Zeitschriftenartikel zum Thema „Mortgages (German law)“

Kirsten Lylloff: The Struggle on the German schools in Denmark after 1945 In 1945 there were 58 private and 31 public German schools in Southern Jutland [private school and public school are defined following US-standards], all founded after the reunion of the former German region with Denmark in 1920, and one private German school in Copenhagen founded in 1575.Since Hitler’s seizure of power in 1933 a part of the German minority in Southern Jutland openly opposed the Danish hegemony, demanding return of the region to Germany, and part of the Danish majority feared, as a consequence of Germany’s rising power, a German reacquisition of the region, especially after the German occupation of Denmark in 1940. During the occupation 9 new private German schools were build and 10 of the older buildings restored, and the budgets, which always had been partly subsidized from Germany, were raised. Germany’s payment to the schools was drawn on the German-Danish clearing account, which at the end of the war showed a huge deficit for the Danes.With the German surrender 1945 the time was ripe for revenge for the Danish majority, and as a consequence all German schools in Southern Jutland were closed in the summer of 1945.From January 1946 special classes for German-speaking pupils were established in some of the public schools, but it was no success, partly because of local opposition from the Danish majority, and the classes were suspended in the summer of 1946. The private German schools were allowed to reopen from January 1946, but two other post-war laws, which weren’t intended to harm the German schools, in fact closed the schools, as the laws led to the confiscation of the school buildings. The first law resulted in the confiscation of all German property in Denmark. Because mortgages in some of the school buildings were owned by German juridical persons, the Danish custodian for German property seized the mortgages and required them redeemed. The second law intended to force Danish firms, which have had an unreasonable high profit by trading with and servicing the Germans, to repay to the Danish state the excess profit. It meant that the schools were asked to repay all the payments received over the German-Danish clearing account, and as they of course weren’t able to do this, the buildings were confiscated as security. The Danish public school only had the capacity to absorb 1⁄3 of the pupils from the German schools, and for that reason a large part of the children from the German minority couldn’t attend school until after the summer of 1946, where they were allowed entrance to the public school.The German school in Copenhagen, Sankt Petri School, wasn’t exposed to the same national hatred towards all Germans as the schools in Southern Jutland, even though a considerable part of the pupils were German citizens. The reason was probable, that the school was “less visible” in the Copenhagen environment, than the German schools in Southern Jutland. Sankt Petri School had drawn considerable larger amounts from the German-Danish clearing account than all the German schools in Southern Jutland together, most of it used to build a new prestigious school building in Copenhagen, the rest used to salaries to the teachers.Sankt Petri School wasn’t closed, but managed to hold on with a few pupils and by subordinating to the Danish demand, that teaching and examination were done in Danish.At last in 1949 the social democratic government was able to push through, that Sankt Petri School’s debt to the Danish state was eliminated, and from 1959 the school was again allowed to teach and examine in German. In 1949 too, the government allowed that German private schools in Southern Jutland reacquired 13 school buildings. But pupils were not allowed to pass exams, which were meritorious to further education in Denmark, and they were under strict supervision of the local authorities, – the supervision was eventually lifted in 1952.In 1955 the Danish Prime Minister H. C. Hansen and the German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer agreed on the Copenhagen-Bonn Declaration, concerning minority-rights on both sides of the German-Danish border. In this agreement German private schools in Southern Jutland were permitted to pass exams to their pupils, giving them right to further education in Denmark. That was the end of the struggle, equality between German and Danish private schools was a fact. But the struggle had been expensive for the German minority. The number of pupils has never since reached the heights of the period 1920–1945.Especially the social democrats Hartvig Frisch and H. C. Hansen were at the forefront in reestablishing the German schools, the strongest opposition coming from the political parties, Danmarks Kommunistiske Parti and Dansk Samling. Most of the Danish majority in Southern Jutland and a considerable part of the civil servants were against a reopening of the German schools, but the high ranking civil servants in the ministries followed the intentions of the various governments and did what they were told to do by their ministers, whether they were for or against reopening of German schools.

Abstract: The following paper deals with the national law in England, Scotland and Germany governing real securities over land. After an introduction (under I) a short outline over the generally possible interests in land and their protection within the three considered legal systems follows (under II) to allow a better understanding of some special terms. A brief comparison concludes this overview. In the main part (under III) the different types and contents of real securities over land are shown, compared and discussed. Especially their technical construction (under 1), the English equitable mortgages and charges over legal interests in land (under 2), other rights in land, such as the English equitable interests in land, as security (under 3) and the possibility of a conveyance of land as security (under 4) are examined. Here it is focused especially on the law?s consideration of the arising practical needs and interests of mortgagor/chargor and mortgagee/chargee as well as on the systematical clearness of the law. In the final conclusion (under IV) it is pointed out that within the rules governing real securities over land there are similarities as well as differences between the three legal systems. However the differences partly result from general phenomena which are sometimes deeply rooted in the legal system. Since their harmonisation does not seem probable in the near future the creation of a special international ?land charge or mortgage? is finally recommended.

“Should bankers be publicly hanged for what they have done?” During a visit to Abu Dhabi in March 2009, the author came upon this sarcastic question while reading the well-known United Arab Emirates' journal “The National.” The aforesaid question was part of an interview with Paul Koster, chief executive of the Dubai Financial Services Authority, concerning the financial crisis. He answered in the negative by saying, “There will be court cases, but public hanging is a bit extreme.” His statement has, in a way, anticipated the result of the paper at hand: There should be criminal proceedings in Germany as well; however, they should not result in draconian criminal consequences.

Relevance. For many years in the Russian Federation there has been a steady growth in mortgage lending, which makes it especially important to find ways to improve the legal regulation of mortgage legal relations on the basis of analysis of domestic and foreign experience in this area. Mortgage lending is the most important source of funds for purchasing real estate by citizens of the Russian Federation and foreign countries. In this connection, legal regulation of relations connected with such lending requires continuous development based on a balanced consideration of the interests of debtors and creditors as participants in mortgage legal relations. The analysis of foreign experience in the regulation of mortgage legal relations, including the experience accumulated and fixed in the German legislation, is most important for the solution of this problem. The purpose of the study is to develop theoretical provisions aimed at improving the legal regulation of mortgage legal relations in order to protect the rights of their participants. Objectives: to reveal features of legal regulation of relations connected with granting mortgage loans and pro-tection of rights of their recipients in German legislation; to investigate features of providing balance of interests of mortgage debtors and creditors in German legislation; to determine directions of further development of legal regulation of the considered questions. Methodology. The author relied on the dialectical-materialistic method, the systematic method, methods of analysis and synthesis, the formal-legal method. The results of the research are are of theoretical and applied nature and are aimed at improving the quality of legal regulation of civil relations. Conclusions. The conclusions made in the article are of debatable character, directed to the continuation of researches within the framework of the declared subject, directed to the development of the basic principles allowing uniformly to solve the problems connected with development of legal regulation of questions of mortgage crediting in the Russian Federation taking into account foreign experience. The article is a continuation of the author's research on the issues related to the legal regulation of mortgage lending in the Russian Federation and abroad.

The article presents the basic solutions to be applied in the so-called annuity real rights. These are limited real rights (iura in rem), which permit obtaining certain revenues from real property on a regular basis. Their essential purpose is to secure specified periodical benefits, primarily those of a pecuniary nature. These rights show some similarities, on the one hand, to pledge-type rights (especially mortgage) and, on the other hand, to easements. Currently, no annuity real charges of any kind have been regulated under the Polish civil law (since the entry of the Civil Code into force in 1965), as they were perceived, albeit incorrectly, as a reminiscence of the epoch of feudalism. However, they are still popular in other European civil law legislations, for example in the German, Swiss, Austrian, Spanish, Czech, Estonian, Slovenian or Croatian laws. The prototype for this category of rights is the real burden (German: Reallast). This paper presents various solutions for the latter institution as well as related institutions, such as the Swiss “annuity letter” (German: Gült, French: lettre de rente) and the German annuity land charge (German: Rentengrundschuld). Different concepts for the legal nature of the annuity rights have been presented, in particular the German real burden, which formed the basis for proposals of solutions in the work of the Polish Civil Law Codification Committee at the beginning of the 21st century. The potential usefulness of the real burden rights indicated in this article confirms the legitimacy of introducing this type of legal institution into the Polish law.

Since the 1960s, there has been discussion regarding the introduction of a flexible real estate pledge law in Europe that could serve to ensure security above all for cross-border loans. Although this issue is not currently undergoing detailed analysis, due to a number of significant changes in variousEuropean legislations, including in Polish law, anticipating new solutions in mortgage law, it is worth considering anew whether they and which ones might constitute a possible model for future security in rem in European Union law. The first section of the article outlines the historical background of solutions breaking with the Roman model of accessory pledge rights, and presents a few selected modern mortgage systems, in which there has been a significant departure from the principle of pendency of collateral security on real estate above all the German, Slovenia, Swiss, French, Estonian and Hungarian systems. Slovenian practice may be taken as an example of solutions that have not worked out in practice due to abuses related to the establishing of a non-accessory pledge right to the detriment of creditors seeking the satisfaction of other debts from the property of the owner of the encumbered property.

