The Forever Frontier of Urbanism: Historicizing Persian Gulf Cities

In recent years, Persian Gulf cities have become symbols of the most spectacular forms of the ‘globalization of urbanization’. Current scholarship has sought to situate these cities in transnational processes and linkages with conceptualizations of ‘the global city’ and the mechanisms of ‘worlding’. This article builds on but moves beyond this line of analysis by turning to the histories of this region and its built environment to explore the longue‐durée influence of capital and empire operating across multiple scales. From this perspective, the glittering high‐rises and manmade islands are contemporary manifestations of a century of urban forms and logics of social control emanating from company towns, the struggles of state building, and the circulation and fixing of capital. To grasp how the Persian Gulf region has been remade as a frontier for accumulation, the analysis in this article blurs the boundaries between metropole and periphery, reconceptualizing the region not as an eclectic sideshow, but as a central site for global shifts in urbanism, capitalism and architecture in the twentieth century.     

The burden of the family company: Leopoldo Pirelli and his times

Leopoldo Pirelli was the third generation to run the family firm and a key character of Italian capitalism. He played a major role in Italy’s biggest merger and served as Head of the Committee for Reforms of the Italian Confederation of Industrialists. As head of Pirelli, he was appreciated by shareholders and by management. Though intent on internationalisation, he failed twice (the ‘Union’ with Dunlop and later with Continental). After this second failure he resigned. A respected leader of the international business community, Pirelli failed at his most important task – transforming a family firm into a public company.     

Inequality and the Phases of Capitalism

We live in a capitalist world characterized by economic inequality. Inequality is a real curse, but it does not have to always increase. In different phases of capitalism, it may be increasing, constant, or decreasing, depending on the dominant type of technical progress (capital-using, capital-neutral, or capital-saving), on the organizational capacity of the workers, on the competition from other countries with lower wages, and on the prevailing degree of democracy. But distribution faces an economic constraint: the expected profit rate must remain attractive to business entrepreneurs. From the mid-twentieth century, we would expect technological progress to change from neutral to capital-saving, which would allow wages to increase at a faster rate than productivity. Indeed, this happened in the Golden Years of capitalism, but such progress stalled in the succeeding neoliberal years, dominated as they were by a class coalition of rentier capitalists and financiers.     

列宁帝国主义思想及国外学术界最新发展

列宁帝国主义思想是马克思学者关于资本主义研究的重要成果,具有开创性意义。随着资本主义经济社会发展变化,国外学者对列宁帝国主义思想作了补充性研究。列宁帝国主义思想诞生虽已经有近百年历史,但仍然具有较强的现实意义。帝国主义的本质特征和基本矛盾并没有发生改变,但社会主义取代资本主义采取的方式可能会出现多样化,并不仅限于暴力革命。     

全面认识社会主义与资本主义的关系--学习邓小平有关国际关系论述的一点体会

在当今社会主义与资本主义共存的时代里 ,必须从理论上全面认识社会主义与资本主义的关系 :一方面 ,要看到社会主义与资本主义在根本制度上是对立的 ,它们之间是一种相互取代的关系 ;另一方面 ,要看到它们之间还存在相互合作、交流和学习、借鉴的关系。这两个方面不能偏废。     

资本逻辑视域下的资本主义演变规律

在资本主义发展演变中起着支配作用的资本逻辑存在着两种不同的增殖模式:一种是只顾眼前增殖不顾长远后果的非理性模式,另一种是兼顾短期利益与长远利益、着眼于可持续增殖的理性模式。在资本主义产生之初,非理性模式占主导地位。随着资本主义在曲折中不断发展,资本逻辑的理性模式逐渐显现,其对资本主义发展的影响也不断增大。在资本逻辑的这两种模式的交互作用下,资本主义逐渐从非理性走向理性。     

Competitive Intelligence Management in Knowledge Economy

This paper is to discuss management of competitive Intelligence （CI） from the viewpoint of knowledge management, in which the author creatively uses adapted SECI model to make explanation, and points out the different roles played by individual and organization in this process. At the end of this paper, some implications are given in respect with some fundamental problems with application of individual knowledge and organizational knowledge resulting from their idiosyncrasy, and orientation for CI management.     

正确看待当代资本主义的变与不变

当代资本主义不同于以往的资本主义,它出现了许多新特点和新变化。其主要表现在生产力、生产关系和上层建筑等方面。这是在特定的国内外经济和政治条件的作用下实现的。这意味着它仍具有相当大的发展潜力和生命力。同时还要看到,当代资本主义的种种新特点和新变化没有触动资本主义统治的根基,没有改变资本主义的基本特征,没有消除资本主义的内在矛盾,其本质及必然灭亡的历史趋势没有也不可能改变。