Books on the topic 'Three time-Scale systems'

There is a great diversity among welfare states in Europe. This diversity is reflected in the scale of expenditures for social protection systems, their evolution over time and the division of expenditures among programs. This chapter analyses the level and structure of expenditures for the last year for which data is available. Then, it turns to the evolution of social expenditure over time. Even though one observes some convergence, social spending is increasing in almost all countries. One of the reasons for this is the development of entitlements that makes it difficult to dismantle programs that have lost most of their raison d’être. Another issue concerns the international comparison of programs that are public in some countries and private, but heavily subsidized, in others.

This handbook is currently in development, with individual articles publishing online in advance of print publication. At this time, we cannot add information about unpublished articles in this handbook, however the table of contents will continue to grow as additional articles pass through the review process and are added to the site. Please note that the online publication date for this handbook is the date that the first article in the title was published online. For more information, please read the site FAQs. Wind storms impact human lives, their built as well as natural habitat. During the last century, society’s vulnerability to wind storms has been reduced by enhanced knowledge of their impact and by controlling exposure through better design. However, only two of the wind systems have so far been considered in the design of buildings and structures, i.e., synoptic winds resulting from macroscale weather systems spanning thousands of kilometers, e.g., extratropical storms, and mesoscale tropical storms spanning hundreds of kilometers and traveling fast, e.g., hurricanes/typhoons/cyclones. During the last two decades, enough evidence has surfaced to support that a third type of very localized wind storms, the non-synoptic winds, are the most damaging in some regions of the world. Thus far there are no design provisions established for the codification of these wind storms. Their characterization in terms of climatology, wind field and intensity, frequency and occurrence, as well as their impact on the built environment, is slowly developing. This handbook presents the state-of-the-art of knowledge related to all these features including their risk, insurance issues, and economics. The research in this area is on the one hand more arduous given the reduced scale, the three-dimensionality, and nonstationary aspects of these non-synoptic winds while, at the same time, its understanding and modeling are being aided by the emergence of novel modeling and simulation techniques which are addressed in this handbook. This will serve as a guiding resource for those interested in learning about and contributing to the advancement of the field.

The convergence of terror and revolution has been noted from the time of the French and Russian revolutions. This article lays out the ways in which the concept of extreme political violence in communist revolution from Russia to Cambodia continues to be both politicized and resistant to agreement about such basics as definition, scale, and numbers of victims. There is particular disagreement about whether to count as victims of terror those who were the collateral damage from poorly conceived and brutally implemented policies such as collectivization and the Great Leap Forward alongside terror deliberately inflicted upon particularly targeted individuals and groups. The article suggests that whether deliberate or incidental, terror in communist systems is best understood as proactive and reactive campaigns to ensure regime security by mobilizing the bureaucracy and engaging in a display of communicative theatre with mass populations through such forms as mass trials.

Normal metabolism results in a net acid production of approximately 1 mmol/kg day−1. Physiological pH is regulated by excretion of this acid load (as carbon dioxide) by the kidneys and the lungs. A series of buffers in the body reduces the effects of metabolic acids on body and urine pH. For acid–base disorders to occur, there must be excessive intake (or loss) of acid (or base) or, alternatively, an inability to excrete acid. For these changes to result in a substantially abnormal pH, the various buffer systems must been overwhelmed. The pH scale is logarithmic, so relatively small changes in pH signify large differences in hydrogen ion concentration. Most minor perturbations in acid–base balance are asymptomatic, as small changes in acid or base levels are rapidly controlled through consumption of buffers or through changes in respiratory rate. Alterations in renal acid excretion take some time to occur. Only when these compensatory mechanisms are overwhelmed do symptoms related to changes in pH develop. This chapter reviews the causes and consequences of acid–base disorders.