After establishing the general legal framework for international bankruptcies, and then examining the competence of the forum state to open bankruptcy proceedings, and the effects recognised by the forum state in relation to a foreign bankruptcy, the present report tries to provide a brief overview of the fate reserved for security rights, whether rights in rem, created by statute (legal mortgage, privilege), or contractual, as well as rights of preference (right of retention, or compensation), in the context of an international bankruptcy under German, English, Belgian, Canadian, Greek, French, Italian, Japanese, Dutch, North American, Swedish and Yugoslavian law.

Institutions that provide credit to consumers have usually included a clause in the loan documentation that allows the credit provider to unilaterally amend the applicable interest rate. Over the past years, these clauses and the way they have been used has come under increased scrutiny. This article charts a number of relevant developments and identifies focus points for the future. Under Dutch law, consumers claim that these clauses are unreasonably onerous and should be invalidated. Dutch courts have to take into account the supranational origin of this provision. The Dutch Hoge Raad (Supreme Court) has given some guidance on the assessment of such clauses in consumer mortgage loans, but has given no principled ruling. In the assessment of the unfairness of an interest rate amendment clause, it is key whether the negative consequences for consumers of these clauses are balanced by the consumer’s contractual rights. Setting aside an interest rate amendment clause can have far reaching consequences, especially if the contract cannot survive without this clause. While the Dutch landscape is still evolving, the German Bundesgerichtshof (Federal Court of Justice) solves this through supplementary interpretation of the contract. It is debatable whether this practice is compatible with European Court of Justice (ECJ) case law. In conclusion, it is noted that the discussion about the unfairness of interest rate amendment clauses should take place in the wider context of both interpretation of the clause and the banks’ duty of care when supplying revolving consumer loans.

Abstract: In Comparative and European Property law, there is a clear need for studies into the fundamental basis of the legal systems in Europe. One part of this fundamental basis is the creation and extinction of property rights. One of the most interesting elements of this subject and the reason for this article is the idea of concurrence of the right of ownership and a limited property right burdening that same right of ownership held by the same person. This possibility is not recognized in every legal system. In the discussion on the development of a European property law, this fundamental question and the differing treatments it receives in various European legal systems are very vital. Very interestingly, the argumentation used in German, French, Dutch and English law is very similar but reaches different results. The possibility of holding a property right and ownership over the same object is recognized in German law, but generally not in Dutch, French and English law. Only when the position of third parties is taken into account some convergence between the various approaches to this problem can be reached. The European Commission, when working on property law proposals such as a possible right of Euro-Mortgage, other property security rights, but also in the area of EU consumer law, should therefore take these doctrinal differences and similarities between these four Member States into account. Résumé: Il existe en droit comparé et en droit européen de la propriété un besoin évident d’approfondir les bases fondamentales des systèmes de droit en Europe. Une partie de cette base fondamentale concerne l’acquisition et l’extinction des droits réels. L’un des éléments les plus intéressants sur ce sujet, objet de cet article, est l’idée de concours entre le droit de propriété (right of ownership) et un droit réel limité (limited property right) grevant ce même droit de propriété, détenus par la même personne. Cette possibilité n’est pas reconnue dans tous les systèmes de droit. Dans la discussion sur le développement d’un droit européen de la propriété, cette question fondamentale, ainsi que les différents traitements reçus dans les divers systèmes de droit sont d’une extrême importance. Il est très intéressant de constater que l’argumentation utilisée en droit allemand, français, néerlandais et anglais est très similaire, mais aboutit à des résultats différents. La possibilité de détenir un droit réel (holding a property right) et un droit de propriété (ownership) sur le même objet est reconnue en droit allemand, mais généralement pas en droit néerlandais, français et anglais. C’est seulement lors de la prise en compte de la position des tiers que certaines convergences apparaissent entre les différentes approches de ce problème. La Commission européenne, lorsqu’elle travaille sur des propositions concernant le droit de la propriété tel qu’une éventuelle euro-hypothèque, d’autres droits de sûretés, mais aussi le droit européen de la consommation, devrait donc prendre en considération les différences et similitudes doctrinales entre ces quatre États Membres.

Forfeiture of property is one of the oldest penalties in Polish law. Its origins can be traced in pre-state law, in the penalty of exclusion from tribe. Anybody could kill a person thus punished and destroy his property, and would suffer no penalty for such acts. Later on, in early Middle Ages, the penalty of plunder was introduced: the offender’s possessions were looted, and his house burned. Destruction of the offender’s property as a penal sanction resulted from the conception of crime and punishment of that time. Crime was an offence against God, and punishment was seen as God’s revenge for crime – that offender’s house was destroyed as the place that had become unchaste, inhabited by an enemy of God. The penalties imposed in Poland in the 12th and 13th centuries were personal, material, and mixed penalties. There were two material penalties: forfeiture of the whole or part of property and pecuniary penalties. The utmost penalty was being outlawed which consisted of banishment of the convicted person from the country and forfeiture of his property by the ruler. Being outlawed was imposed for the most serious offences; with time, it became an exceptional penalty. In those days, forfeiture of property was a self-standing, as well as an additional penalty, imposed together with death, banishment, or imprisonment. As shown by the sources of law, forfeiture of property (as an additional penalty) could be imposed for “conspiracy against state” rape of a nun forgery of coins, cheating at games, and profiteering. Other offences punishable in this way included murder, raid with armed troops and theft of Church property, murder of a Jew committed by a Christian, and raid of a Jewish cemetery. Data on the extent of the imposition of that penalty in the early feudal period are scarce; as follows from available sources, it was applied but seldom. The consequences of forfeiture were serious in those days. Deprived of property, the convicted person and his family inevitably lost their social and political status which made forfeiture one of the most severe penalties. From the viewpoint of the punishing authority (duke), forfeiture was clearly advantageous due to its universal feasibility; to the duke’s officials, it was profitable as they were entitled to plunder the convicted persons’s movables. In the laws of the 16th and 17th centuries, forfeiture was provided for: serious political crimes (crimen leaesae maiestatis – laese-majesty; perduelio – desertion to the enemy), offences against currency and against the armed forces. As an additional penalty, it accompanied capital punishment and being outlawed. The law also provided for situations where forfeiture could be imposed as a self-standing penalty. In 1573, the Warsaw Confederacy Act which guaranteed equality to confessors of different religions banned the inposition of forfeiture for conversion to another faith. Initially absolute – the whole of property being forfeited and taken over by the Treasury where it was at the king’s free disposal – forfeiture of property was limited already in the 14th century. To begin with, in consideration of the rights of the family and third to forfeited property, the wife’s dowry was excluded from forfeiture. Later on, in the 16th century, the limitations concerned the king’s freedom of disposal of forfeited property. A nobleman’s property could no longer remain in the king’s hands but had to be granted to another nobleman. Forfeiture of property can also be found in the practice of Polish village courts; as follows from court registers, though, it was actually seldom imposed. European Enlightenment was the period of emergence of ideas which radically changed the conceptions of the essence and aims of punishment, types of penalties, and the policy of their imposition. In their writings, penologists of those days formulated the principle of the offender’s individual responsibility. This standpoint led to a declaration against forfeiture of property as a penalty which affected not only the offender but also his family and therefore expressed collective responsibility. The above ideas were known in Poland as well. They are reflected in the numerous drafts of penal law reform, prepared in 18th century Poland. The first such draft, so-called Collection of Jidicial Laws by Andrzej Zamojski, still provided for forfeiture. A later one (draft code of King Stanislaw August of the late 18th century) no longer contained this penalty. The athors argued that, affecting not only the offender, that penalty was at variance with the principles of justice. The drafts were never to become the law. In 1794, after the second partition of Poland, an insurrection broke out commanded by Tadeusz Kościuszko. The rebel authorities repealed the former legal system and created a new system of provisions regulating the structure of state authorities, administration of justice, and law applied in courts. In the sphere of substantive penal law and the law of criminal proceedings, an insurgent code was introduced, with severe sanctions included in the catalog of penalties. Forfeiture of property was restored which had a double purpose: first, acutely to punish traitors, and second – to replenish the insurgent funds. When imposing forfeiture, property rights of the convicted person’s spouse and his children’s right to inheritance were taken into account. Yet compared to the administration of justice of the French Revolution with its mass imposition of forfeiture, the Polish insurgent courts were humane and indeed lenient in their practice of sentencing. After the fall of the Kościuszko Insurrection, Poland became a subjugated country, divided between three partitioning powers: Prussia, Russia, and Austria. The Duchy of Warsaw, made of the territories regained from the invaders, survived but a short time. In the sphere of penal law and the present subject of forfeiture of property, that penalty was abolished by a separate parliamentary statute of 1809. After the fall of the Duchy of Warsaw, Poland lost sovereignty and the law of the partitioning powers entered into force on its territories. In the Prussian sector, a succession of laws were introduced: the Common Criminal Law of Prussian States of 1794, followed by the 1851 penal code and the penal code of the German Reich of 1871. Only the first of them still provided for forfeiture: it was abolished in the Prussian State by a law of March 11, 1850. Much earlier, forfeiture disappeared from the legislation of Austria. lt was already absent from the Cpllection of Laws on Penalties for West Galicia of June 17,1796, valid on the Polish territories under Austrian administration. Nor was forfeiture provided for by the two Austrian penal codes of 1803 and 1852. Forfeiture survived the longest in the penal legisation of Russia. In 1815, the Kingdom of Poland was formed of the Polish territories under Russian administration. In its Constitution, conferred by the Tsar of Russia, a provision was included that abolished forfeiture of property. It was also left in the subsequent Penal Code of the Kingdom of Poland, passed in 1818. Forfeiture only returned as a penal sanction applied to participants of the anti-Russian November insurrection