An important feature of Iran’s political economy is the variety of opportunities it provides, through which individuals and groups can accrue economic benefits from and through the state. At the broadest level, the Iranian economy cannot be said to be in a healthy state. The Iranian economy is structurally unhealthy. But the economy’s maladies are products of, and also contributing factors to, means of personal enrichment for those with the right political connections. There are a number of areas to focus on, including the strong connections between the state and bazaari merchants; the perverse consequences of resource curses such as overreliance on oil and rampant corruption; the state’s efforts at various welfare schemes and the impulse toward statist economics; and the processes and consequences of pulling back from statism through privatization. All of these developments have combined to undermine the economy’s developmental potential. They have also coalesced to provide multiple means of patronage and clientelism in which the state plays a critical facilitating role. As such, Iran’s economy, diseased and underperforming as it is, provides important sources of support and resilience for the state.

Late modernism in the US, lasting roughly from 1945 to 1960, is characterized by two simultaneous yet contradictory developments. In one, the techniques and, to a lesser extent, themes of international literary modernism continued to infuse America’s literary bloodstream, diversifying, spreading, and becoming part of the common artistic vocabulary, particularly for underground or countercultural movements. But at the same time, the major institutions of elite culture in the US such as publishers, universities, book-review magazines, and even foundations and the government gradually and then wholeheartedly adopted it in the 1950s and rewrote its history to create a kind of “official” modernism. If late modernism was a set of techniques bereft of a mission, Cold War modernism then voided the modernist project of any urgency or sociopolitical critique, reframing it as the highest expression of the self-satisfied liberal society that avant-garde modernism had always reviled.

The Medici family, through commercial and business ventures, attained considerable wealth and political sway in thirteenth century Florence. They also initiated the concept of patronage, providing sums of money to scientists to pursue their research; in fact, science philanthropy in the modern day resembles this Medici-esque patronage structure. Philanthropy can positively impact the research community, in part due to the flexibility of the funding structure it provides as well as the lack of political influence compared to public funding. They also have the flexibility to test new funding mechanisms that public funding bodies can later adopt, such as supporting individuals and not projects - in a way serving as a funding R&D project for future funding initiatives. However, the direction of research may also be skewed by vested interests from foundations and donors - as well as having other potentially negative downstream effects on the rate of progress. This chapter explores the complex role of philanthropy in setting the rate and direction of medical progress and provides solutions on how to improve their impact.

This chapter focuses on Maritain’s analysis of the ontological and epistemological foundations of human rights, and his wider hope for ‘practical agreement’ on the content of those rights. On the ontological front, I argue that such agreement is not forthcoming on the basis of natural teleology or eternal law. Neither of these secures assent across the world’s major religious or philosophical traditions. On the epistemological front, neither rationalism nor naturalism holds great promise. While Maritain upholds the naturalist alternative, his efforts devolve into a performative contradiction. For he hopes to rest agreement about human rights on ‘natural inclinations’, which, at the same time, he confines to the realm of the non-conceptual, non-rational and pre-conscious. This constitutes a markedly weak, even incoherent basis for agreement. The stage is set, therefore, for ‘new’ natural law theory, which proposes a non-ontological, purely rationalist foundation. I conclude that this too is an unpromising basis for agreement on rights. Instead, we need a new approach, one that privileges the deliverances of the social sciences and does not strive for universal consensus.

Chapter 15 contains an explanation of the basic rules and procedures contained in Article XIX of the GATT 1994, in the light of the developed requirements and rules contained in the Agreement on Safeguards. It is a summary that places most of the provisions of the Agreement on Safeguards in perspective with Article XIX as the starting point of the multilateral regime on safeguard measures.

This chapter is concerned with Germany’s perspective on the foundations and functions of international law. It is structured in two parts: international law in general and sources of international law. The first part deals with the notion of ‘rules-based order’ as brought forward by Federal Foreign Minister Heiko Maas. The term is understood to be broader than ‘international law’. It is argued that the same is putting at risk the principle of sovereign equality, while ultimately undermining the credibility of international law. Secondly, the first part focuses on Germany’s criticism of the United States’ approach to international law with respect to Israel’s occupation of certain Palestinian territories. The third topic addressed in the first part is Germany’s concept of an ‘Alliance for Multilateralism’, which is assessed as a rather loose and incoherent network of primarily European States. The second part discusses a ruling of the German Federal Constitutional Court concerning the state of necessity as a general principle of international law. The decision is grounded in the context of Argentina’s debt crisis. It is argued that the German Constitutional Court did not seize the opportunity to offer a substantive contribution to the question of State bankruptcy.