In 2013, the Saudi government embarked on a nationwide strategy to restructure its labor market and its policies towards the recruitment of foreign workers. These changes are in line with the implementation of Saudi Arabia’s Nitaqat system which aims to better regulate foreign labor in the country and to reduce the number of irregular workers in the Kingdom. As a result of these changes in policy and implementation, there have been large-scale deportations of irregular workers—along with their family members, in some cases—from KSA beginning in mid-2013 and continuing up to the time of writing. Yemeni workers in KSA have been particularly hard hit by these policy changes due to the largely informal nature of labor migration flows that have existed between KSA and Yemen for the past few decades. This chapter explores the possible implications of the recent labor policy changes in KSA for Yemeni and host communities in KSA, as well as for returning workers, their families, and communities of origin in Yemen. The chapter concludes with several recommendations on how to effectively address the challenges these disruptions will cause and how to build new avenues to support the transnational linkages between Yemeni migrant workers in KSA and their communities in Yemen.

Climate change adaptation is the ability of a society or a natural system to adjust to the (changing) conditions that support life in a certain climate region, including weather extremes in that region. The current discussion on climate change adaptation began in the 1990s, with the publication of the Assessment Reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Since the beginning of the 21st century, most countries, and many regions and municipalities have started to develop and implement climate change adaptation strategies and plans. But since the implementation of adaptation measures must be planned and conducted at the local level, a major challenge is to actually implement adaptation to climate change in practice. One challenge is that scientific results are mainly published on international or national levels, and political guidelines are written at transnational (e.g., European Union), national, or regional levels—these scientific results must be downscaled, interpreted, and adapted to local municipal or community levels. Needless to say, the challenges for implementation are also rooted in a large number of uncertainties, from long time spans to matters of scale, as well as in economic, political, and social interests. From a human perspective, climate change impacts occur rather slowly, while local decision makers are engaged with daily business over much shorter time spans.Among the obstacles to implementing adaptation measures to climate change are three major groups of uncertainties: (a) the uncertainties surrounding the development of our future climate, which include the exact climate sensitivity of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions, the reliability of emission scenarios and underlying storylines, and inherent uncertainties in climate models; (b) uncertainties about anthropogenically induced climate change impacts (e.g., long-term sea level changes, changing weather patterns, and extreme events); and (c) uncertainties about the future development of socioeconomic and political structures as well as legislative frameworks.Besides slow changes, such as changing sea levels and vegetation zones, extreme events (natural hazards) are a factor of major importance. Many societies and their socioeconomic systems are not properly adapted to their current climate zones (e.g., intensive agriculture in dry zones) or to extreme events (e.g., housing built in flood-prone areas). Adaptation measures can be successful only by gaining common societal agreement on their necessity and overall benefit. Ideally, climate change adaptation measures are combined with disaster risk reduction measures to enhance resilience on short, medium, and long time scales.The role of uncertainties and time horizons is addressed by developing climate change adaptation measures on community level and in close cooperation with local actors and stakeholders, focusing on strengthening resilience by addressing current and emerging vulnerability patterns. Successful adaptation measures are usually achieved by developing “no-regret” measures, in other words—measures that have at least one function of immediate social and/or economic benefit as well as long-term, future benefits. To identify socially acceptable and financially viable adaptation measures successfully, it is useful to employ participatory tools that give all involved parties and decision makers the possibility to engage in the process of identifying adaptation measures that best fit collective needs.

This book provides readers with a unique understanding of the ways in which Aboriginal people interacted with their environment in the past at one particular location in western New South Wales. It also provides a statement showing how geoarchaeology should be conducted in a wide range of locations throughout Australia. One of the key difficulties faced by all those interested in the interaction between humans and their environment in the past is the complex array of processes acting over different spatial and temporal scales. The authors take account of this complexity by integrating three key areas of study – geomorphology, geochronology and archaeology – applied at a landscape scale, with the intention of understanding the record of how Australian Aboriginal people interacted with the environment through time and across space. This analysis is based on the results of archaeological research conducted at the University of New South Wales Fowlers Gap Arid Zone Research Station between 1999 and 2002 as part of the Western New South Wales Archaeology Program. The interdisciplinary geoarchaeological program was targeted at expanding the potential offered by archaeological deposits in western New South Wales, Australia. The book contains six chapters: the first two introduce the study area, then three data analysis chapters deal in turn with the geomorphology, geochronology and archaeology of Fowlers Gap Station. A final chapter considers the results in relation to the history of Aboriginal occupation of Fowlers Gap Station, as well as the insights they provide into Aboriginal ways of life more generally. Analyses are well illustrated through the tabulation of results and the use of figures created through Geographic Information System software. Winner of the 2015 Australian Archaeology Association John Mulvaney Book Award