of 1831. The Organic Statute of 1832, conferred to the Kingdom of Poland by the Tsar, reintroduced the penalty of forfeiture of property. Moreover, it was to be imposed for offences committed before Organic Statute had entered into force which was an infringement of the ban on retroactive force of law. Of those sentenced to forfeiture in the Kingdom of Poland, Lithuania, and Russia as participants of the November insurrection, few had estates and capital. A part of forfeited estates were donated, the rest were sold to persons of Russian origin. The proces of forfeiting the property of the 1830–1831 insurgents only ended in 1860 (the Tsar’s decree of February 2/March 2,1860). After November insurrection, the Russian authorities aimed at making the penal legislation of the Kingdom of Poland similar to that of the Russian Empire. The code of Main Corrective Penalties of 1847 aimed first of all at a legal unification. It preserved the penalty of “forfeiture of the whole or part of the convicted persons’ possessions and property” as an additional penalty imposed in cases clearly specified by law. It was imposed for offences against the state: attempts against the life, health, freedom or dignity of the Emperor and the supreme rights of the heir to the throne, the Emperor’s wife or other members of the Royal House, and rebellion against the supreme authority. Forfeiture was preserved in the amended code of 1866; in 1876, its application was extended to include offences against official enactments. The penalty could soon be applied – towards the participants of January insurrection of 1863 which broke out in the Russian Partition. The insurgents were tried by Russian military courts. After the January insurrection, 6,491 persons were convicted in the Kingdom of Poland; 6,186 of tchem were sentenced to forfeiture of property. Of that group, as few as 28 owned the whole or a part of real estate; 60 owned mortgage capital and real estate. The imposition of forfeiture on January insurgents stopped in 1867 in the Kingdom of Poland and as late as 1873 in Lithuania. The penalty was only removed from the Russian penal legislation with the introduction a new penal code in 1903. As can be seen, the Russian penal law – as opposed to the law of Prussia and Austria retained forfeiture of property the longest. It was designet to perform special political and deterrent functions as the penalty imposed on opponents of the system for crimes against state. It was severe enough to annihilate the offender’s material existence. It was also intended to deter others, any future dare-devils who might plan to resist authority. It was an fitted element of the repressive criminal policy of the Russian Empire of those days. Forfeiture of the whole of property of the convicted person can be found once again in the Polish legislation, of independent Poland this time: in the Act of July 2, 1920 on controlling war usury where forfeiture was an optional additional penalty. At the same time, the act prohibited cumulation of repression affecting property (fine and forfeiture could not be imposed simultaneously). It originated from the special war conditions in Poland at the time. The ban on cumulation of repression affecting property is interesting from the viewpoint of criminal policy. The Polish penal code of 1932 did not provide for the penalty of forfeiture, and the Act on controlling war usury was quashed by that code’s introductory provisions. In the legislation of People’s Poland after World War II, forfeiture of property was re-established and had extensive application.

AbstractUp to now Herman Becker, one of the people who lent Rembrandt money in the straitened circumstances of the last years of his life, has had a bad press as an art-dealer who owed his wealth and influence to the exploitation of artists (Notes 1, 2). It is now possible to correct this image on the basis of recent research in the Amsterdam archives. Becker was born around 1617 and the supposition that he came from Riga in Latvia is borne out by the facts that he had contacts there, that his father Willem certainly lived there between 1640 and 1650 and that the words 'of or 'to' Riga appear in some documents after his name. His commercial activities certainly go back to 1635 (note 6) and from the earliest records of him in Amsterdam in the 1640s, it is clear that he was a merchant and that he also chartered ships. At this period he further invested money in shares and engaged in a certain amount of moneylending, while he is also mentioned as his father's agent. That financially he was almost certainly in a sound osition by the end of the 1640s is clear from the fact that in 1648 he gave a surety for the merchant Gerard Pelgrom, who was in debt to the Dutch East India Company. That same year he concluded an agreement with the merchant Abraham de Visscher to sell sailcloth for him in Riga. In the 1650s Becker strengthened his financial position and again engaged in moneylending. In 1653 he made a large loan to Johannes de Renialme, an art lover and dealer, and at the time of the latter's death in 1657 his debt to Becker was even larger, while the inventory of his estate mentions nine paintings, including three by Jan Lievens and one by Philips de Koninck, which were mortgaged to Becker along with some jewelry. From the autumn of 1653 Becker spent a considerable time in Riga, but he was certainly back in Amsterdam in 1658. In 1659 he married Anna Maria Vertangen, the widow of his former business contact Gerard Pelgrom, who had died in 1657. This marriage brought Becker two large houses on Keizersgracht, where he moved in June 1659. That he was a Lutheran emerges from records of the baptisms of two of his three children at the Lutheran church in Amsterdam. His wife died shortly after the birth of theyoungest child and was buried in the Oude Kerk on 9 November 1661. By her will Becker was granted usufruct of all her property until his death, on condition that he did not remarry. This increase in his means led to a change of direction in his activities in the 1660s and a growth in the scale and scope of his moneylending. Becker's library (see Appendix I) The list of books in Becker's inventory amounts to 285 titles, a not inconsiderable library by 17th-century standards (Note 26). Their diversity indicates that, though clearly an educated man, he was not a scholar, while they were not arranged under subjects, like a scholar's library, but according to sizes. The presence of works in Latin indicates that Becker must have been educated at a Latin or grammar school, but the large number of German titles point to his coming from the influential German elite, which had long dominated the city government, trade and the guilds in Riga and part of which, like Becker, was Evangelical Lutheran by religion. Books on religion and theology formed a third of the 145 books of which the titles are given, followed by histories and chronicles, classical literature, law, poetry, medicine, physics and astronomy. Contacts with artists In the 1660s Becker continued his shipping interest, but now also invested in property, building a house next to the two others on Keizersgracht in 1665. He also continued to lend money, now for the first time to artists. Rembrandt is known to have owed three sums of money to Becker: 537 guilders borrowed in December 1662 at 5% interest, 450 guilders borrowed in March 1663 against a pledge, and an obligation to Lodewijck van Ludick which was sold to Becker early in 1664 (Notes 31,32). Difficulties over repayment probably arose in the first two instances over disagreement as to the conditions of the loans. On 29 August 1665 the apothecary Abraham Francken declared in a sworn statement that he had ofered the amount due, plus the interest, to Becker at Rembrandt's request, but that Becker had refused to accept it, because Rembrandt first had to finish a Juno and also had to do something else for him. Rembrandt appears to have threatened legal action, but in any case the matter was settled on 6 October 1665 when Becker accepted the payment and returned the pledge, in the form of nine paintings and two (constprint boecken'. What happened to the Juno is not clear. A Juno by Rembrandt is listed in Becker's inventory and it is generally assumed that the Juno in the Armand Hammer Foundation in Los Angeles is the one mentiorted in the statemertt and the inventory. That it is certainly the one in the statement would seem to be justified by the fact that it appears to be unfinished (Notes 37,38). The sale of the obligation to Lodewijck van Ludick to Becker is attested in statements of 31 December 1664 by Abraham Francken and the poet-cum-dyer Thomas Asselyn, the latter declaring that it was bought for textiles to the value of 500 guilders. Three years later Rembrandt had still not paid the debt and the case was brought before an arbitration commission. In the commission's findings of 24 July 1668 the extent of the debt was settled at 1082 guilders, two-thirds of which had to be paid in cash, while the rest was to be paid off in six months in the form of drawings, prints or paintings. Rembrandt also agreed to pay the cash amount within six months while Becker agreed to pay Rembrandt's share of the costs. Rembrandt offered his person and possessions as surety and his son Titus also came forward as guarantor. Whether the debt was ever paid is unclear: Titus died shortly afterwards and Rembrandt about a year later (Note 42). The conditions were actually quite lenient, while Becker's admiration for Rembrandt's art is clear from the fact that he did not mind whether the debt was paid in paintings, prints or drawings. The fourteen works by Rembrandt in Becker's inventory are the largest group by a single master. Obviously Becker had a predilectionfor his work and bought it, but he did not sell it on, as has been suggested (Note 44). Two other artists who borrowed money from Becker were Frederick de Moucheron, who was given an apparently interest-free loan of a hundred guilders in August 1662 and Jan Lievens the Elder, who borrowed four hundred guilders in all between May 1667 and October 1668. By far the greatest number of loans made by Becker date from the period 1674-8, his debtors including Willem Six, Gerrit Uylenburg, Willem Blauw and Abraham van Halmael, as well as the artists Philips de Koninck, Domenicus van Tol and Antony van der Laen. The pledges for the loans are extremely varied, but paintinas often figured among them in the case of both artists and non-artists. In addition Becker also continued to invest in shipping and property. At the end of the summer of 1678 he fell seriously ill and on 16 September he was buried in the Oude Kerk. His estate at his death amounted to 200,000 guilders and it seems fairly clear that in the 1660s and 1670s his activities as a merchant had declined and he had lived mainly off the interest on loarts. Becker's collection of paintings (see Appendix II) Becker appears to have begun collecting pictures around 1660, when the increase in his means allowed it. By comparison with other collections of the day, such as those of Jan van de Cappelle (197 paintings) and Gerrit Uylenburg (95 paintings), his 231 works represent a very sizable holding (Note 63). In the case of 137 of them the name of the painter is known, the best represented artists being Rembrandt (14 works), Jan Lievens the Elder (6), Jan Lievens the Younger (10), Philips de Koninck (7), Frederick de Moucheron (5) and Rubens (3). The collection also included worksfrom Rembrandt's circle (Last-man and Bol) and from Haarlem (Brouwer, Jan de Bray, Goltzius and Cornelis van Haarlem), and in addition work by much earlier artists such as Dürer, Holbein, Lucas van Leyden and Herri met de Bles, as well as ten pictures of Italian origin. Becker certainly acquired paintings through his moneylending and he may further have had agreements like the one with Rembrandt with other artists, these actually being advantageous to both parties. However, his loans to artists were not very numerous, so he must certainly have bought a great many pictures as well. An advertisement discovered in the Oprechte Haerlems Dinsdacgse Courant of 21 March 1679 shows that Becker's art collection was sold separately from the rest of his estate. It also clearly describes him as a collector of many year's standing.No indication whatever has been found that Becker acted as an art-dealer, while his known financial transactions with artists show him to have acted fairly and in no sense can he be said to have exploited them.

