Adolescence in the year 2000

This article is based on the results and conclusions derived from an international colloquium held on the subject of young people in the year 2000. ¹ It is mainly policy oriented and reflects what is desired rather than what is predicted. The authors cover the many factors that affect adolescence: modern communications, relative population decline, family size, conflict, equality, and diversity. Other topics included are the family (and its alternatives), socialisation, parental roles, divorce, education, peer relations, work and leisure, and social policy. The initiatives required now are outlined, and the authors identify many areas of importance to policy making where basic data are still lacking.     

Toward the year 2000

If the world population continues to grow at its present rate, in only about 35 more years there will be an additional 3.5 billion people. Although it is likely that the growth rate will slow down in the future, there will be an increase of between 2.3-3.5 billion people by the year 2000. At that time the Asian, African, and Latin American regions of the world will account for between 81-84% of world population, regardless of whether there is a fertility decline. Simultaneously, the populations of Europe and North America will decrease from 26 to between 16-19%. The People's Republic of China is now working to contain population increase, but despite the efforts for every 10 Chinese alive in 1970 there will be 15 in the year 2000. For the other 9 most populous less developed countries, there will be nearly 20 persons for every 10. As this figure is 12 in the year 2000 for every 10 Russians or Americans in 1970, a significant reduction in the growth rate of population in the 10 largest less developed countries would do much to reduce the world's population problems. The number of children born between now and the year 2000 depends on the fertility of all women in the childbearing ages during that period. Finally, as the population of the world continues to increase, there will be a marked concentration of the world's children in the poorer nations, and this will be a major problem in these developing countries.     

Agriculture in the EEC: Two scenarios to the year 2000

The nine-member EEC, soon to be enlarged to 12 countries, is a major agricultural producer and trader. The author describes the assumptions behind two scenarios: high agricultural-commodity output (protectionist), and low output (liberalisation). After examining the pressures for change, he concludes that some measure of liberalisation is likely, possibly with new adjustment mechanisms (eg farm-income support rather than price intervention). However, the complexity of present EEC agricultural policy and the prevailing interests of current member countries make radical change unlikely.     

Population,wealth, and resources up to the year 2000

The authors use the second-generation Mesarovic-Pestel model to produce global scenarios. In the first (open-loop) case there is little interaction between different areas (eg agriculture, energy, or resources). The results are similar to forecasts made by other research groups. The authors show that in the long run this open-loop approach is implausible. The closed-loop approach significantly alters the scenarios. This is highlighted by the combined-problem scenario, which adopts some of the more pessimistic assumptions from the other organisations' projections while retaining the interactions between areas. The authors stress the importance of the closed-loop approach when considering global futures. They also examine the regional trends which may be masked by the global figures.     

What did people predict for the year 2000 and what happened?

Comparing the global situation in the year 2000 with what the respondent samples from 10 countries predicted 30 years earlier, the conclusion can only be that people were remarkably accurate. This does not mean that any single respondent was that accurate but that anybody, who would have liked to anticipate the year 2000, would have done quite well based on these samples. Actually, the peripheries in the samples came out even better than the centers, making us wonder what education and high special position are actually about. One possible set of explanations would be that the peripheries know better where the shoes pinch, are more holistic and are not paid by anybody to make self-fulfilling or self-denying predictions.We are going to look at what people thought and what actually happened, in three movements. The first is about what they thought about the futures of their own societies and the second about international futures. The third movement deals with how their hopes and expectations depended on who they were, more specifically: whether they belonged to the center or the periphery in their countries.     

Financial control, managerial control and accountability: evidence from the British Cotton Industry, 1700–2000

The paper seeks to identify the underlying and long run historical determinants of accounting practices. These practices include the nature and relative importance of management and financial accounting techniques, together with the mediating roles of corporate finance and especially financial markets. To explain historical variation in the application of these techniques the paper introduces an analytical model. The model is based on the principles of historical materialism and hence comprises objective and subjective elements. Definitional categories are borrowed from Marx’s analysis of the workings of capitalism, and extended to include contexts where there is extensive socialization of capital, as manifested by the pooling of investments in liquid financial markets. To examine the detailed implications for accounting change, the model is then applied to a longitudinal case study of the British cotton textile industry. The paper shows that techniques of financial and managerial control and mechanisms of accountability can be explained by the dynamic interaction of capital centralization and capital socialization.     

Work and nonwork : Europe in the 1980s and beyond

Through an understanding of major trends in employment, unemployment and informal work and in patterns of life, possible alternative futures in work and nonwork may be identified. Communications and information technologies (IT) may themselves transform the recent transformations in work and nonwork, and already disadvantaged groups may further suffer unless fully involved in the policy processes relating to IT and its products.     

欧元十年回眸与展望

1999年1月1日,欧洲单一货币——欧元宣告诞生成为世界货币史上一个划时代的事件。2009年新年的第一天,欧元在迎来10岁"生日"的同时,欧元区大家庭也迎来了第16个成员——斯洛伐克。一方面,尽管欧元自问世以来一直备受争议,但是经过10年的发展,欧元已经成为国际主要货币之一;另一     

Higher education in the year 2030

Nicholson speculates that in the 21st century, universities evolve to become quite different from their precursor institutions. The changes, fuelled by the unwillingness of students to enrol in overpriced and overrated degree-granting programs, have propelled higher education in two directions. In 2030, one type of higher education takes place in ‘Experience Camps.' These organisations are publicly funded enterprises which provide study and social service experiences for a relatively small group of students. They take place in physical settings such as former military bases and farms. ‘Advanced Learning Networks' are the other type of higher education enterprise. These are vast distance learning enterprises without campuses, and they provide high quality education to a great number of students around the world, while offering a variety of opportunities for faculty.