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State islam and tribes facing international organizations. The case of Afghanistan 1978-1998. This paper analyses the confrontation of society, state and tribes with an omnipresent actor in the Afghan crisis : the UN agencies and other international organizations (IO). We intend to show in which way this actor is a factor of change and social recomposition, and how the different political parties, commanders and factions brought into play strategies of adaptation and resistance. Till the advent of the Talihan (1994), the IO were put in the following contradiction : although they identify themselves with the universal and egalitarian principles, they are forced to interact with local pettychiefs of regional powers. These latter share with them at best, only the discourse of democracy and human rights. The paper concludes that the Talihan and the IO are at variance both about the priorities and the finalities of humanitarian programmes and about their underlying philosophies. The formers tolerate the presence of the seconds for pragmatic reasons or in order to obtain international recognition., Centlivres Pierre, Centlivres-Demont Micheline. État, islam et tribus face aux organisations internationales. Le cas de l'Afghanistan, 1978-1998. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 54ᵉ année, N. 4, 1999. pp. 945-965.

Game Theory and Historical Institutional Analysis: Self-Enforcing, Non-Market Institutions During the Late Medieval Period. A. Greif. Recent development of game theory has enabled expanding the analysis of historical institutions to examine self-enforcing, non-market institutions. This paper provides a brief methodological discussion of Historical Institutional Analysis that utilizes game theory for the study of such institutions. To illustrate the methodology, contributions, and potential benefit of this approach, the paper briefly discusses recent works applying this methodology to the study of institutions during the late medieval period. Particular attention is given to these studies' implications regarding institutional efficiency and path dependance., Greif Avner. Théorie des jeux et analyse historique des institutions. Les institutions économiques du Moyen Âge. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 53ᵉ année, N. 3, 1998. pp. 597-633.

Economic Rationality and Rationalization of Production in Russia. 1892-1930. The paper analyzes two generations of Russian economists specialized in peasant economy. In particular, the author tries to point out the main categories of the economic analysis : market, progress, work, property. Economic rationality as an expression of the ideal world of the economist is the crucial notion. Rationality is opposed to rationalization, i.e an administrative project of economic reforms. In this context, the author analyzes the use of economical and statistical knowledge by bureaucracy. Third, the paper tries to elucidate the impact of economic knowledge and economic policies on the peasantry. By this way, the main turning points of Russian history between 1890 and 1930 are discussed. Questions on the contemporary use of "economic rationality" in economics (in developed as well as less developed countries) are equally raised., Stanziani Alessandro. Rationalité économique et rationalisation de la production en Russie. 1892-1930. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 51ᵉ année, N. 1, 1996. pp. 215-239.

The monetary value of things. Non religious purposes of Roman law. This paper concerns the monetary value of goods in ancient Roman law. In order to understand the nature of such a legal process, it could be useful to take into account the status of things which can not be given a monetary value, in particular the res sacrae. By antithesis, they give us an access to the understanding of the ordinary world where things can be priced, valued, and traded. It can be stressed that the value of goods imposes itself most clearly during the civil trial, when the decision which has to be enforced sets aside the "thing itself" to only consider its monetary equivalent. To be sentenced to the "thing itself" (res ipsa) and not to its monetary value, occurred only for these sacred or public goods, which overall appear to be the only real things in the eye of law: things which cannot be valued., Est proposée ici une analyse du régime juridique de la valeur des choses en droit romain. Pour comprendre un tel régime, un détour par les choses inestimables est nécessaire : le régime des biens sacrés notamment. Ce régime d'exception fait comprendre, par antithèse, le droit ordinaire de toutes les autres choses qui s'évaluent, s'estiment et s'échangent. Or, la valeur des choses apparaît le plus clairement dans les procès, où la condamnation ne porte jamais sur les choses mêmes, mais sur leur estimation monétaire. La condamnation à la « chose même » (res ipsa) plutôt qu'à son équivalent pécuniaire n'est attestée que pour ces biens publics ou sacrés, qui sont en définitive les seules choses irréductiblement concrètes du droit : les seules choses inévaluables., Thomas Yan. La valeur des choses. Le droit romain hors la religion. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 57ᵉ année, N. 6, 2002. pp. 1431-1462.