ABSTRAK Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk menguji spillover effect indeks saham syariah Amerika Serikat dan Cina terhadap indeks saham syariah ASEAN dengan menggunakan metode Nonlinier Autoregressive Distributed Lag (NARDL) untuk menemukan spillover effect yang bersifat asimetris selama pandemi Covid-19. Data yang diamati dimulai pada 1 Januari 2020 sampai dengan 30 September 2021 dengan total observasi sebanyak 336 data untuk masing-masing indeks saham. Penelitian ini mendapatkan beberapa temuan. Pertama, indeks saham syariah Amerika Serikat dan Cina memiliki pengaruh asimetris jangka pendek terhadap indeks saham syariah Indonesia, Malaysia dan Thailand selama pandemi Covid-19. Kedua, indeks saham syariah Amerika Serikat dan Cina hanya memiliki pengaruh asimetris jangka panjang terhadap indeks saham syariah Malaysia selama pandemi Covid-19. Ketiga, efek ketika terjadi penurunan indeks saham syariah Amerika Serikat dan Cina lebih besar dibandingkan pada saat terjadi kenaikan terhadap indeks saham syariah Malaysia selama pandemi Covid-19. Salah satu penyebab hubungan tersebut adalah karena adanya hubungan dagang yang sangat erat antara Amerika Serikat dan Cina terhadap Malaysia. Adapun implikasi dari penelitian ini adalah investor internasional dapat menjadikan hasil penelitian ini sebagai bahan pengambilan keputusan apabila terjadi kontraksi akibat krisis seperti pada saat pandemi Covid-19 terhadap indeks saham syariah Amerika Serikat dan Cina untuk mempertahankan maupun menjual portofolio investasi mereka. Kata Kunci: Spillover, Indeks Syariah, Asimetris, Covid-19. ABSTRACT This study aims to examine the spillover effect of Islamic stock indexes of the United States and China on the ASEAN Islamic stock index using the Nonlinear Autoregressive Distributed Lag (NARDL) method to find asymmetric spillover effects during the Covid-19 pandemic. The observed data starts on January 1, 2020, until September 30, 2021, with a total of 336 observations for each stock index. This study found some findings. First, the Islamic stock indexes of the United States and China have a short-term asymmetric influence on the Islamic stock indices of Indonesia, Malaysia, and Thailand during the Covid-19 pandemic. Second, the Islamic stock indexes of the United States and China have only a long-term asymmetric influence on Malaysia's sharia stock indexes during the Covid-19 pandemic. Third, the effect when there is a decline in Islamic stock indexes of the United States and China is greater than when there is an increase in the Malaysian sharia stock index during the Covid-19 pandemic. One of the reasons for this relationship is the very close trade relationship between the United States and China with Malaysia. The research implication of this study is that international investors can use the results of this research as a decision-making material in the event of a contraction due to the crisis (one of which is the Covid-19 pandemic) in the United States and China Islamic stock indexes to maintain or sell their investment portfolios. Keywords: Spillover, Islamic Index, Asymmetric, Covid-19. DAFTAR PUSTAKA Abdullahi, S. I. (2021). Islamic equities and covid-19 pandemic: Measuring Islamic stock indices correlation and volatility in period of crisis. Islamic Economic Studies, 29(1), 50-66. https://doi.org/10.1108/IES-09-2020-0037 Aslam, F., Mohmand, Y. 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There is an old Danish fable that says that the Devil was watching when God created the earth, and that, as the creation progressed, he became increasingly agitated over the wondrous achievements he was made to witness. At the end of it all, the Devil turned to God, and said, ‘Now, watch this.’ He created Iceland. It’s a vision of the country that resembles my own. I have always thought of Iceland as the island apart. The place that came last in the earth’s construction, whoever the engineer, and so remains forever distant. Perhaps that’s because, for me, Iceland is a home far from home. It is the country that I am from, and the place to which I am always tending—in my reading, my travels, and my thoughts. But since we left when I was ten, I am only ever in Iceland for mere glimpses of the Devil’s work, and always leave wanting more, some kind of deeper involvement. Perhaps all of his temptations are like that. Iceland’s is an inverted landscape, stuck like a plug on the roof of the Earth, revealing all the violence and destruction of the layers beneath. The island expands as the tectonic plates beneath it move. It grows by ten centimetres a year, but in two different directions—one towards the States, and the other towards Europe. I have noticed something similar happening to me. Each year, the fissure is a little wider. I come to be more like a visitor, and less like the one returning to his birthplace. I last visited in February just gone, to see whether Iceland was still drifting away from me and, indeed, from the rest of the world. I was doing research in Germany, and set aside an extra week for Reykjavík, to visit friends and family, and to see whether things were really as bad as they appeared to be from Brisbane, where I have lived for most of my life. I had read countless bleak reports of financial ruin and social unrest, and yet I couldn’t suppress the thought that Iceland was probably just being Iceland. The same country that had fought three wars over cod; that offered asylum to Bobby Fischer when no-one else would take him; and that allowed Yoko Ono to occupy a small island near Reykjavík with a peace sculpture made of light. Wasn’t it always the country stuck out on its own, with a people who claimed their independent spirit, and self-reliance, as their most-prized values? No doubt, things were bad. But did Iceland really mean to tie itself closer to Europe as a way out of the economic crisis? And what would this mean for its much-cherished sense of apartness? I spent a week of clear, cold days talking to those who made up my Iceland. They all told me what I most wanted to hear—that nothing much had changed since the financial collapse in 2008. Yes, the value of the currency had halved, and this made it harder to travel abroad. Yes, there was some unemployment now, whereas before there had been none. And, certainly, those who had over-extended on their mortgages were struggling to keep their homes. But wasn’t this the case everywhere? If it wasn’t for Icesave, they said, no-one would spare a thought for Iceland. They were referring to the disastrous internet bank, a wing of the National Bank of Iceland, which had captured and then lost billions in British and Dutch savings. The result was an earthquake in the nation’s financial sector, which in recent years had come to challenge fishing and hot springs as the nation’s chief source of wealth. In a couple of months in late 2008, this sector all but disappeared, or was nationalised as part of the Icelandic government’s scrambling efforts to salvage the economy. Meanwhile, the British and Dutch governments insisted on their citizens’ interests, and issued such a wealth of abuse towards Iceland that the country must have wondered whether it wasn’t still seen, in some quarters, as the Devil’s work. At one point, the National Bank—my bank in Iceland—was even listed by the British as a terrorist organization. I asked whether people were angry with the entrepreneurs who caused all this trouble, the bankers behind Icesave, and so on. The reply was that they were all still in London. ‘They wouldn’t dare show their faces in Reykjavík.’ Well, that was new, I thought. It sounded like a different kind of anger, much more bitter than the usual, fisherman’s jealous awareness of his neighbours’ harvests. Different, too, from the gossip, a national addiction which nevertheless always struck me as being rather homely and forgiving. In Iceland, just about everyone is related, and the thirty or so bankers who have caused the nation’s bankruptcy are well-known to all. But somehow they have gone too far, and their exile is suspended only by their appearances in the newspapers, the law courts, or on the satirical T-shirts sold in main street Laugavegur. There, too, you saw the other side of the currency collapse. The place was buzzing with tourists, unusual at this dark time of year. Iceland was half-price, they had been told, and it was true—anything made locally was affordable, for so long unthinkable in Iceland. This was a country that had always prided itself on being hopelessly expensive. So perhaps what was being lost in the local value of the economy would be recouped through the waves of extra tourists? Certainly, the sudden cheapness of Iceland had affected my decision to come, and to stay in a hotel downtown rather than with friends. On my last full day, a Saturday, I joined my namesake Kári for a drive into the country. For a while, our conversation was taken up with the crisis: the President, Ólafur Ragnar Grímsson, had recently declined to sign a bill that ensured that Iceland repaid its debts to the British and Dutch governments. His refusal meant a referendum on the bill in the coming March. No-one doubted that the nation would say no. The terms were unfair. And yet it was felt that Iceland’s entry into the EU, and its adoption of the Euro in place of the failed krónur, were conditional on its acceptance of the blame apportioned by international investors, and Britain in particular. Britain, one recalled, was the enemy in the Cod Wars, when Iceland had last entered the