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Indonesia 2010 : The Misfortunes of Virtue Devoted to the year 2010, this chronicle emphasizes another Indonesian paradox : while the archipelago is on the way to economic success against the backdrop of a stable democracy meant to be virtuous, it still has to deal with the continuing prevalence of structural evils : corruption, religious tensions and the vanity of ruling elites. The desire of doing good is thwarted by the unfortunate excesses of reformist zeal, as illustrated among others by the case of the president vs the sultan.
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This article examines the evolution of the institution of the trust from its inception in the Middle Ages, associated with the development of English law, to its use in the field of international law, in particular in international environmental law, mainly through environmental trust funds used to finance the adhesion of developing countries and transition economies to higher standards of environmental protection. In this context, the most remarkable example, the Global Environment Facility, corresponds to a special type of trust whose ultimate beneficiaries are the international community and the future generations.
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With 28000 tourists in 1998, the Islamic Federal Republic of the Comoros is a very secondary tourist destination. The interest to analyse it holds in the fact that, in a comparative step, it corresponds at a preliminary stage of the process of setting in tourism of the intertropical islands, with a concentration of the occupancy on the main island and a low diversity of the tourist places.
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Sovereign Funds and the Big French Companies.The appearance of sovereign funds in the French economy – though still small – must be considered as a positive fact. The main concern should be the risk of a lack of their interest in the investment opportunities of the French economy rather than that of a massive inflow of funds. The big French companies own major assets to attract them and have them associated to their growth. On the whole, the attractiveness strategy to implement must rely first on the main economic agents but also on a sound politico economic diplomacy targeting these funds. Another important point is trying to have a French influence in these funds’ management teams. Classification JEL : F30, G21, G28.
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Land, Peasants and Economic Power — Greece, 18th-20th century. After obtaining its independence in 1830, the new Greek State converted all Ottoman estates into "National Lands". The notables and merchants were neither much interested nor allowed to buy them, but kept their traditional control on taxfarming, trade and credit. The peasants kept their holdings and were allowed to expand to rented and illegally occupied public land. Meanwhile, traditional clientelism blended with early parliamentary democracy and universal male suffrage; and the peasants became a formidable electoral force. Such conditions favoured negotiation, compromise and privilege-sharing between the two politically dominant classes. The Bourgeoisie enjoyed tax-haven legislature, large subsidized credits, and unconditional protectionism, abandoning tax-farming and agricultural credit to the State. The Peasantry peacefully obtained land, tax, and credit reform, product subsidies and cancellation of debts — and this in just over eighty years (1871-1955). The lower urban classes, under- represented in Parliament, paid the bill through heavy taxes and waves of inflation. Their discontent was diverted to chauvinist and populist ideologies; contained through social mobility, civil service recruitments or other spoils; and occasionally suppressed by authoritarian regimes, brief and relatively mild. The interwar crises and World War II reversed this unstable equilibrium and led to a period of conflict and instability.
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2008 was a contrasted year when the rise of oil prices made it difficult for president Yudhoyono to manage the economy properly as a few months later the financial bubble burst, giving way to a serious downturn. Facing the prospect of the 2009 general and presidential elections, political actors prepared for the contest. While muslim parties seemed unable to present candidates against Yudhoyono and Megawati, they could advance some of their own agendas : under their pressure the Ahmadiyah sect was virtually banned and the anti pornography bill was eventually voted in parliament. Yudhoyono dealt with these challenges by making compromises, yielding to principles of realpolitik.
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On the causality of a shortcoming : why is the Arab world not democratic?The absence of democratie practice or even demands for democracy in the Arab world has been explained in varions ways : culture, religion, economy or even foreign influence. There is no single explanation that fits about 20 countries, unless through an insertion of such factors in a historic reading of the closing century in which the beginnings of democratization have been intimately tied to the domination of those who claimed to « export » their democratic model. That was the first liberal phase. The second, which followed independence, was marked by the national political elites' incapacity to defend that political regime and by their tendency to use it as a means for political individuation and wealth mostly in real estate. If there is now an opportunity for democratization, its bases should be sought in the crises of regimes unable to carry out the social promises of the politically authoritarian and economically dirigiste state of the nationalist era. There is a need to legitimize protest, but also to make a clearer distinction between the nationalist-type daims, which retain their validity, and the regimes which have established authoritarianism while pretending to answer those daims.
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