Incomparable or identical twins? Renouncers in Hinduism and in Islam. For centuries in India, Hindu and Muslim renouncers have been designated by the same Arabic word faqîr, which means "poor". This is one of the many similarities between Hinduism and Islam which have been ignored by sociological theories such as that of Louis Dumont: they insisted on constructing completely opposite models of two religions, the first one being described as fundamentally hierarchical, and the second one — unduly assimilated to Christianity — as entirely equalitarian. In order to make comparison possible and to account for historically attested similarities, this paper first points out to the dead-locks these theories lead to. The second part investigates the mystical market in Medieval India and bring out hagiographical, historical and juridical evidence to show how competing renouncers of the two religious communities had so many features in common that they could be interchangeable. This evidence compelled us in the third part to recast the sociological approach: following Max Weber, it is argued that Hinduism and Islam have comparable conceptions of renunciation; on this point, Islam should not be assimilated to Christianity which raises specific problems., Depuis des siècles, les renonçants hindous et musulmans ont été désignés en Inde par le même terme arabe faqîr, qui signifie pauvre. C'est l'une des ressemblances entre hindous et musulmans qui ont été ignorées par les théories sociologiques, comme celle de Louis Dumont: elles ont construit des modèles complètement opposés des deux religions, la première étant décrite comme fondamentalement hiérarchique, et la seconde — indûment assimilée au christianisme -, comme intégralement égalitariste. Pour permettre la comparaison, et rendre compte des ressemblances historiquement attestées, cet article commence par attirer l'attention sur les impasses auxquelles conduisent de telles théories. La seconde partie étudie le marché mystique de l'Inde médiévale et produit des preuves hagiographiques, historiques et juridiques attestant que les renonçants des deux religions avaient de si nombreux traits communs qu'ils pouvaient être interchangeables. Ce qui nous a conduit, dans la troisième partie, à refondre l'approche sociologique. Nous inspirant de Max Weber, nous arguons que l'hindouisme et l'islam ont des conceptions comparables du renoncement: l'islam ne doit pas, sur ce point, être assimilé au christianisme, qui soulève des problèmes spécifiques., Gaborieau Marc. Incomparables ou vrais jumeaux ? Les renonçants dans l'hindouisme et dans l'Islam. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 57ᵉ année, N. 1, 2002. pp. 71-92.

Chiapas 1993. Analysis of an insurrectional situation. The paper analyses the situation of Chiapas on the eve of the Indian uprising that broke out in this South-Eastern State of Mexico at the beginning of 1994. Using different variables such as the agrarian structure, the demographic pressure, the social relations, the public policies, the agencies of mobilization, the political mediation and the mode of development, the analysis points out the contribution and the limitations of the structural theories as well as those of the theories of collective behaviour which pretend to explain the insurrectional phenomenon. The conclusion shows how difficult it is to forecast the occurrence of this phenomenon and thus to answer the social demand that leads to set again the insurrection on the agenda of the social research., L'article analyse la situation du Chiapas à la veille de l'insurrection indienne qui a éclaté dans cet État du sud-est du Mexique au début de 1994. Faisant intervenir diverses variables telles que la structure foncière, la pression démographique, les relations sociales, les politiques publiques, les agences de mobilisation, les médiations politiques et le mode de développement, l'analyse signale les apports ainsi que les limites des théories structurelles et des théories des comportements collectifs qui prétendent rendre compte du phénomène insurrectionnel. Elle conclut à la difficulté de prévoir l'occurrence de ce phénomène et de répondre ainsi à la demande sociale qui tend à remettre l'insurrection à l'ordre du jour de la recherche en sciences sociales., Favre Henri. Chiapas 1993. Tentative d'analyse d'une situation insurrectionnelle. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 57ᵉ année, N. 5, 2002. pp. 1251-1289.