international press. Iceland had won that war. Why not this one, as well? That Iceland should suddenly need the forgiveness and assistance of its neighbours was no surprise to them. The Danes and others had long been warning Icelandic bankers that the finance sector was massively over-leveraged and bound for failure at the first sign of trouble in the international economy. I remember being in Iceland at the time of these warnings, in May 2007. It was Eurovision Song Contest month, and there was great local consternation at Iceland’s dismal showing that year. Amid the outpouring of Eurovision grief, and accusations against the rest of Europe that it was block-voting small countries like Iceland out of the contest, the dire economic warnings from the Danes seemed small news. ‘They just didn’t like the útrásarvíkingar,’ said Kári. That is, the Danes were simply upset that their former colonial children had produced offspring of their own who were capable of taking over shops, football clubs, and even banks in main streets of Copenhagen, Amsterdam and London. With interests as glamorous as West Ham United, Hamleys, and Karen Millen, it is not surprising that the útrásarvíkingar, or ‘Viking raiders’, were fast attaining the status of national heroes. Today, it’s a term of abuse rather than pride. The entrepreneurs are exiled in the countries they once sought to raid, and the modern Viking achievement, rather like the one a thousand years before, is a victim of negative press. All that raiding suddenly seems vain and greedy, and the ships that bore the raiders—private jets that for a while were a common sight over the skies of Reykjavík—have found new homes in foreign lands. The Danes were right about the Icelandic economy, just as they’d been right about the Devil’s landscaping efforts. But hundreds of years of colonial rule and only six decades of independence made it difficult for the Icelanders to listen. To curtail the flight of the new Vikings went against the Icelandic project, which from the very beginning was about independence. A thousand years before, in the 870s, Iceland had been a refuge. The medieval stories—known collectively as the sagas—tell us that the island was settled by Norwegian chieftains who were driven out of the fjordlands of their ancestors by the ruthless King Harald the Fair-Haired, who demanded total control of Norway. They refused to humble themselves before the king, and instead took the risk of a new life on a remote, inhospitable island. Icelandic independence, which was lost in the 1260s, was only regained in full in 1944, after Denmark had fallen under German occupation. Ten years later, with the war over and Iceland in the full stride of its independence, Denmark began returning the medieval Icelandic manuscripts that it had acquired during the colonial era. At that point, says the common wisdom, Icelanders forgave the Danes for centuries of poor governance. Although the strict commercial laws of the colonial period had made it all but impossible for Icelanders to rise out of economic hardship, the Danes had, at least, given the sagas back. National sovereignty was returned, and so too the literature that dated back to the time the country had last stood on its own. But, most powerfully, being Icelandic meant being independent of one’s immediate neighbours. Halldór Laxness, the nation’s Nobel Laureate, would satirize this national characteristic in his most enduring masterpiece, Sjálfstætt fólk, or Independent People. It is also what the dominant political party of the independence period, Sjálfstæðisflokkurinn, The Independence Party, has long treasured as a political ideal. To be Icelandic means being free of interference. And in a country of independent people, who would want to stop the bankers on their raids into Europe? Or, for that matter, who was now going to admit that it was time to join Europe instead of emphasizing one’s apartness from it? Kári and I turned off the south road out of Reykjavík and climbed into the heath. From here, the wounds of the country’s geological past still dominated the surface of the land. Little wonder that Jules Verne claimed that the journey to the centre of the world began on Snæfellsnes, a peninsula of volcanoes, lava, and ice caps on a long arm of land that extends desperately from the west of the island, as if forever in hope of reaching America, or at the very least Greenland. It was from Snæfellsnes that Eirík the Red began his Viking voyages westwards, and from where his famous son Leif would reach Vínland, the Land of Vines, most probably Newfoundland. Eight hundred years later, during the worst of the nation’s hardships—when the famines and natural disasters of the late eighteenth century reduced the nation almost to extinction—thousands of Icelanders followed in Leif’s footsteps, across the ‘whale road’, as the Vikings called it, to Canada, and mainly Winnipeg, where they recreated Iceland in an environment arguably even more hostile than the one they’d left. At least there weren’t any volcanoes in Winnipeg. In Iceland, you could never escape the feeling that the world was still evolving, and that the Devil’s work was ongoing. Even the national Assembly was established on one of the island’s most visible outward signs of the deep rift beneath—where a lake had cracked off the heath around it, which now surrounded it as a scar-scape of broken rocks and torn cliffs. The Almannagjá, or People’s Gorge, which is the most dramatic part of the rift, stands, or rather falls apart, as the ultimate symbol of Icelandic national unity. That is Iceland, an island on the edge of Europe, and forever on the edge of itself, too, a place where unity is defined by constant points of separation, not only in the landscape as it crunches itself apart and pushes through at the weak points, but also in a persistently small social world—the population is only 320,000—that is so closely related that it has had little choice but to emphasise the differences that do exist. After a slow drive through the low hills near Thingvellir, we reached the national park, and followed the dirt roads down to the lake. It’s an exclusive place for summerhouses, many of which now seem to stand as reminders of the excesses of the past ten years: the haphazardly-constructed huts that once made the summerhouse experience a bit of an adventure were replaced by two-storey buildings with satellite dishes, spa baths, and the ubiquitous black Range Rovers parked outside—the latter are now known as ‘Game Overs’. Like so much that has been sold off to pay the debts, the luxury houses seem ‘very 2007,’ the local term for anything unsustainable. But even the opulent summerhouses of the Viking raiders don’t diminish the landscape of Thingvellir, and a lake that was frozen from the shore to about fifty metres out. At the shoreline, lapping water had crystallized into blue, translucent ice-waves that formed in lines of dark and light water. Then we left the black beach for the site of the old Assembly. It was a place that had witnessed many encounters, not least the love matches that were formed when young Icelanders returned from their Viking raids and visits to the courts of Scandinavia, Scotland, Ireland, and England. On this particular day, though, the site was occupied by only five Dutchmen in bright, orange coats. They were throwing stones into Öxará, the river that runs off the heath into the Thingvellir lake, and looked up guiltily as we passed. I’m not sure what they felt bad about—throwing stones in the river was surely the most natural thing to do. On my last night, I barely slept. The Saturday night street noise was too much, and my thoughts were taken with the ever-apart Iceland, and with the anticipation of my returning to Brisbane the next day. Reykjavík the party town certainly hadn’t changed with the financial crisis, and nor had my mixed feelings about living so far away. The broken glass and obscenities of a night out didn’t ease until 5am, when it was time for me to board the Flybus to Keflavík Airport. I made my way through the screams and drunken stumblers, and into the quiet of the dark bus, where, in the back, I could just make out the five Dutchmen who, the day before, Kári and I had seen at Thingvellir, and who were now fast asleep and emitting a perfume of vodka and tobacco smoke that made it all the way to the front. It had all seemed too familiar not to be true—the relentless Icelandic optimism around its independence, the sense that it would always be an up-and-down sort of a place anyway, and the jagged volcanoes and lava fields that formed the distant shadows of the half-hour drive to the airport. The people, like the landscape, were fixed on separation, and I doubted that the difficulties with Europe would force them in any other direction. And I, too, was on my way back, as uncertain as ever about Iceland and my place in it. I returned to the clinging heat and my own separation from home, which, as before, I also recognized as my homecoming to Brisbane. Isn’t that in the nature of split affinities, to always be nearly there but never quite there? In the weeks since my return, the Icelanders have voted by referendum to reject the deal made for the repayment of the Icesave debts, and a fresh round of negotiations with the British and Dutch governments begins. For the time being, Iceland retains its right to independence, at least as expressed by the right to sidestep the consequences of its unhappy raids into Europe. Pinning down the Devil, it seems, is just as hard as ever.