Transformation has become a buzz word in today's military, but what are its historical precursors—those large scale changes that were once called Revolutions in Military Affairs (RMA)? Who has gotten it right, and who has not? The Department of Defense must learn from history. Most studies of innovation focus on the actions, choices, and problems faced by individuals in a particular organization. Few place these individuals and organizations within the complex context where they operate. Yet, it is this very context that is a powerful determinant of how actions are conceived, examined, and implemented, and of how errors are identified and corrected. The historical cases that Mandeles examines reveal how different military services organized to learn, accumulate, and retrieve knowledge; and how their particular organization affected everything from the equipment they acquired to the quality of doctrine and concepts used in combat. In cases where more than one community of experts was responsible for weighing in on decisionmaking, the service benefited from enhanced application of evidence, sound inference, and logic. These cases demonstrate that, for senior leadership, participating in such a system should be a strategic and deliberate choice. In each of the cases featured in this book, no such deliberate choice was made. The interwar U.S. Navy (USN) aviation community and the U.S. Marine Corps amphibious operation community were lucky that, in a time of rapid technological advance and strategic risk, their decisions in framing and solving technological and operational problems were made within a functioning multi-organizational system. The Army Air Corps and the Royal Marines were unfortunate, with corresponding results. It is characteristic of 20th-century military history that no senior civilian or military leader suggested a policy to handle overlapping responsibilities by multiple departments. Today's policymakers have not learned this lesson. In the present time, while a great deal of thought is devoted to proper organizational design and the numbers of persons required to perform necessary functions, there is still no overarching framework guiding these designs.

Unambiguous and homogeneous geodetic reference frames are essential to the proper determination of locations and heights. The reference frames used in the Netherlands are the Rijksdriehoekmeting (RD) for locations and the Normaal Amsterdamse Peil (NAP) for heights. The RD has traditionally been managed by the Kadaster; the NAP by Rijkswaterstaat. The emergence of satellite positioning has resulted in drastic changes to these geodetic reference frames. A surveyor is now offered one instrument, GPS (the Global Positioning System), capable of the simultaneous determination of locations and heights. This is possible by virtue of one three-dimensional geodetic reference system - the European Terrestrial Reference System (ETRS89) - which in the Netherlands is maintained in a collaborative arrangement between the Kadaster and Rijkswaterstaat. GPS has been advanced as a practical measurement technique by linking the definition of the RD grid to ETRS89. Nevertheless the introduction of GPS also revealed distortions in the RD grid, which are modelled in the RDNAPTRANSTM2004 transformation. Furthermore, the use of the geoid model has become essential to the use of GPS in determining the height in comparison to NAP. Subsidence that has disrupted the backbone of the NAP gave cause to the need for a large-scale adjustment of the heights of the underground benchmarks and, in so doing, of the grid. Consequently new NAP heights have been introduced at the beginning of 2005; a new definition of the RD grid that had already been introduced in 2000 was once again modified in 2004. During the past few years two NCG subcommissions have devoted a great deal of time to these modifications. This publication lays down ETRS89, the RD and the NAP, together with their mutual relationships. In addition to reviewing the history of the reference frames and the manner in which they are maintained (including, for example, the use of AGRS.NL as the basis for the Dutch geometric infrastructure), the publication also discusses the status of the frames as at 1 January 2005. This encompasses the realisation of ETRS89 via AGRS.NL, the revision and new definition of the RD grid in 2004, and the new NAP publication in 2005. The publication also describes the mutual relationships between the frames in the modernized RDNAPTRANSTM2004 transformation consisting of the new NLGEO2004 geoid model and a model for the distortions of the RD grid. In conclusion, the publication also devotes attention to the future maintenance of the ETRS89, RD and NAP. The continuity of the link between the traditional frames and the three-dimensional frames is of great importance, and ETRS89 will continue to fulfil this linking role. The GPS base network and AGRS.NL reference stations will increasingly assume the leading role in the maintenance of the RD frame. The maintenance of the NAP will continue to be necessary, although during the coming decades the the primary heights will not need revision. In so doing the high quality of the geodetic reference frames required for their use in actual practice will continue to be guaranteed.

