der Rolle des Hörens in modernen Wissenskulturen. Lange galt die Moderne als primär visuelles Zeitalter. Die Sound Studies haben in den letzten Jahren ...jedoch in vielfacher Hinsicht gezeigt, dass auch dem Hören zentrale Bedeutung in der Moderne zukommt. Der Schwerpunkt lag dabei jedoch zumeist auf den kulturellen Variationsformen des Hörens und zeitlich auf dem 20. und frühen 21. Jahrhundert. Demgegenüber verlängert dieser Band die historische Perspektive bis zurück in die Frühe Neuzeit und legt den Schwerpunkt auf die Frage nach dem epistemischen Status des Hörens in der Moderne. Er folgt dabei einem weiten Wissensbegriff und untersucht 1) welche Arten von Wissen über das Hören sich historisch rekonstruieren lassen und 2) welche Funktionen das Hören selbst im Prozess der Wissensproduktion und -kommunikation hatte, welche Formen des auditiven Wissens sich also innerhalb der Wissenschaften, der Musik, der Politik, der darstellenden Künste, der Literatur und der Philosophie beschreiben lassen. Dadurch trägt der Band zur Historisierung von zentralen Begriffen und Annahmen der Sound Studies bei und problematisiert die Hypothese einer Hegemonie des Visuellen in der Moderne.
The appeal of insurance Clark, Geoffrey
The appeal of insurance,
c2010, 20100731, 2017, 2010, 2010-01-01, 20100101
eBook
The Appeal of Insuranceexplores how insurance has grown in concert with a clientele largely of its own making. Drawing on the fields of history, sociology, criminology and economics, these essays ...illuminate the dialectical relationship between the expansion of business and the public demand for economic and social security.
Overdrev er måske den begrebsmæssigt mest problematiske landskabsbetegnelse, som vi har i Danmark, da den dækker over forskellige betydninger og benyttes om forskellige landskaber. Overdrev betyder ...noget forskelligt fra periode til periode, fra egn til egn og fra faggren til faggren. Ikke mindst historikere og landskabsforvaltere har haft svært ved at kommunikere, da de forstår overdrev som noget meget forskelligt. Artiklen følger betydningerne af begrebet overdrev og udbredelserne af disse fra midten af 1700-tallet op til i dag og diskuterer problemstillingerne ved begrebsforvirringen og den til tider problematiske brug af historien inden for natur- og fredningsdebatten i dag.
lost wolves of Japan Walker, Brett L; Cronon, William
2005, 20091123, 2009, 2009-11-23
eBook, Book
Many Japanese once revered the wolf as Oguchi no Magami, or Large-Mouthed Pure God, but as Japan began its modern transformation wolves lost their otherworldly status and became noxious animals that ...needed to be killed. By 1905 they had disappeared from the country. In this spirited and absorbing narrative, Brett Walker takes a deep look at the scientific, cultural, and environmental dimensions of wolf extinction in Japan and tracks changing attitudes toward nature through Japan's long history.
Grain farmers once worshiped wolves at shrines and left food offerings near their dens, beseeching the elusive canine to protect their crops from the sharp hooves and voracious appetites of wild boars and deer. Talismans and charms adorned with images of wolves protected against fire, disease, and other calamities and brought fertility to agrarian communities and to couples hoping to have children. The Ainu people believed that they were born from the union of a wolflike creature and a goddess.
In the eighteenth century, wolves were seen as rabid man-killers in many parts of Japan. Highly ritualized wolf hunts were instigated to cleanse the landscape of what many considered as demons. By the nineteenth century, however, the destruction of wolves had become decidedly unceremonious, as seen on the island of Hokkaido. Through poisoning, hired hunters, and a bounty system, one of the archipelago's largest carnivores was systematically erased.
The story of wolf extinction exposes the underside of Japan's modernization. Certain wolf scientists still camp out in Japan to listen for any trace of the elusive canines. The quiet they experience reminds us of the profound silence that awaits all humanity when, as the Japanese priest Kenko taught almost seven centuries ago, we "look on fellow sentient creatures without feeling compassion."
Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden today all enjoy a reputation for strong labour movements, which in turn are widely seen as part of a distinctive regional approach to politics, ...collective bargaining and welfare. But as this volume demonstrates, narratives of the so-called "Nordic model" can obscure the fact that experiences of work and the fortunes of organized labour have varied widely throughout the region and across different historical periods. Together, the essays collected here represent an ambitious intervention in labour historiography and European history, exploring themes such as work, unions, politics and migration from the early modern period to the twenty-first century.
Permeable Walls Mooney, Graham; Reinarz, Jonathan
Clio Medica Online,
2009, Volume:
86
eBook, Book
Visiting relatives and friends in medical institutions is a common practice in all corners of the world. People probably go into hospitals as a visitor more frequently than they do as a patient. ...Permeable Walls is the first book devoted to the history of hospital and asylum visiting and deflects attention from medical history's more traditionally studied constituencies, patients and doctors.
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