The story of Barbie is a tapestry woven with threads of cultural significance, societal shifts, and corporate narratives. It’s a tale that encapsulates the evolution of American post-war capitalism, mirroring the changing tides of social norms, aspirations, and identities. Barbie’s journey from Germany to Los Angeles, along the way becoming a global icon, is a testament to the power of Ruth Handler’s vision and Barbie’s marketing. Barbie embodies and reflects the rise of mass consumption and the early days of television advertising, where one doll could become a household name and shape the dreams of children worldwide. The controversies and criticisms surrounding Barbie – from promoting a ‘thin ideal’ to perpetuating gender and racial stereotypes – highlight the complexities of representation in popular culture. Yet, Barbie’s enduring message, “You can be anything”, continues to inspire and empower, even as it evolves to embrace a more inclusive and diverse portrayals of power, beauty, and potential. Barbie’s story is not just about a doll; it’s about the aspirations she represents, the societal changes she’s witnessed, and the ongoing conversation about her impact on gender roles, body image, and consumer culture. It’s a narrative that continues to unfold, as Barbie adapts to the times and remains a symbol of possibility. Barbie: A Popular Culture Icon “It is impossible to conceive of the toy industry as being anything other than dependent on a popular culture which shapes and structures the meanings carried by toys” (Fleming 40). The relationship between toys and popular culture is symbiotic. While popular culture influences the creation of toys, toys also contribute to the spread and longevity of cultural icons and narratives. Today, one of the most influential, popular, and contested toys of the twentieth century is Mattel’s Barbie doll. Her launch at the New York Toy Fair on 9 March 1959 by Mattel co-founder Ruth Handler was a game-changer in the toy industry. Her adult appearance, symbolised by her fashionable swimsuit and ponytail, was a bold move by Mattel. Despite the doubts from the toy industry which thought nobody would want to play with a doll that had breasts (Tamkin) and Mattel’s skepticism of its commercial success (Westenhouser 14), Barbie was a success, selling over 350,000 units in her first year, and she quickly became an iconic figure, paving the way for other male and female adult dolls. For the first time in mid-century America, Barbie meant children could play with a doll that looked like a woman, not a little girl or a baby. In a 1965 interview, Ruth Handler argued that American girls needed a doll with a “teen-age figure and a lot of glorious, imaginative, high-fashion clothes” (cited in Giacomin and Lubinski 3). In a 1993 interview, Handler said it was “important that Barbie allowed play situations that little girls could project themselves into … to imagine, pretend and to fantasize”. Hence Ruth Handler’s Barbie could be an “avatar for girls to project their dreams onto” (Southwell). Barbie hit the market with a “sassy ponytail, heavy eyeliner, a healthy dose of side-eye and a distinctly adult body” (Blackmore). Her arched eyebrows were matched with a coy sideways glance reflecting her sexual origins (Thong). Mattel did not reveal that Ruth Handler’s Barbie was inspired by a German novelty men’s toy, Bild Lilli, which Handler had purchased on a European holiday in 1955. Mattel fought several lawsuits and eventually secured the rights to Bild Lilli in 1964, which required the German maker of the Bild Lilli doll to not make her again. Barbie dolls, both blonde and brunette, changed little until 1967, when Mattel launch the ‘new’ Barbie doll which is the foundation for today’s Stereotypical Barbie. The same size as the original, thanks to Mattel engineer Jack Ryan she could twist and turn at the waist. Her facial features were softened, she had ‘real’ eyelashes’ and took on an ‘outdoor look’. The new 1967 version of Barbie originally retailed for US$3.00. Mattel, assuming consumers may not want to buy a new Barbie when they already had one, offered buyers the new Barbie at US$1.50 if they traded in their old 1950s Barbie. The television advertising campaign for the new Barbie featured Maureen McMormick (who would go on to play Marcia Brady in the TV series The Brady Bunch from 1969 to 1974). The original #1 Barbie today sells for over US$25,000 (Reinhard). The most expensive Barbie sold to date was a Stefano Canturi-designed Barbie that sold in 2010 for US$302,500 at Christies in New York (Clarendon). Barbie has been described as “the most successful doll in history”, “the most popular toy in history”, the “empress of fashion dolls” (Rogers 86), the “most famous doll in the world” (Ferorelli), the biggest-selling fashion doll in history (Green and Gellene), and is one if the world’s “most commercially successful toys” (Fleming 41). Barbie is both “idealistic and materialistic” and characterises an “American fantasy” (Tamkin). More so, she is a popular culture icon and “a unique indicator of women’s history” (Vander Bent). The inclusion of Barbie in America’s twentieth-century Time Capsule “cemented her status as a true American icon” (Ford), as did Andy Warhol when he iconised Barbie in his 1968 painting of her (Moore). During the 1950s and 1960s, Barbie’s name was licenced to over 100 companies; while a strategic move that expanded Barbie’s brand presence, it also provided Mattel with substantial royalty payments for decades. This approach helped solidify Barbie’s status as a cultural icon and enabled her to become a lucrative asset for Mattel (Rogers). Sixty-five years later, Barbie has 99% global brand awareness. In 2021, Mattel shipped more than 86 million Barbies globally, manufacturing 164 Barbies a minute (Tomkins). In 2022, Barbie generated gross sales of US$1.49 billion (Statista 2023). With this fiscal longevity and brand recognition, the success of the Barbie film is not surprising. The 2023 film, directed by Greta Gerwig and starring Australian Margot Robbie as Barbie and Canadian Ryan Gosling as Ken, as of March 2024 has a global box office revenue of US$1.45 billion, making it the 14th most successful movie of all time and the most successful movie directed by a woman (Statista 2024). Contested Barbie Despite her popularity, Barbie has been the subject of controversy. Original Barbie’s proportions have been criticised for promoting an unrealistic body image (Thong). Barbie’s appearance has received numerous critiques for “representing an unrealistic beauty standard through its former limited skin tone and hair combination” (Lopez). The original Barbie’s measurements, if scaled to life-size, would mean Barbie is unusually tall and has a slim figure, with a height of 5 feet 9 inches, a waist of just 18 inches, and hips of approximately 33 inches. Her bust would measure around 32 inches with an under-bust of 22 inches, and her shoulder width would be approximately 28 inches. Original Barbie’s legs, which are proportionally longer than an average human’s, would make up more than half her height (Thong). A 1996 Australian study scaled Barbie and Ken to adult sizes and compared this with the physical proportions of a range of women and men. They found that the likelihood of finding a man of comparable shape to Ken was 1 in 50. Barbie was more problematic. The chance of a woman being the same proportion as Barbie was 1 in 100,000 (Norton et al. 287). In 2011, The Huffington Post’s Galia Slayen built a life-sized Barbie based on Barbie’s body measurements for National Eating Disorder Awareness Week. Slayen concluded that “if Barbie was a real woman, she’d have to walk on all fours due to her proportions”. One report found that if Barbie’s measurements were those of a real woman her “bones would be so frail, it would be impossible for her to walk, and she would only have half a liver” (Golgowski). A 2006 study found that Barbie is a “possible cause” for young girls’ “body dissatisfaction”. In this study, 162 girls from age 5 to 8 were exposed to images of a thin doll (Barbie), a plus-size doll (US doll Emme, size 16), or no doll, and then completed assessments of body image. Girls exposed to Barbie reported “lower body esteem and greater desire for a thinner body shape than girls in the other exposure conditions”. The study concluded that “early exposure to dolls epitomizing an unrealistically thin body ideal may damage girls' body image, which would contribute to an increased risk of disordered eating and weight cycling” (Dittman and Halliwell 283). Another study in 2016 found that “exposure to Barbie” led to “higher thin-ideal internalization”, but found that Barbie had no “impact on body esteem or body dissatisfaction” (Rice et al. 142). In response to such criticism, Mattel slowly introduced a variety of Barbie dolls with more diverse body types, including tall, petite, and curvy models (Tamkin). These changes aim to reflect a broader range of beauty standards and promote a more positive body image. Barbie has always had to accommodate social norms. For this reason, Barbie always must have underpants, and has no nipples. One of the reasons why Ruth Handler’s husband Elliott (also a co-founder of Mattel) was initially against producing the Barbie doll was that she had breasts, reportedly saying mothers would not buy their daughters a doll with breasts (Gerber). Margot Robbie, on playing Barbie, told one news outlet that while Barbie is “sexualized”, she “should never be sexy” (Aguirre). Early prototypes of Barbie made in Japan in the 1950s sexualised her body, leaving her to look like a prostitute. In response, Mattel hired film make-up artist Bud Westmore to redo Barbie’s face and hair with a softer look. Mattel also removed the nipples from the prototypes (Gerber). Barbie’s body and fashion have always seemed to “replicate history and show what was what was happening at the time” (Mowbray), and they also reflect how the female body is continually surveilled. Feminists have had a long history of criticism of Barbie, particularly her projection of the thin ideal. At the 1970 New York Women’s Strike for Equality, feminists shouted “I am not a Barbie doll!” Such debates exemplify the role and impact of toys in shaping and reforming societal norms and expectations. Even the more recent debates regarding the 2023 Barbie film show that Barbie is still a “lightning rod for the messy, knotty contradictions of feminism, sexism, misogyny and body image” (Chappet). Decades of criticism about Barbie, her meaning and influence, have left some to ask “Is Barbie a feminist icon, or a doll which props up the patriarchy?” Of course, she’s both, because “like all real women, Barbie has always been expected to conform to impossible standards” (Chappet). Diversifying Barbie Over the decades Mattel has slowly changed Barbie’s