Kinship and Landed Property in the Modern Era: a Reinterpretation. Landed property transfers in European rural societies at the end of Middle Ages and in the modern era are often to be examined in connection with the kinship relations between the authors of the transfers. This paper suggests that a better understanding of these issues can be gained from a new formulation of the very terms in which they are usually addressed. Since kinship does not play the same role in all parts of Europe and has different implications in various rural societies, which have their own inheritance practices and modes of social reproduction, its influence on property transactions requires a manifold analysis. For instance, the circumstances which determine such transfers as well as the land price-setting practices also need to be studied. Among the wide variety of local conditions, two opposites "models" can be traced. They each represent a specific answer to the questions of land-pricing transactions and reflect specific relations among kin — collaterals and relatives in ascending and descending lines — with respect to land., Parenté et marché foncier à l'époque moderne : une réinterprétation (B. Derouet). Les analyses du marché foncier consacrées aux sociétés rurales européennes de la fin du Moyen âge et de l'époque moderne sont amenées à s'intéresser particulièrement à l'articulation entre ces transferts et les relations de parenté qui peuvent exister entre les acteurs de l'échange. Il sera suggéré ici qu'une meilleure compréhension de ces problèmes passe par une reformulation des termes mêmes dans lesquels la question est généralement posée. Dans la mesure où les relations de parenté ne tiennent pas partout la même place et sont utilisées selon des voies spécifiques dans les différentes sociétés rurales — notamment en rapport avec la variété des pratiques d'héritage et des modes de reproduction sociale — , l'étude de leur interférence avec le marché foncier nécessite elle-même une analyse plurielle. Cela concerne aussi bien les circonstances qui donnent lieu à de tels transferts, que le problème de la formation du prix de la terre en pareil cas. Tout en tenant compte de l'infinie variété des situations locales, deux « modèles » opposés peuvent être mis en lumière à cet égard. Chacun d'eux représente une réponse particulière au problème du prix des transactions foncières, et traduit des modalités spécifiques des relations entre parents, tant entre collatéraux qu'entre ascendants et descendants, au sujet de la terre., Derouet Bernard. Parenté et marché foncier à l'époque moderne : une réinterprétation. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 56ᵉ année, N. 2, 2001. pp. 337-368.

The Historical Bases of American Economiec Leadership. G. Wright. The economic pre-eminence of the USA is one of the dominant facts of twentieth century world history, often taken as so self-evident and inevitable as to require no explanation. This paper argues to the contrary, that American economic leadership was far from inevitable, and indeed poses a challenge to historical understanding. Geographic size and natural resources were not in themselves advantageous, but they became so through the rise of an indigenous national technological community or network, engaged in adapting European technologies to the American environment. This proposition is illustrated with accounts of the so-called "American system of manufactures", and of minerals as a knowledge industry. These two sectors laid the institutional foundations for the science-based industries ofthe twentieth century. American economic performance demonstrates the power of increasing returns to scale, as depicted in the models from the "new" or endogenous growth theory. But the effective economic scale of the US national economy was itself the cultural and institutional product of Amercian history., Wright Gavin, Reffait Christophe. Les fondements historiques de la domination économique américaine. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 53ᵉ année, N. 3, 1998. pp. 539-567.