The relationship between Book I of Aristotle’s De Generatione et Corruptione to the rest of his writings on the physical world has been found puzzling. Aristotle’s first statement of its scope promises an account of very general principles of explanation. But the actual focus seems very restricted: theory of elements and of homoeomerous mixture. This study proceeds by examination of cross-references to and from other Aristotelian treatises. These reveal the reading order – the order of argument and exposition – that Aristotle intended for them. GC I presupposes readers already familiar with the cosmology and conceptual system expounded in the Physics, while in the other physical treatises the basic ideas of GC 1 are adapted and refined in explanations of more complex physical entities. GC 1 in fact provides three kinds of foundation: physical, conceptual, and teleological. The order Aristotle insists upon is directed towards a definite goal, the understanding of life and living things. It is not merely pedagogical. More likely it reflects a cosmic scale of values which grades living things as better than non-living, and knowledge of better things as a finer, more valuable kind of knowledge.

The accumulation of assets by charities enhances the risk of agency costs resulting from charity controllers shirking or acting in their own interests, such as by losing or misapplying accumulated funds or hoarding assets to increase their own prestige or job security. This chapter identifies that there is limited need for structural reform, although there may be some scope for improved administration by regulators so as to reduce agency costs. The chapter sketches key market mechanisms that work to reduce agency costs for many of the types of charities identified as potential sites of accumulation, such as universities, hospitals and fund-raising religious institutions. It then outlines the coordinated effect of the legal restraints discussed in Part II and considers whether there really are material gaps, particularly in jurisdictions such as Australia, the United Kingdom and New Zealand that have reformed their charity regulators. Finally, consideration is given to whether more coordinated action by existing regulators could fill any remaining gaps. Examples are provided from the United States, Canada, Australia and the United Kingdom.

Money talks when it comes to global justice, no less than elsewhere. But what does money say? And does that have any legitimate role in realizing global justice? The persistence of injustice in a world dominated by the wealthy suggest they should not be relied upon. This chapter discusses the formative agency of the global rich, corporations, and foundations. The formative agency of the rich is exercised in both their political influence, in choosing recipients of their charity, and on what terms. Justice requires the democratic extension of formative agency beyond the rich and toward the poor. The influence of corporations is felt in the Sustainable Development Goals and in networked climate governance. So long as corporations are hard-wired for profit their formative agency should be restricted on questions of justice. Foundations are increasingly prominent in global governance; the Gates Foundation distributes over $4 billion per year. Embedding foundations in deliberative democratic relationships would advance democratic legitimacy and accountability, while bringing different sorts of knowledge to their activities. Deliberative accountability should apply to all wealthy actors, whose capacity to decide what global justice means and requires should be counterbalanced by an active role for citizens, the global poor, civil society, and international organizations.

Israel is recognized as one of the most innovative countries in the world. According to the Bloomberg Index of Innovation, Israel stands at number five, while according to the Global Competitive Index, Israel ranks third in the innovation category. The country is now recognized around the world for its excellence in technology and as a center for high-tech entrepreneurship, especially in the area of information and communication technology. In this chapter, we first provide a brief historical perspective. We then provide background, summary, and trend data. We shed light on the quiet but important “high-tech” movement in the Israeli Arab sector. Finally, we examine key problems facing Israeli high tech and briefly discuss promising new frontiers for Israeli high tech.

Of all types of Greek benefaction, agonistic festivals – that is, festivals that revolved around athletic, dramatic or cultural contests – may have been the most central to the phenomenon of civic euergetism in the Greek cities of the Hellenistic and Roman period. Core questions of the chapter are: What was the significance of the fact that public festivals were paid and organised by private benefactors? Why did benefactors do this? And what was it that cities stood to gain? The main argument is that agonistic festivals were not simply an object of euergetism but also a medium through which euergetism evolved. They not only were an opportunity for elite benefactors (and athletes) to increase their prestige but were primarily mass events where benefactors and their communities were jointly involved in representing the central social, cultural and political values of the time.

Chapter 9, on siting and installation, considers some of the key steps leading to the successful installation of a wind energy project, whether a single machine or large array. A section on resource assessment considers site wind measurements, the IEC Wind Classification system, and the measure-correlate-predict (MCP) procedure for establishing long-term characteristics at a prospective site. Array interactions are described in terms of energy loss and increased turbulence: empirical models are given for predicting both effects, and wake influence is illustrated with field measurements from large and small arrays. The civil engineering aspects of project construction are examined, with description of different foundation types; simple rules are given for conventional gravity base design, with illustrations. The construction and environmental advantages of rock anchor foundations are described, and some examples are given. Transport, access, and crane operations are discussed. The use of winch erection is illustrated with the example of a 50kW machine. The chapter concludes with a short summary of the necessary electrical infrastructure between a wind turbine and the external grid network.