Developing a scale for measuring the perceived value of cultural institutions

Previous research into the value of cultural institutions has emphasized a variety of benefits arising from cultural institutions such as social, educational and health-related impacts. An economic assessment of cultural institutions is usually made in monetary units. This one-dimensional assessment of value has been criticized for being elusive, disregarding the complex and multidimensional nature of cultural values. This article suggests scales for measuring the value of cultural institutions. Based on previous research, and an exploratory study on the perceived value of cultural institutions, this article describes the development of a scale using exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses. Six factors comprise the scale: social, educational, health, image, identity and financial effects. The scale may be used to describe and compare the value of cultural institutions qualitatively. Conclusions about the perceived contribution of different institutions may be possible. From a policy perspective, the scale may allow an understanding of the contribution individuals with different socioeconomic backgrounds perceive the cultural institution as making.     

Emotional energy and sub-cultural politics: alternative bands in post-1997 Hong Kong

The paper attempts to work out the link between the structuring of the public domain and hegemonic masculinities in contemporary Kerala, South India. Using the debates around an incident of sexual harassment that happened in 1999, it argues for a conjunctural understanding of the contemporary where various events and moments in history are replayed through narrativization and popular memory. The paper goes on to analyse the debates around the incident that produce a ‘narrative public domain’, to foreground the various notions of masculinity that construct and structure it in relation to notions of female sexuality and changing structures of family. These notions of masculinity could be, the paper argues, a starting point for a historical inquiry into Kerala's modernity – an inquiry that would throw light on the past and the ways in which the contemporary is produced through its historical legacies.     

Progressivism and the History of the Public House, 1850–1950

ABSTRACT

In a recent article, Alistair Mutch suggests that twin concepts – ‘control’ and ‘interpretation’ – explain the evolution of the public house over a century of dramatic changes between 1850 and 1950. This article argues that these concepts are confusing, ambiguous and misleading. It was not regulatory pressures, the temperance movement, local politicians, pressure groups or magistrates that most shaped the history of drinking premises, but developments outside the brewing industry, most notably Progressivism. Emerging in the late nineteenth century, Progressives set out to reform drinkers and drink premises, first in the trust house movement, and then in the Liquor Traffic Central Control Board during the First World War. Appropriating their ideas and philosophy immediately following the war, England's foremost brewers launched the public house improvement movement, the most far-reaching attempt to transform the nature of public drinking in the twentieth century.     

Knots in the Fourth Dimension

ABSTRACT

The article analyses a debate that preoccupied the Russian press in the winter of 1878/9. Writers, journalists and scientists discussed whether mathematics could explain spiritualist séance phenomena. At its core, this was an assessment of social change and a debate about the ambiguity of modern life. While spiritualists hoped to bridge the divide between science and religion, subjectivity and objectivity, their opponents feared that séance phenomena and modern mathematics undermined a rationalist world-view that was endowed with reliability and universal truth. That no agreement could be reached indicates that the post-reform public sphere had become truly pluralist and modern.     

Space and the City

ABSTRACT

Influenced by interdisciplinary studies and the ‘spatial turn’ in social history, this article explores the relationship between space and the construction of gender identity amongst the poor to middling sorts of seventeenth-century Norwich. To this end I have considered gendered interaction in different ‘types' of space: domestic, private space, ‘borderline’ space – such as the alehouse or threshold – and, finally, the public space of streets and markets. Each section explores the relevance of recent spatial historiography in the Norwich context, and evaluates whether men and women inhabited different ‘worlds' in the city, not only in terms of their physical movement or access to certain places but also, more importantly, in terms of how their presence was perceived, and thus their identity shaped by others. The empirical basis is primarily defamation depositions of the Norwich Diocese Court, largely used by the middling sorts, contextualized where appropriate with secular court records.     

事业单位人力资源优化与专业技术职称改革论析

优化人力资源结构以夯实事业单位可持续发展基础,加大专业技术职称改革力度以强化事业单位能力建设,是当前事业单位改革相互密切关联的两大重点。对此必须坚持科学发展观和以人为本原则,在实施全员聘用制前提下,通过构建岗位职责、工作绩效和实际贡献相结合的分配机制和公正、公平、科学的职称评审评价机制等一系列综合性措施,有效激活事业单位竞争择优的成长动力,以切实发挥事业单位人力资源优势和潜能,并藉此提高事业单位公共服务的有效性。     

论政府公共体育服务供给的需求导向——以上海市为例

运用文献资料法和调查法,在对上海市公共体育服务供给现状分析的基础上发现:虽然政府努力为市民提供公共体育服务,但由于政府是以供给为导向,导致公共体育服务供需不一致,市民满意度不高.其原因是政府在提供公共体育服务时自身存在自利性、服务理念陈旧、信息沟通渠道不畅和决策机制不完善等.为了实现公共体育服务由政府供给导向向市民需求导向的转变,应该广泛了解市民的体育诉求、畅通民意表达渠道,并邀请市民参与决策,提高公共体育服务决策的科学性.     

析我国涉外代理法律实施困顿

《涉外民事关系法律适用法》的出台,对我国法院审理涉外代理案件在法律适用上统一了标准。然而由于我国司法实践的匮乏,加之我国实体法中又无有关代理单行法对之概念加之明确,民法与合同法对代理的界定也不一致,这必然导致我国法院对涉外代理案件适用的困顿或导致出现司法惰怠。为保证我国关于涉外代理法律制度的有效、准确实施,我国有必要借鉴海牙国际私法会议《代理法律适用公约》中有关条款的规定,或以单行法的形式,或以司法解释的方式,明确界定《涉外民事关系法律适用法》关于代理法律制度规定的适用范围,对代理采用明确定义、穷尽列举及排除性条款相结合的方法,对代理的适用范围进行规范。以突破立法界定缺陷导致的司法困境．完善我国的代理法律法规。