Taxation and the Mobilization of the Agricultural Surplus during Stalinist era. R.C. Allen. Did the collectivization of agriculture contribute to Soviet capital formation by mobilizing the agricultural surplus? While many historians have supported this view, it has been challenged by revisionists who claim that there was never a net flow of commodities from agriculture to the rest of the economy and that agriculture's terms of trade actually improved during the First Five Year Plan since the inflation of prices on the collective farm market outweighed the effects of the low prices paid for state procurements. This paper proposes new calculations of agriculture's trade balance that show that it was, indeed, a net supplier of resources and that those resources financed the investment drive of the 1930s. A computable general equilibrium model is used to assess intersectoral linkages. These simulations show that rapid industrialisation would have been possible without collectivization, but that collectivization did accelerate industrial growth by depressing peasant incomes and increasing the rate of rural urban migration. The key contribution of collectivization was the mobilization of labour surplus, not surplus grain., Allen Robert C. Imposition et mobilisation du surplus agricole à l'époque stalinienne. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 53ᵉ année, N. 3, 1998. pp. 569-595.

The Dead-Ends of Economic Policy at the Era of Financial Markets. F. Lordon. Because economics is unable to provide certain statements, agents' action must rely on "home-made " substitution knowledge. This one is in fact a collective product, named hereafter a referential. The referential is a corpus of representations which provides a synoptic view of the working of the economy and helps agents to make themselves an idea of what is "good" or "bad" for them. Mixing pieces of academic theory, more or less ideological statements and various beliefs, the referential is built in the interplay of multiple institutional talks. The referential allows to settle an economic policy norm, whereas multiple such norms were a priori possible. The present paper tries to show how such an economic policy norm is self-stabilizing because of self-fulfilling prophecies effects, but how nevertheless it can be driven to crisis as soon as doubts or critics on its relevance reappear. It is suggested that since the beginning of the 90's, the French economic policy is faced with a return of multiple equilibria of norm: in short the so-called "desinflation competitive" vs the "other policy". Because of the competition between these two norms, the decisions of economic policy may be quite indeterminate. It is proposed that not all the societies are able, as the German is, to build the hermeneutic and semiotic devices which permit to contain indeterminacy on a long term horizon., Lordon Frédéric. Les apories de la politique économique à l'époque des marchés financiers. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 52ᵉ année, N. 1, 1997. pp. 157-187.

Exact Measurements and Nomadic Instruments: Scientists on the Move and a New Experience of the World in the Enlightenment. M.-N. Bourguet et C. Licoppe. This paper is focused on the various instruments and measuring devices that travellers took with them to the top of mountains, such as barometers, thermometers, hygrometers and other meteorological devices. It aims at investigating the transformation of instrumental practices by scientific travellers and natural philosophers between the late 17th century and the end of the 18th century. Focusing our attention particularly on thermometric and barometric measurements, we intend to analyse how measuring and quantifying practices were related to philosophical assumptions about order in nature, and how within the new ethos of precision and accuracy they contributed, in turn, to reshape the perception of nature and the relationship between man and nature., Bourguet Marie-Noëlle, Licoppe Christian. Voyages, mesures et instruments : une nouvelle expérience du monde au Siècle des lumières. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 52ᵉ année, N. 5, 1997. pp. 1115-1151.

Maurice Halbwachs and cities (1908-1912). An Inquiry in the Social History of the Social Sciences. C. Topalov. Halbwachs was both a sociologist of Durkheim's school and a socialist "intellectual". Through his involvement in Albert Thomas' network he was related to the urban reformers who were then inventing "urbanisme", the French version of town planning. This paper is intended to document those various social positions of the scientist and to see how they can account for the very content of his early work about cities. It appears that the scientific programme of Halbwachs' 1909 doctoral dissertation on Expropriations and Land Prices in Paris (1860-1900) rests on a twofold basis: first, the methodological controversies in which the Durkheimians were involved with historians and economists in the context of a fight for institutionalizing sociology in humanities and law faculties; second, Halbwachs' specific construction of the city as an object for sociology can be related to the contemporary emergence of a new perspective on reform of both the urban built environment and workers' mores., Topalov Christian. Maurice Halbwachs et les villes (1908-1912). Une enquête d'histoire sociale des sciences sociales. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 52ᵉ année, N. 5, 1997. pp. 1057-1083.