At the end of 2019 the world became aware of the existence of a new virus stemming from the Coronaviridae family and causing a specific disease – COVID-19. In less than three months, the virus and its consequences, developed from being a local public health problem in China to a daunting global problem we all had to face. On March 11, 2020 the World Health Organization (WHO) declared a pandemic of COVID-19. On the international scale, even in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH), the response of the professionals and scientists has been rapid, although not always consistently efficient enough. Despite the selfless cooperation of scientists and practitioners worldwide, countries with developed economies, good public health and a strong scientific system have had the advantage in the fight against the disease over developing countries. Despite the fact that by these criteria BiH is not one of the most resilient countries, so far, its response to the pandemic has seemed to be satisfactory. The Academy of Sciences and Arts of Bosnia and Herzegovina (ANUBiH) was one of the first institutions of the science system to respond to the pandemic. On the initiative and under the leadership of academician Mirsada Hukić, on March 22, 2020 the development of the project "Epidemic Location Intelligence System (ELIS)" and its Geoportal began on a voluntary basis, with the task of permanently monitoring the spread of COVID-19. Theoretical and professional parts of the project in the areas of medicine, public health and informatics were completed by April 2, 2020. Thanks to the support to the project by the Chairman of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Mr. Šefik Džaferović, the expert system received additional hardware support and was filled in time with data from across the country. This enabled the system to become operational as early as on April 8, 2020. The results of all these efforts are visible in this publication. Initially, the ELIS project was important for the epidemiological and public health area. The abundance of collected data and obtained virus samples enabled the extension of the project idea to the sequencing of viruses found in BiH and their typology. The transition of research to the clinical aspects of COVID-19 is the next phase in the development of the ELIS project. ANUBiH has already started the work on examining the economic and pedagogical consequences of COVID-19 in order to look at this medical phenomenon in the broadest possible context. All the results of ANUBiH in response to the epidemic challenges of COVID-19 are achieved due to the synergistic action of numerous individuals and institutions in different fields of science and public health in cooperation with government. Therefore, I believe that the ELIS project has shown the way to go in solving the burning problems of our society which we will encounter in the future.