body, including early versions of a black Barbie-like dolls in the 1960s and 1970s such as Francie, Christie, Julia, and Cara. However, it was not until 1980 that Mattel introduced the first black Barbie. African American fashion designer Kitty Black-Perkins, who worked for Mattel from 1971, was the principal designer for black Barbie, saying that “there was a need for the little Black girl to really have something she could play with that looked like her” (cited in Lafond). Black Barbie was marketed as She’s black! She’s beautiful! She’s dynamite! The following year, Asian Barbie was introduced. She was criticised for her nondescript country of origin and dressed in an “outfit that was a mishmash of Chinese, Korean and Japanese ethnic costumes” (Wong). More recently, the Asian Barbies were again criticised for portraying stereotypes, with a recent Asian Barbie dressed as a veterinarian caring for pandas, and Asian violinist Barbie with accompanying violin props, reflecting typical stereotypes of Asians in the US (Wong). In 2016, Mattel introduced a range of Barbie and Ken dolls with seven body types, including more curvy body shapes, 11 skin tones and 28 hairstyles (Siazon). In 2019, other Barbie body types appeared, with smaller busts, less defined waist, and more defined arms. The 2019 range also included Barbies with permanent physical disabilities, one using a wheelchair and one with a prosthetic leg (Siazon). Wheelchair Barbie comes with a wheelchair, and her body has 22 joints for body movement while sitting in the wheelchair. The Prosthetic Barbie comes with a prosthetic leg which can be removed, and was made in collaboration with Jordan Reeve, a 13-year-old disability activist born without a left forearm. In 2020, a No Hair Barbie and a Barbie with the skin condition vitiligo were introduced, and in 2022, Hearing Aid Barbie was also launched. In 2022 other changes were made to Barbie’s and Ken’s bodies, with bodies that became fuller figured and Kens with smaller chests and less masculine body shapes (Dolan). Down Syndrome Barbie was released in 2023, designed in collaboration with the US National Down Syndrome Society to ensure accurate representation. By 2024, Barbie dolls come in 35 skin tones, 97 hairstyles, and nine body types (Mattel 2024). Spanning hundreds of iterations, today the Barbie doll is no longer a homogenous, blond-haired, blue-eyed toy, but rather an evolving social phenomenon, adapting with the times and the markets Mattel expands into. With dolls of numerous ethnicities and body types, Barbie has also embraced inclusivity, catering to the plethora of different consumers across the world (Green and Gellene 1989). Career Barbie While not dismissing Barbie’s problematic place in feminist, gender and racial critiques, Barbie has always been a social influencer. Her early years were marked by a variety of makeovers and modernisations, as have recent changes to Barbie’s body, reflecting the changing social norms of the times. Stereotypical Barbie had her first major makeover in 1961, with her ponytail swapped for a short ‘Bubble Bob’ hairstyle inspired by Jackie Kennedy and Marilyn Monroe, reflecting women’s emerging social independence (Foreman). In the early 1970s, Barbie’s original demure face with averted eyes was replaced by a new one that “depicted confidence and a forward-facing gaze” (Vander Bent). Her “soft look” was a departure from the mature image of the original 1959 Barbie (Lafond). The ‘soft look’ on Malibu Barbie with her newly sculpted face featured an open smile for the first time, as well as sun-tanned, make-up free skin and sun-kissed blonde hair. The disappearance of Barbie’s coy, sideways glance and the introduction of forward-looking eyes was a development “welcomed by feminists” (Ford). Barbie’s early makeovers, along with her fashion and accessories, including her homes, cars, and pets, contributed to shaping her image as a fashionable and independent woman. Barbie’s various careers and roles have been used to promote ideas of female empowerment. From astronaut to presidential candidate, Barbie has broken barriers in traditionally male-dominated fields. However, the effectiveness of these efforts in promoting female empowerment is a topic of debate. The post-war period in America saw a significant shift in the pattern of living, with a move from urban areas to the suburbs. This was facilitated by a robust post-war economy, favourable government policies like the GI Bill, and increasing urbanisation. The GI Bill played a crucial role by providing low-interest home loans to veterans, making home ownership accessible to a large segment of the population. It was a significant transformation of the American lifestyle and shaped the country’s socio-economic landscape. It is in this context that Barbie’s first Dreamhouse was introduced in the early 1960s, with its mid-century modern décor, hi-fi stereo, and slim-line furniture. This was at a time when most American women could not get a mortgage. Barbie got her first car in 1962, a peach-colored Austin-Healey 3000 MKII convertible, followed short afterwards by a Porsche 911. She has also owned a pink Jaguar XJS, a pink Mustang, a red Ferrari, and a Corvette. Barbie’s car choices of luxurious convertibles spoke to Barbie’s social and economic success. In 1998, Barbie became a NASCAR driver and also signed up to race in a Ferrari in the Formula 1. Barbie’s ‘I Can Be Anything’ range from 2008 was designed to draw kids playing with the dolls toward ambitious careers; one of those careers was as a race car driver (Southwell). While Barbie’s first job as a baby-sitter was not as glamourous or well-paying as her most of her other over 250 careers, it does reflect the cultural landscape Barbie was living in in the 1960s. Babysitter Barbie (1963) featured Barbie wearing a long, pink-striped skirt with ‘babysitter’ emblasoned along the hem and thick-framed glasses. She came with a baby in a crib, a telephone, bottles of soda, and a book. The book was called How to Lose Weight and had only two words of advice, ‘Don’t Eat’. Even though there was a backlash to the extreme dieting advice, Mattel included the book in the 1965 Slumber Party Barbie. Barbie wore pink silk pajamas with a matching robe and came prepared for her sleepover with toiletries, a mirror, the controversial diet book, and a set of scales permanently set at 110 pounds (approx. 50kg), which caused further backlash (Ford). Barbie’s early careers were those either acceptable or accessible to women of the era, such as the Fashion Designer Barbie (1960), Flight Attendant Barbie (1961), and Nurse Barbie (1962). However, in 1965 Barbie went into space, two years after cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman in space, and four years before the American moon landing. Barbie’s career stagnated in the 1970s, and she spends the decade being sports Barbie, perhaps as a response to her unpopularity among vocal second wave feminists and reflecting the economic downturn of the era. America’s shift to the right in the 1980s saw in the introduction of the Yuppie, the young urban professional who lived in the city, had a high-powered career, and was consumption-driven. More women were entering the workforce than ever before. Barbie also entered the workforce, spending less time doing the passive leisure of her earlier self (Ford). It also signals the beginning of neoliberalism in America, and a shift to individualism and the rise of the free market ethos. In 1985, Day-to-Night Barbie was sold as the first CEO Barbie who “could go from running the boardroom in her pink power suit to a fun night out on the town”. For Mattel she “celebrated the workplace evolution of the era and showed girls they could have it all”. But despite Barbie’s early careers, the focus was on her "emphasized femininity”, meaning that while she was now a career woman, her appearance and demeanor did not reflect her job. Astronaut Barbie (1985) is a good example of Barbie’s ‘emphasised femininity’ in how career Barbies were designed and dressed. Astronaut Barbie is clearly reflecting the fashion and culture trends of the 1980s by going into space in a “shiny, hot pink spacesuit”, comes with a second space outfit, a shiny “peplum miniskirt worn over silver leggings and knee-high pink boots” (Bertschi), and her hair is too big to fit into the helmet. A dark-skinned US Astronaut Barbie was released in 1994, which coincided with the start of the Shuttle-Mir Program, a collaboration between the US and Russia which between 1994 and 1998 would see seven American astronauts spend almost 1,000 days living in orbit with Russian cosmonauts on the Mir space station. Throughout the 1990s, Barbie increasingly takes on careers more typically considered to be male careers. But again, her femininity in design, dressing and packaging takes precedence over her career. Police Officer Barbie (1993), for example, has no gun or handcuffs. Instead, she comes with a "glittery evening dress" to wear to the awards dance where she will get the "Best Police Officer Award for her courageous acts in the community”. Police Office Barbie is pictured on the box "lov[ing] to teach safety tips to children". Barbie thus “feminizes, even maternalises, law enforcement” (Rogers 14). In 1992, Teen Talk Barbie was released. She had a voice box programmed to speak four distinct phrases out of a possible 270. She sold for US$25, and Mattel produced 350,000, expecting its popularity. The phrases included ‘I Love Shopping’ and ‘Math class is tough’. The phrase ‘Math class is tough’ was seen by many as reinforcing harmful stereotypes about girls and math. The National Council of American Teachers of Maths objected, as did the American Association of University Women (NYT 1992). In response to criticisms of the gendered representations of Barbie’s careers, Mattel have more recently featured Barbie in science and technology fields including Paleontologist Barbie (1996 and 2012), Computer Engineer Barbie (2010), Robotics Engineer Barbie (2018), Astrophysicist Barbie (2019), Wildlife Conservationist Barbie, Entomologist Barbie (2019), and Polar Marine Biologist Barbie (all in collaboration with National Geographic), Robotics Engineer Barbie (2018), Zoologist Barbie (2021), and Renewable Energy Barbie (2022), which go some way to providing representations that at least encompass the ideal that ‘Girls Can Do Anything’. Barbie over her lifetime has also taken on swimming, track and field, and has been a gymnast. Barbie was an Olympic gold medallist in the 1970s, with Mattel releasing four Barbie Olympians between 1975 and 1976, arguably cashing in on the 1976 Montreal Olympics. Gold Medal Barbie Doll Skier was dressed in a red, white, and blue ski suit completed with her gold medal. Gold Medal Barbie Doll is an Olympic swimmer wearing a red, white, and blue tricot swimsuit, and again wears