Aboriginality, Race and the State: The Minority Debate and National Hegemony in Australia. A. A. Yengoyan. This paper examines the status of Aboriginal Australians in relation to post-contact history and the development of the national Australian State. Traditional Aboriginal essentialisms of blood and land persist across this time span and define critical arenas in which cultural, economic and political aspects of the contemporary minority debate occur. The long standing silence on the role of the Aboriginal populations within this history of Aboriginal and European contact is being broken by both Aboriginals and scholars. It is argued here that blood (race), and the spirituality which Aboriginals endow to place and space—land—are traditional cultural foundations that provide the basis of Aboriginality as an ideology and a highly visible political culture. Blood is a pivotal, essential and irreductible factor in what constitutes Aboriginality; land is the source of all being and existence, and the return to ancestral lands and tracks is vital for all Aboriginal peoples. Thus, land rights issues and policies, most recently the "Marbo " decisions, are at the center of the assertion of Aboriginal identity and political activism and are manifest at local, national, and global levels, and it is local essentialisms, such as blood and land, which cement and bind societies to their past and define their future., Yengoyan Aram A., Gaviano Marie-Pierre. L'aborigène, la race et l'État. Débat sur les minorités et hégémonie nationale en Australie. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 52ᵉ année, N. 3, 1997. pp. 621-631.

This paper examines the new rhetoric and policy of 'democratic' association that emergea1 in Dakar after World War I. New threats to French authority—the election of Biaise Diagne and revolts throughout AOF against conscription—along with a shift to the rightin France, led administrators in the 1920s to reformulate the politique indigene followed since 1895. The legitimate aspirations of old and new African elites for power were now to be met by associating them in decision-making. Ostensibly a liberalizing move, association in fact was fundamentally backwards-looking, seeking to contain the African ambitions that Dakar's prewar policies had unwittingly unleashed., Conklin Alice L. « Democracy » Rediscovered : Civilization through Association in French West Africa (1914-1930). In: Cahiers d'études africaines, vol. 37, n°145, 1997. pp. 59-84.

Piety and the Demand for Art after the Black Death. S. K. Cohn. From over 500 artistic commissions found scattered through thousands of last wills and testaments in Tuscany and Umbria, this paper draws new conclusions about art production after the Black Death of 1348. The "notable disturbances " in painting magisterially discussed by Millard Meiss and other art historians, I argue, were not the results of new waves of pessimism spawned by the plague's unprecedented mortalities. Rather, the opposite was the case. With the recurrence of plague in the late Trecento patricians and plebeians alike broke from the grip of mendicant piety and sought out new ways to memorialize themselves and, more importantly, their male lineages. This flood of new patrons to the art market conditioned new workshop practices, leading to that "strict uniformity and regimentation of figures" that Meiss and others have interpreted as "a return to the Dugento. ", Cohn Samuel K., Fabre Pierre-Antoine. Piété et commande d'œuvres d'art après la Peste noire. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 51ᵉ année, N. 3, 1996. pp. 551-573.

The Byzantine Image Production and Practices. The article first examines the "schism of images", i.e the moment when Carolingian Europe and Byzantium (mostly after the Triumph of Orthodoxy of 843) started on producing and practicing religious images according to different theological principles. The miracles set apart, to be looked at was perhaps the main function of the byzantine image, and at the same time, a procedure used by the Church authority in order to control the religious attitudes and conducts. Once related to the exercice of power, the production of images and the organization of the practices involved by the images is analyzed, in the last section of the paper, by means of two particular examples of the fourteenth century, from the St Nicholas Church of Curtea de Arges (Vallachia)., Barbu Daniel. L'image byzantine : production et usages. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 51ᵉ année, N. 1, 1996. pp. 71-92.

