Managing Complexity Through Methodic Participation: The Case of Air Quality in Santiago,Chile

Three concrete results have been achieved over a 5-year period in Santiago, Chile, in a process addressed to managing through participation the difficult air quality situation of this 5-million-person metropolis: (1) a highly complex problem has become manageable, (2) a legitimate and effective Prevention and Decontamination Plan is in operation, and (3) citizens and the government are mutually committed to this process. This paper describes how these results have been achieved by applying Innovative Development, a social systems methodology developed by the author and co-workers and applied in many fields over the last 20 years. Following a review of the problem and results that have been achieved, an explanation is offered for why a participative methodology is necessary for dealing with a highly complex problem like the current one. The fourth section provides a brief outline of the Innovative Development methodology. The last section presents the case itself, describing three stages. In the short space available we have tried to balance the practical, methodological, and conceptual issues of this case and this approach.     

BBS虚拟社区的演化规律探索及仿真

结合复杂网络理论对BBS中虚拟社区网络的演化规律进行了研究.首先,通过BBS版块的数据信息构建有向虚拟社区网络,研究了网络拓扑结构特性的演化,包括新增结点数和边数、度分布的幂指数、网络结构熵等随时间变化的规律,发现网络从"有序"到"无序"再到"稳定有序"的变化过程,并且在此类社区网络中存在富人俱乐部现象.然后,基于BBS版块虚拟社区的演化规律,提出了一种虚拟社区网络构造模型.该模型方法的仿真结果与真实虚拟社区网络演化特性相符,在一定程度上能解释虚拟社区的演化规律,具有很强的实际意义.     

Community Organizations in Venezuela: Toward the Disintegration of the Modern State and the Emergence of a Community Organized Society?

This paper argues that Venezuelan community organizations (COs) are playing a substantial role in the building of a new social order in which elements such as rights, equity, and justice are being displaced from a universal narrative toward more local narratives. This displacement is enwrapped in a discourse on the political participation of citizens in the running of public affairs, which implies a redefinition of the role of COs and the state beyond the usually accepted sphere of COs. The need to unfold the sense of COs thus becomes paramount for understanding our present and its current manifestations of an epochal change.     

自然灾害与湖北地方社会——以《潜江旧闻录》为中心

明清时期，地处江汉平原的潜江自然灾害特别是洪涝灾害频仍，灾害影响了潜江的人口发展，制约了农业经济与城镇的发展，并带来了流民、田地不清等社会问题。     

喜鹊在山地次生林中鸟类群落组织结构形成的作用

通过山地次生林鸟类群落组织结构的研究,表明喜鹊在鸟类群落组织形成中是关键类群之一.关键类群是通过巢地资源的被利用来实现的.5年中,利用喜鹊巢繁殖的鸟类达5种,利用率为25%~40.7%.     

Terrestrial isopods and myriapods in a forested scree slope: subterranean biodiversity,depth gradient and annual dynamics

Diversity, depth distribution and seasonal activity of isopods and myriapods were studied using subterranean traps buried in a forested limestone scree slope in the ?ierna Hora Mts, Western Carpathians, Slovakia, throughout the depth gradient from 5 to 95 cm. A total of five isopod, 13 diplopod and 11 chilopod species were identified. Most edaphic species strongly preferred the uppermost organic soil layers. Among the species captured, some represented rare stenoecous Carpathian endemics, namely the isopod Trichoniscus carpaticus, and diplopods Julus curvicornis and Leptoiulus mariae. Others were subterranean forms, partly adapted to hypogean conditions: the isopod Mesoniscus graniger, and diplopods Mecogonopodium carpathicum and Trachysphaera costata. The annual activity in the vast majority of the species ceased completely in winter, and was gradually relaunched in spring. In evaluating the age structure of two predominant diplopods Polydesmus denticulatus and Mecogonopodium carpathicum, both widespread across the depth gradient, a vertical segregation of early post-embryonic stages was found. While P. denticulatus tended to undergo the early stages of development in the soil-filled topmost levels, the early juvenile stage of M. carpathicum was distributed deep in the scree slope profile.     

Scientists and their cultural heritage: Knowledge,politics and ambivalent relationships

For many years, scientific heritage has received attention from multiple actors from different spheres of activity—archives, museums, scientific institutions. Beyond the heterogeneity revealed when examining the place of scientific heritage in different places, an authentic patrimonial configuration emerges and takes the form of a nebula of claims and of accomplishments that result, in some cases, in institutional and political recognition at the national level, in various country all around the world. At the international level, the creation of the international committee dedicated to University Museums and Collections (UMAC) within the International Council of Museums (ICOM) certainly testified from this raising interest in academic heritage and the existence of a specific community concern with it.This article presents numerous initiatives for the preservation of scientific heritage in France, with the goal of analysing the relationship scientists have with their heritage. We argue that scientific communities have a special relationship with heritage, which is characterized by a number of ambiguities. We show that such ambivalences allow analysis of identity, discipline, professional, and social issues operative in defining heritage and being redefined by heritage. To explore these dimensions, we have chosen to present three different case studies. The first traces the institutional uses of heritage by a scientific institution, the Commissariat à l’énergie atomique (CEA), through the transformation of the first French atomic reactor (ZOE) into a museum. The second example describes the initiatives of French astronomers from the mid-1990s to construct a national programme for the protection of astronomy heritage. Lastly, we recount the case of universities, with the example of the Université de Strasbourg.     

Notes on astogeny of some Petraliellidae (Bryozoa) from Australia

Members of the bryozoan family Petraliellidae share the capacity to develop basal rhizoids, which anchor the unilaminar, semi-repent parts of the colonies above the substratum, and enable them to overgrow other, competing sessile forms. Little is known of the larval behaviour and settlement, or the early astogeny of species. Ancestrulate colonies of the Australian Tertiary lunulitiform species Smittia biincisa are referred to the genus Riscodopa, and together with Riscodopa paucipora sp. nov. are described and compared with the Recent species R. cotyla and R. parva from New Zealand, and with R. hyalina sp. nov. from New South Wales, Australia. All the Recent species are known to develop basal rhizoids, and an early astogeny similar to that of many other small, rooted bryozoans, comprising the post-metamorphosis development of a binary complex, including rhizoid and feeding elements, is inferred for Riscodopa. Observations on living Hippopetraliella magna from Queensland suggest that both the ancestrular morphology and early astogeny show a capacity for semi-repent growth, even though they do not include rhizoid development. Larvae metamorphose without direct attachment, and the ancestrula develops elongated, partially calcified supporting processes, which raise the early stages of growth above the substratum. A similar kind of ancestrula has been found in preserved specimens of Mucropetraliella ellerii.     

The first instar larva of Aulacoscelis appendiculata n. sp. (Coleoptera: Chrysomelidae: Aulacoscelinae) and its value in the placement of the Aulacoscelinae

Of all of the chrysomelid subfamilies, only the larvae of the Aulacoscelinae remain undescribed. The adults and first instar larva of Aulacoscelis appendiculata sp. n., from Panama are described, as well as the eggs. Larval characters, eggs, and oviposition behaviour are used to relatethe Aulacoscelinae with other chrysomelid subfamilies, in support of what is known to date concerning adult morphology.