an Olympic gold medal around her neck. The doll was also produced as a Canadian Olympian wearing a red and white swimsuit. Gold Medal Barbie Skater looks like Barbie Malibu and is dressed in a long-sleeved, pleated dress in red, white, and blue. The outfit included white ice skates and her gold medal. Mattel also made a Gold Medal P.J. Gymnast Doll who vaulted and somersaulted in a leotard of red, white, and blue tricot. She had a warm-up jacket with white sleeves, red cuffs, white slippers, and a gold medal. Mattel, as part of a licencing agreement with the International Olympic Committee, produced a range of toys for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. The collection of five Barbies represented the new sports added to the 2020 Olympics: baseball and softball, sport climbing, karate, skateboarding, and surfing. Each Barbie was dressed in a sport-specific uniform and had a gold medal. Barbie Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 Surfer, for example, was dressed in a pink wetsuit top, with an orange surfboard and a Tokyo 2020 jacket. For the 2022 Winter Olympics and Paralympics, Mattel released a new collection of Barbie dolls featuring among others a para-skiing Barbie who sits on adaptive skis and comes with a championship medal (Douglas). As part of Mattel’s 2023 Barbie Career of the Year doll, the Women in Sports Barbie range shows Barbie in leadership roles in the sports industry, as manager, coach, referee, and sport reporter. General Manager Barbie wears a blue-and-white pinstripe suit accessorised with her staff pass and a smartphone. Coach Barbie has a pink megaphone, playbook, and wears a two-piece pink jacket and athletic shorts. Referee Barbie wears a headset and has a whistle. Sports Reporter Barbie wears a purple, geometric-patterned dress and carries a pink tablet and microphone (Jones). Political Barbie Barbie has run for president in every election year since 1992. The first President Barbie came with an American-themed dress for an inaugural ball and a red suit for her duties in the Oval Office. In 2016, Barbie released an all-female presidential ticket campaign set with a president and vice-president doll. The 2000 President Barbie doll wore a blue pantsuit and featured a short bob cut, red lipstick pearl necklace, and a red gown to change into, “presumably for President Barbie’s inaugural ball” (Lafond). This followed the introduction of UNICEF Ambassador Barbie in 1989. She is packaged as a member of the United States Committee for UNICEF (United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund), which is mandated to provide humanitarian and development aid to children worldwide. Rather problematically, and again with a focus on her femininity rather than the importance of the organisation she represents, she wears a glittery white and blue full length ball gown with star patterning and a red sash. While some proceeds did go to the US Committee for UNICEF, the dressing and packaging featuring an American flag overshadows the career and its philanthropic message. The period signalled the end of the Cold War and was also the year the United States invaded Panama, resulting in a humanitarian disaster when US military forces attacked urban areas in order to overthrow the Noriega administration. Military Barbie Barbie has served in every US military branch (Sicard). Barbie joined the US army in 1989, wearing a female officer’s evening uniform, though with no sense of what she did. While it may be thought Barbie would increase female in interest in a military career, at the time more women were already enlisting that in any other period from the early 1970s to 2012 (Stillwell). Barbie rejoined the army for the 1990-1991 Gulf War, wearing a Desert Combat Uniform and the 101st Airborne "Screaming Eagle" patch, and serving as a medic. Barbie also joined the Air Force in 1990, three years before Jeannie Leavitt became the first female Air Force fighter pilot. Barbie wore a green flight suit and leather jacket, and gold-trimmed flight cap. She was a fighter pilot and in 1994, she joined the USAF aerial demonstration team, The Thunderbirds. Busy in the 1990s, she also enlisted in the US Navy wearing women's Navy whites. Marine Corps Barbie appeared in 1992, wearing service and conduct medals (Stillwell). All of Barbie’s uniforms were approved by the Pentagon (Military Women’s Memorial). The 2000 Paratrooper Barbie Special Edition was released with the packaging declaring “let’s make a support drop with first aid and food boxes”. She was dressed in undefined military attire which includes a helmet, dog tags, parachute, boots, and hairbrush. Barbie’s Influence In 2014, Barbie became a social media influencer with the launch of the @barbiestyle Instagram account, and in 2015, Barbie launched a vlog on YouTube to talk directly to girls about issues they face. The animated series features Barbie discussing a range of topics including depression, bullying, the health benefits of meditation, and how girls have a habit of apologising when they don’t have anything to be sorry about. The Official @Barbie YouTube channel has over eleven million global subscribers and 23 billion minutes of content watched, making Barbie the #1 girls’ brand on YouTube. Barbie apps average more than 7 million monthly active users and the Instagram count boasts over 2 million followers. The 2023 Barbie film really does attest to Barbie’s influence 70 years after her debut. Barbie, as this article has shown, is more than an influencer and more than a doll, if she ever really was only a doll. She is a popular culture icon, regardless of whether we love her or not. Barbie has sometimes been ahead of the game, and sometimes has been problematically represented, but she has always been influential. Her body, race, ability, careers, independence, and political aspirations have spoken different things to those who play with her. She is fiercely defended, strongly criticised, and shirks from neither. She is also liberating, empowering, straight, and queer. As the articles in this issue reflect, Barbie, it seems, really can be anything. Imagining and Interrogating Barbie in Popular Culture The feature article in this issue outlines how Australian Barbie fans in the 1960s expressed their creativity through the designing and making of their own wardrobes for the doll. Through examining articles from the Australian Women’s Weekly, Donna Lee Brien reveals this rich cultural engagement that was partly driven by thrift, and mostly by enjoyment. Eva Boesenberg examines the social and environmental effects of a plastic doll that is positioned as an ecological ambassador. While there is no doubt that climate change is one of our most pressing social issues, Boesenberg questions the motivations behind Barbie’s eco-crusade: is she an apt role-model to teach children the importance of environmental issues, or is this just a case of corporate greenwashing? Emma Caroll Hudson shifts the focus to entertainment, with an exploration of the marketing of the 2023 blockbuster film Barbie. Here she argues that the marketing campaign was highly successful, utilising a multi-faceted approach centred on fan participation. She highlights key components of the campaign to reveal valuable insights into how marketing can foster a cultural phenomenon. Revna Altiok’s article zooms in on the depiction of Ken in the 2023 film, revealing his characterisation to be that of a ‘manic pixie dream boy’ whose lack of identity propels him on a journey to self-discovery. This positioning, argues Altiok, pulls into focus social questions around gender dynamics and how progress can be truly achieved. Rachel Wang turns the spotlight to Asian identity within the Barbie world, revealing how from early iterations a vague ‘Oriental’ Barbie was accompanied by cultural stereotyping. Despite later, more nuanced interpretations of country-specific Asian dolls, problematic features remained embedded. This, Wang argues, positions Asian Barbies as the racial ‘other’. Kaela Joseph, Tanya Cook, and Alena Karkanias’s article examines how the 2023 Barbie film reflects different forms of fandom. Firstly, Joseph interrogates how the Kens’ patriarchal identity is expressed through acts of collective affirmational fandom. Here, individual fans legitimise their positions within the group by mastering and demonstrating their knowledge of popular culture phenomena. Joseph contrasts this with transformational fandom, which is based upon reimagining the source material to create new forms. The transformation of the titular character of the Barbie movie forms the basis of Eli S’s analysis. S examines how the metaphor of ‘unboxing’ the doll provides an avenue through which to understand Barbie’s metamorphosis from constrained doll to aware human as she journeys from the pink plastic Barbie Land to the Real World. Anna Temel turns her critical gaze to how the 2023 film attempts to reposition Barbie’s image away from gender stereotypes to a symbol of feminist empowerment. Director Greta Gerwig, Temel argues, critiques the ‘ideal woman’ and positions Barbie as a vehicle through which contemporary feminism and womanhood can be interrogated. Temel finds that this is not always successfully articulated in the depiction of Barbie in the film. The reading of the Barbie movie’s Barbie Land as an Asexual Utopia is the focus of Anna Maria Broussard’s article. Here Broussard draws the focus to the harmonious community of dolls who live without social expectations of sexuality. Barbie provides a popular culture reflection of the Asexual experience, expressed through Barbie’s rejection of a heteronormative relationship both in Barbie Land and the Real World. Completing this collection is Daisy McManaman’s article interrogating the multiple iterations of the doll’s embodied femininity. Incorporating an ethnographic study of the author’s relationship with the doll, McManaman uncovers that Barbie serves as a site of queer joy and a role model through which to enjoy and explore femininity and gender. These articles have been both intellectually stimulating to edit, and a joy. We hope you enjoy this collection that brings a new academic lens to the popular cultural phenomenon that is Barbie. References Aguirre, Abby. “Barbiemania! Margot Robbie Opens Up about the Movie Everyone’s Waiting For.” Vogue, 24 May 2023. 16 Mar. 2024 <https://www.vogue.com/article/margot-robbie-barbie-summer-cover-2023-interview>. Bertschi, Jenna. “Barbie: An Astronaut for the Ages.” Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, 18 Jul. 2023. 11 Mar. 2024 <https://airandspace.si.edu/stories/editorial/barbie-astronaut-ages>. Blackmore, Erin. “Barbie’s Secret Sister Was a German Novelty Doll.” History.com, 14 Jul. 2023. 11 mar. 2024 <https://www.history.com/news/barbie-inspiration-bild-lilli>. 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