Condorcet. Two other Paradoxes. At the occasion of the republication of "Mémoires sur les monnaies" (Memoirs concerning Money) of 1790 and of "Discours sur les finances" (Discourse on Finance) of 1792, several apparently contradictory scenarios appear in these texts by Condorcet. They regard the choice of the bi-metallic monetary regime and the inflationary effects of the issuing of paper money during the revolutionary period. What would seem paradoxical from the point of view of logician becomes much less so when one envisages the man of action engaged in combat for justice as much as for truth. If we place Condorcet's argument within its context, we see the true nature of economic reasoning at the moment when it was affirming itself as scientific discourse. This discourse which belonged to the moral and political sciences is fundamentally normative; it defines itself by process of trial and error in accordance with the commitments of its author, adapts its argumentation to the evolving circumstances and, what is more, ends up by creating its own truth., Gillard Lucien. Condorcet, deux autres paradoxes ?. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 51ᵉ année, N. 1, 1996. pp. 201-214.

Memory Repressed. Russia and its Stalinian Past. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the reasons for the psychological repression of Stalinism in post-communist Russia. Condemned to be forgotten by the regime, the memory of the Stalinian tragedy was only able to be reconstructed under perestroika. Starting in 1990 however, the doubt cast upon the October Revolution led to new psychological repression of Stalinism. The new representation of the past which then affirmed itself in the Liberal-democratic public opinion was constructed around mythicization of pre-revolutionary Russia. Consolatory and gratifying this image imposed itself upon the society quite rapidly because it facilitated an affranchisement from the collective guilt-feelings engendered by the weight of past too heavy to be carried., Ferretti Maria. La mémoire refoulée. La Russie devant le passé stalinien. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 50ᵉ année, N. 6, 1995. pp. 1237-1257.

(From Testimory to History, from Victims to Martyrs. The Birth of Democracy in Kinshasa). — Qualitative analysis of représentations, based on personal narratives, helps to restore political meaning of ordinary people's actions and opens the way to participatory democracy. Extracting the story of someone's participation in a political event from that person's life story helps avoiding the pur-poseful overpoliticisation of the account offered on the spot. The paper analyses the process of people's appropriation of politics through the personal narrative of Christians' March (February 16, 1992) in Kinshasa, the most important street demonstration against the self perpetuation of the Zairian Second Republic. Once invested by Christian symbols, the narration transforms victims into martyrs. As martyrs, they became founding heros of the people's political participation. As custodians of their memory, ordinary men and women became political actors., Résumé Le récit de vie autorise une analyse qualitative des représentations qui servent à donner aux activités des individus ordinaires un sens politique, ouvrant ainsi la voie à la démocratie. Le contexte d'un récit de vie permet de minimiser la surpolitisation volontaire d'un récit produit à partir d'un événement politique. Tiré d'une histoire de vie, ce récit d'une participation à la marche des chrétiens du 16 février 1992, la plus grande manifestation publique de l'opposition à l'auto-reproduction du régime politique de la deuxième République zaïroise permet d'analyser le processus d'appropriation d'un geste politique par les acteurs sociaux. Il montre comment la mise en récit d'un événement investit celui-ci d'une symbolique chrétienne. Pour les victimes transformées ainsi en martyrs, on revendique la qualité de héros fondateurs de l'activité politique du peuple. Cultiver leur mémoire induit le passage du souvenir à l'histoire et entraîne alors une revendication de participation active à l'ordre politique., Jewsiewicki Bogumil, Mbuyamba Flory-Kante, Mwadi Wa Ngombu Marie Daniella. Du témoignage à l'histoire, des victimes au martyrs : la naissance de la démocratie à Kinshasa. In: Cahiers d'études africaines, vol. 35, n°137, 1995. La démocratie déclinée. pp. 209-235.