The quality of data collected in official spatial databases is crucial in making strategic decisions as well as in the implementation of planning and design works. Awareness of the level of the quality of these data is also important for individual users of official spatial data. The author presents methods and models of description and evaluation of the quality of spatial data collected in public registers. Data describing the space in the highest degree of detail, which are collected in three databases: land and buildings registry (EGiB), geodetic registry of the land infrastructure network (GESUT) and in database of topographic objects (BDOT500) were analyzed. The results of the research concerned selected aspects of activities in terms of the spatial data quality. These activities include: the assessment of the accuracy of data collected in official spatial databases; determination of the uncertainty of the area of registry parcels, analysis of the risk of damage to the underground infrastructure network due to the quality of spatial data, construction of the quality model of data collected in official databases and visualization of the phenomenon of uncertainty in spatial data. The evaluation of the accuracy of data collected in official, large-scale spatial databases was based on a representative sample of data. The test sample was a set of deviations of coordinates with three variables dX, dY and Dl – deviations from the X and Y coordinates and the length of the point offset vector of the test sample in relation to its position recognized as a faultless. The compatibility of empirical data accuracy distributions with models (theoretical distributions of random variables) was investigated and also the accuracy of the spatial data has been assessed by means of the methods resistant to the outliers. In the process of determination of the accuracy of spatial data collected in public registers, the author’s solution was used – resistant method of the relative frequency. Weight functions, which modify (to varying degree) the sizes of the vectors Dl – the lengths of the points offset vector of the test sample in relation to their position recognized as a faultless were proposed. From the scope of the uncertainty of estimation of the area of registry parcels the impact of the errors of the geodetic network points was determined (points of reference and of the higher class networks) and the effect of the correlation between the coordinates of the same point on the accuracy of the determined plot area. The scope of the correction was determined (in EGiB database) of the plots area, calculated on the basis of re-measurements, performed using equivalent techniques (in terms of accuracy). The analysis of the risk of damage to the underground infrastructure network due to the low quality of spatial data is another research topic presented in the paper. Three main factors have been identified that influence the value of this risk: incompleteness of spatial data sets and insufficient accuracy of determination of the horizontal and vertical position of underground infrastructure. A method for estimation of the project risk has been developed (quantitative and qualitative) and the author’s risk estimation technique, based on the idea of fuzzy logic was proposed. Maps (2D and 3D) of the risk of damage to the underground infrastructure network were developed in the form of large-scale thematic maps, presenting the design risk in qualitative and quantitative form. The data quality model is a set of rules used to describe the quality of these data sets. The model that has been proposed defines a standardized approach for assessing and reporting the quality of EGiB, GESUT and BDOT500 spatial data bases. Quantitative and qualitative rules (automatic, office and field) of data sets control were defined. The minimum sample size and the number of eligible nonconformities in random samples were determined. The data quality elements were described using the following descriptors: range, measure, result, and type and unit of value. Data quality studies were performed according to the users needs. The values of impact weights were determined by the hierarchical analytical process method (AHP). The harmonization of conceptual models of EGiB, GESUT and BDOT500 databases with BDOT10k database was analysed too. It was found that the downloading and supplying of the information in BDOT10k creation and update processes from the analyzed registers are limited. An effective approach to providing spatial data sets users with information concerning data uncertainty are cartographic visualization techniques. Based on the author’s own experience and research works on the quality of official spatial database data examination, the set of methods for visualization of the uncertainty of data bases EGiB, GESUT and BDOT500 was defined. This set includes visualization techniques designed to present three types of uncertainty: location, attribute values and time. Uncertainty of the position was defined (for surface, line, and point objects) using several (three to five) visual variables. Uncertainty of attribute values and time uncertainty, describing (for example) completeness or timeliness of sets, are presented by means of three graphical variables. The research problems presented in the paper are of cognitive and application importance. They indicate on the possibility of effective evaluation of the quality of spatial data collected in public registers and may be an important element of the expert system.

The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals initiative has the potential to set the direction for a future world that works for everyone. Approved by 193 United Nations member countries in September 2016 to help guide global and national development policies in the period to 2030, the 17 goals build on the successes of the Millennium Development Goals, but also include new priority areas, such as climate change, economic inequality, innovation, sustainable consumption, peace and justice. Assessed against common agreed targets and indicators, the goals should facilitate inter-governmental cooperation and the development of regional and even global development strategies. However, each goal presents considerable challenges in terms of collecting and analysing relevant data and producing the statistics needed to measure progress. Most governments in lower resourced countries simply do not yet have the systems and controls in place to produce high quality, reliable data and statistics, and it is questionable whether the quality and integrity of the available information is adequate to support meaningful decisions and set direction for the future. There are substantial implications: where progress cannot be measured accurately because of inadequate or flawed statistics, the result can be misguided decisions, doubts about achievement of the goals and significant wasted resources. Getting statistics ‘right’ depends upon the quality and integrity of the data used to produce them and on the quality of the processes for collecting, manipulating and analysing the data. Without a documentary records as evidence of how the data were gathered and analysed or how statistics were produced and disseminated, it is not possible to confirm that the statistics are complete, accurate and relevant. Various global organisations do recognise the importance of high quality data and statistics for measuring the SDG indicators reliably, but there has been little attention to the role of records in providing the evidence needed to trust the data and statistics. There is, moreover, a lack of awareness that digital information simply will not survive without policies and procedures to manage and preserve it through time. As a result, digital data, statistics and records are being lost regularly on a large scale, particularly in lower resource countries, where the structures needed to protect and preserve them are not yet in place. This book explores, through a series of case studies, the substantial challenges for assembling reliable data and statistics to address pressing development challenges, particularly in Africa. Hopefully, by highlighting the enormous potential value of creating and using high quality data, statistics and records as an interconnected resource and describing how this can be achieved, the book will contribute to defining meaningful and realistic global and national development policies in the critical period to 2030.