History as State-Run Institution the Soviet Archives. The Soviet archives are from their constitution the result of project to write the history of communism in Soviet Russia. In this paper the mechanism which guided the conservation of historical documents in the USSR is analysed, on the assumption that there is homophony between State historiography and the collection of data, in other words between library and archives. The Russian archives were formerly an institution destined to provide confidential information to State civil servants. After the October revolution they were transformed into research centers controlled by the Party. These new institutions anticipated the utilisation of new source of history memory which was immediately integrated into the actual practice of writing history., Salomoni Antonella. Un savoir historique d'État : les archives soviétiques. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 50ᵉ année, N. 1, 1995. pp. 3-27.

The Sugar Industry, the Sugarcane Roller Mill and Sino-Portuguese Relations from the XVIth to XVIIIth Centuries. Many questions have been raised with respect to the origins of the rolling mill, type of sugarcane mill which by replacing the ancient technology of the edge runner and the beam presses in the xvnth century helped to speed up the process by which sugar cane is crushed and thus to favor the boom in the world sugar industry. This paper reexamines this question since it has come to light in the past few years that the promoters of this invention could be, in fact, the Chinese. A detailed comparison between the Chinese mill and the Brazilian mill shows, on the one hand, that the two machines are quite distinct and suggests, on the other hand, that problems with regard to technological innovation cannot be treated without taking into account the specific social context of each society. Thus for example in China, sugar, which has been produced long before it had in Europe, was not valued on the same basis as in Europe. Furthermore in China white sugar was not so much appreciated until the XVIth cen- tury. The evolution of its status seems linked to the pressures of the international market, after China had come into contact with her Asian neighbors via the Portuguese. At the end of the XVIth century, the Chinese sugar provinces of Guangdong and Fujian are going to produce very white sugar specially for exportation and if the clientele is rapidly satisfied it is because the Chinese possess technique for sugar whitening claying which the Portuguese will only introduce into the West later on. Between the xvith and xvnth century the Chinese sugar activity will experience an unprecedented development, but will rapidly lose energy, without resulting in more advanced stage of industrialisation. Traditional networks of production of artisanal and unrefined sugar meanwhile will continue to function., Sabban Françoise. L'industrie sucrière, le moulin à sucre et les relations sino-portugaises aux XVIe-XVIIIe siècles. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 49ᵉ année, N. 4, 1994. pp. 817-861.

The Changing Face of Judaism : On the Jewish Beard and the Construction of its Meanings. The present paper explores the range of meanings associated with the Jewish beard in Europe, the Mediterranean countries, and the Middle East between the ninth and eighteenth centuries and the processes through which those meanings were constructed. Although classical Jewish law prohibited shaving with razor it did not require that the Jew wears his beard conspicuously long or untrimmed. Where Jews cultivated such an appearance such as in the Maghreb and the Muslim or Byzantine East it was due no less to the cultural values of the surrounding environment in which the beard functioned as badge of masculine honor than to the demands of Jewish tradition. In those same areas the kabbalists were able to endow the beard with an additional dimension of mystical meaning regarding it as symbol of divine splendor which was not to be tampered with in any way. Not surprisingly where the beard was most venerated it was also most subject to violent attack or punitive removal. In medieval Christian Europe by contrast most Jews opted not to grow their beards in pronounced manner. This did not prevent Christians from making use of the beard as symbol of the Jew and his otherness. Jews and Christians travelling to the East or the Holy Land would sometimes grow their beards there but remove them upon returning to Europe apparently so as not to be perceived as an alien Other. The meanings of the Jewish beard were never determined by the Jews alone nor by the cultures in which they lived but through dynamic interactions on both the social and discursive levels., Horowitz Elliott, Rozenbaumas Isabelle. Visages du judaïsme : de la barbe en monde juif et de l'élaboration de ses significations. In: Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 49ᵉ année, N. 5, 1994. pp. 1065-1090.

Y. Person — Long-Distance Trade in Precolonial Africa as a Factor of Social Diversification. While Y. Person supports Roberts on his appreciation of Hopkins' Economie History, he critieizes him for his neglect of the importance of trading and mining in a number of stateless societies. In Lovejoy's paper on kola, he finds faults only with a few linguistic points which tend to overstress the role of Mandingo peoples in this trade., Person Yves. Le commerce à longue distance dans l'Ouest africain précolonial comme facteur de diversification sociale.. In: Cahiers d'études africaines, vol. 20, n°77-78, 1980. pp. 169-171.

C. Becker — The Precolonial Period in Senegambia, i^th to i8th Century. A status artis of historical research on Senegambia: the problem of sources—archives, written documents, oral tradition, archaeology—; chronology and the division into significant periods and sub-periods; a survey of extant and potential materials, including economie, agricultural, commercial, linguistic, religious and, more generally, sociological data. A provisional and partial division into periods based upon the evolution of the slave trade is proposed and contrasted with one founded upon the decline and fall of native hegemonies. The paper ends with a catalogue of tasks which deserve to be given priority in order to produce a genuine Senegalese history., Becker Charles. Histoire de la Sénégambie du XVe au XVIIIe siècle : un bilan.. In: Cahiers d'études africaines, vol. 25, n°98, 1985. pp. 213-242.

M. Houseman, B. Legonou, C. Massy & X. Crepin — Note on the Evolving Structure of a Historical City: The Case of Abomey (Popular Republic of Benin). An ethnological survey of land rights in the historical town of Abomey provides the basis for a conception of urban space as a total phenomenon corresponding to an overall evolving pattern. The paper is an attempt to show that the present organization and the past development of the city are underlaid by a generai dynamics systematically associating an incorporation of foreign elements, at the bottom of the social scale, with an exclusion of autochthonous ones, at the summit. This ongoing process in founded upon kinship and residence relationships, mediated by religious phenomena, with a central reference to royalty., Houseman Michael, Legonou Blandine, Massy Christianne, Crepin Xavier. Note sur la structure évolutive d'une ville historique. L'exemple d'Abomey (République populaire du Bénin). In: Cahiers d'études africaines, vol. 26, n°104, 1986. pp. 527-546.

D. Poitou—Juvenile Delinquency and Urbanization in Niger and Nigeria. Among the factors contributing to the growth of juvenile delinquency in West Africa, urbanization and the change from a traditional to an urban way of life play an essential role. The first part of this paper shows why delinquency is a primarily urban phenomenon and how the city per se can be considered as crime-generating. The sharply contrasted examples of Niger and Nigeria, at the opposite ends of the urbanization spectrum, reveal the operation of the processes which contribute to the worsening of unbalance and dysfunction in a context of uncontrolled urban growth. In both countries, in spite of their different characteristics, it seems that urban juvenile delinquency is chiefly the resuit of an anomic situation stemming from the disruption of traditional family and community life., Poitou Danielle. Délinquance juvénile et urbanisation au Niger et au Nigeria.. In: Cahiers d'études africaines, vol. 21, n°81-83, 1981. Villes africaines au microscope. pp. 111-127.

T HE last generation of research has brought impressive progress in our knowledge of millenarian movements. There has been a long series of individual monographs and, more recently, a number of comparative and synthetic works (1). This research has had two foci: 1) the syncretistic chiliasm of the uncivilized peoples of Asia, Africa, Oceania, and the Americas; 2) millenarian movements within the prophetic, revelatory high religions Judaism, Islam, and Christianity. In either case, millenarianism appears as something external to, or lying on the fringe of, advanced industrial society. It has, however, been suggested that ( there are secular millenial equivalents within these advanced societies * (2). In this paper, I propose to discuss one example, namely the Social Credit movement which arose in Alberta, one of the Western provinces of Canada, in the midst of the Great Depression. After a brief gestation, Social Credit became a fullfledged political party, won a sweeping victory in the provincial election of 1985, and formed the provincial government for the next 36 years. I will analyze the origins and early years of the movement in order to demonstrate the detailed parallels with recognized millenarian patterns of behaviour.