Precipitation levels in southern Africa exhibit a marked east–west gradient and are characterized by strong seasonality and high interannual variability. Much of the mainland south of 15°S exhibits a semiarid to dry subhumid climate. More than 66 percent of rainfall in the extreme southwest of the subcontinent occurs between April and September. Rainfall in this region—termed the winter rainfall zone (WRZ)—is most commonly associated with the passage of midlatitude frontal systems embedded in the austral westerlies. In contrast, more than 66 percent of mean annual precipitation over much of the remainder of the subcontinent falls between October and March. Climates in this summer rainfall zone (SRZ) are dictated by the seasonal interplay between subtropical high-pressure systems and the migration of easterly flows associated with the Intertropical Convergence Zone. Fluctuations in both SRZ and WRZ rainfall are linked to the variability of sea-surface temperatures in the oceans surrounding southern Africa and are modulated by the interplay of large-scale modes of climate variability, including the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO), Southern Indian Ocean Dipole, and Southern Annular Mode.Ideas about long-term rainfall variability in southern Africa have shifted over time. During the early to mid-19th century, the prevailing narrative was that the climate was progressively desiccating. By the late 19th to early 20th century, when gauged precipitation data became more readily available, debate shifted toward the identification of cyclical rainfall variation. The integration of gauge data, evidence from historical documents, and information from natural proxies such as tree rings during the late 20th and early 21st centuries, has allowed the nature of precipitation variability since ~1800 to be more fully explored.Drought episodes affecting large areas of the SRZ occurred during the first decade of the 19th century, in the early and late 1820s, late 1850s–mid-1860s, mid-late 1870s, earlymid-1880s, and mid-late 1890s. Of these episodes, the drought during the early 1860s was the most severe of the 19th century, with those of the 1820s and 1890s the most protracted. Many of these droughts correspond with more extreme ENSO warm phases.Widespread wetter conditions are less easily identified. The year 1816 appears to have been relatively wet across the Kalahari and other areas of south central Africa. Other wetter episodes were centered on the late 1830s–early 1840s, 1855, 1870, and 1890. In the WRZ, drier conditions occurred during the first decade of the 19th century, for much of the mid-late 1830s through to the mid-1840s, during the late 1850s and early 1860s, and in the early-mid-1880s and mid-late 1890s. As for the SRZ, markedly wetter years are less easily identified, although the periods around 1815, the early 1830s, mid-1840s, mid-late 1870s, and early 1890s saw enhanced rainfall. Reconstructed rainfall anomalies for the SRZ suggest that, on average, the region was significantly wetter during the 19th century than the 20th and that there appears to have been a drying trend during the 20th century that has continued into the early 21st. In the WRZ, average annual rainfall levels appear to have been relatively consistent between the 19th and 20th centuries, although rainfall variability increased during the 20th century compared to the 19th.

This is an advance summary of a forthcoming article in the Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Climate Science. Please check back later for the full article.Africa, a continent with the largest number of countries falling under the category of Least Developed Countries (LDCs), remains highly dependent on rain-fed agriculture that suffers from low intake of water, exacerbating the vulnerability to climate variability and anthropogenic climate change. The increasing frequency and severity of climate extremes impose major strains on the economies of these countries. The loss of livelihoods due to interaction of climate change with existing stressors is elevating internal and cross-border migration. The continent is experiencing rapid urbanization, and its cities represent the most vulnerable locations to climate change due in part to incapacitated local governance. Overall, the institutional capacity to coordinate, regulate, and facilitate development in Africa is weak. The general public is less empowered to hold government accountable. The rule of law, media, and other watchdog organizations, and systems of checks and balances are constrained in different ways, contributing to poor governance and resulting in low capacity to respond to climate risks.As a result, climate policy and governance are inseparable in Africa, and capacitating the government is as essential as establishing climate policy. With the highest level of vulnerability to climate change compared with the rest of the world, governance in Africa is pivotal in crafting and implementing viable climate policies.It is indisputable that African climate policy should focus first and foremost on adaptation to climate change. It is pertinent, therefore, to assess Africa’s governance ability to identify and address the continent’s needs for adaptation. One key aspect of effective climate policy is access to up-to-date and contextually relevant information that encompasses indigenous knowledge. African countries have endeavored to meet international requirements for reports such as the National Communications on Climate Change Impacts and Vulnerabilities and the National Adaptation Programmes of Action (NAPAs). However, the capacity to deliver on-time quality reports is lacking; also the implementation, in particular integration of adaptation plans into the overall development agenda, remains a challenge. There are a few successes, but overall adaptation operates mainly at project level. Furthermore, the capacity to access and effectively utilize availed international resources, such as extra funding or technology transfer, is limited in Africa.While the continent is an insignificant source of emissions on a global scale, a more forward looking climate policy would require integrating adaptation with mitigation to put in place a foundation for transformation of the development agenda, towards a low carbon driven economy. Such a futuristic approach calls for a comprehensive and robust climate policy governance that goes beyond climate to embrace the Sustainable Development Goals Agenda 2030. Both governance and climate policy in Africa will need to be viewed broadly, encompassing the process of globalization, which has paved the way to a new geological epoch, the Anthropocene. The question is, what should be the focus of climate policy and governance across Africa under the Anthropocene era?

The nineteenth century was a period of remarkable advance for the Baptists in the United Kingdom. The vigour of the Baptist movement was identified with the voluntary system and the influence of their leading pulpiteers, notably Charles Haddon Spurgeon. However, Baptists were often divided on the strictness of their Calvinism, the question of whether baptism as a believer was a prerequisite for participation in Communion, and issues connected with ministerial training. By the end of the century, some Baptists led by F.B. Meyer had recognized the ministry of women as deaconesses, if not as pastors. Both domestic and foreign mission were essential to Baptist activity. The Baptist Home Missionary Society assumed an important role here, while Spurgeon’s Pastors’ College became increasingly significant in supplying domestic evangelists. Meyer played an important role in the development, within Baptist life, of interdenominational evangelism, while the Baptist Missionary Society and its secretary Joseph Angus supplied the Protestant missionary movement with the resonant phrase ‘The World for Christ in our Generation’. In addition to conversionism, Baptists were also interested in campaigning against the repression of Protestants and other religious minorities on the Continent. Baptist activities were supported by institutions: the formation of the Baptist Union in 1813 serving Particular Baptists, as well as a range of interdenominational bodies such as the Evangelical Alliance. Not until 1891 did the Particular Baptists merge with the New Connexion of General Baptists, while theological controversy continued to pose fresh challenges to Baptist unity. Moderate evangelicals such as Joseph Angus who occupied a respectable if not commanding place in nineteenth-century biblical scholarship probably spoke for a majority of Baptists. Yet when in 1887 Charles Haddon Spurgeon alleged that Baptists were drifting into destructive theological liberalism, he provoked the ‘Downgrade Controversy’. In the end, a large-scale secession of Spurgeon’s followers was averted. In the area of spirituality, there was an emphasis on the agency of the Spirit in the church. Some later nineteenth-century Baptists were drawn towards the emphasis of the Keswick Convention on the power of prayer and the ‘rest of faith’. At the same time, Baptists became increasingly active in the cause of social reform. Undergirding Baptist involvement in the campaign to abolish slavery was the theological conviction—in William Knibb’s words—that God ‘views all nations as one flesh’. By the end of the century, through initiatives such as the Baptist Forward Movement, Baptists were championing a widening concern with home mission that involved addressing the need for medical care and housing in poor areas. Ministers such as John Clifford also took a leading role in shaping the ‘Nonconformist Conscience’ and Baptists supplied a number of leading Liberal MPs, most notably Sir Morton Peto. Their ambitions to make a difference in the world would peak in the later nineteenth and early twentieth century as their political influence gradually waned thereafter.