Open Borders Research Articles

Korupcija kao poticaj za iseljavanje iz Hrvatske

This paper represents an initial step in testing the correlation between corruption and state capture on the one side and emigration as a consequence on the other. The study is based on our qualitative and quantitative research conducted in Germany on a sample of 1734 recently emigrated Croatians from 2016 to 2020 and on our new research on corruption and clientelism as a push factor for emigration from Croatia. The primary hypothesis is that migration and corruption trends are correlated and that with the growth of the emigration of young workers from Croatia, the corruption rate in the country increases even more. The second part of the research was conducted on a sample of small, medium and large companies throughout Croatia. Requests to participate were sent to 2500 companies in all Croatian counties, and 178 companies responded. The questions intended to assess so-called “state capture” in Croatia according to a concept developed by Hellman et al. (2000). We measured the capture of the judiciary, the executive and the legislature in the Republic of Croatia and the perception of bribery, corruption and clientelism in companies. Results: nepotism 71%, bribery 66%, rigging public tenders 93% significantly disrupt business. Companies rate the Government, Parliament and the judiciary as the worst public services. As many as 59% of companies believe that the Croatian judiciary is corrupt. Among the measures that companies unconditionally support are the revision of transformation and privatisation (82%) and the examination of the origin of assets (76%). The study results undoubtedly show that Croatia is even more corrupt today (2022) than it was as a non-EU member. The opening of borders has certainly facilitated emigration from Croatia, but this paper shows that emigration would not be so intense if the state and the society were not “captured”.

Islamic Higher Education as a Part of Kazakhs’ Cultural Revival

Kazakhstan is currently going through a phase of national and cultural renaissance. This began in the 90s when political and spiritual independence had been obtained. The process of national or cultural revival entails a shift in the paradigm, a reevaluation of prior ideas, and a return to long-forgotten customs, beliefs, or traditions that are distinctive to contemporary Kazakhstani culture. Undoubtedly, a return to religious origins via freedom from the burden of the Soviet ideology of atheism and the expansion of Islamic education is the fundamental trend in the development of national-cultural awareness. Kazakhstan has experienced a spiritual vacuum because of the rapid shift from the ban on religion to religious freedom. This has resulted in a surge in the number of religious denominations and religious organizations in the nation and the emergence of radical movements. The issue is particularly significant for the post-USSR nations that are now experiencing hardships. Evidence of this is shown in two ways: (1). many people in the CIS countries have begun to show a keen interest in religious values and traditions, and (2). new sociopolitical and socio-cultural realities brought about by the fall of communism and the dissolution of the USSR have sparked the growth of national consciousness and altered spiritual guiding principles in the post-Soviet society, particularly in Kazakhstani society. The establishment of relations with the Muslim and non-Muslim world has incorporated the opening of borders, allowed missionaries to enter freely, and allowed current citizens to go abroad for religious education and general education in both religious and non-religious-oriented countries. In addition, the liberal legislation in relation to religion in general in the early 2000s opened up new horizons for representatives of religious and pseudo-religious communities. Therefore, religious education, namely Islamic, given that population of the state is predominantly Muslim, is an absolute necessity.

Topical issues of drug addiction criminological characteristics in Ukraine

It has been noted that drug addiction is a person’s mental and physical dependence on narcotic substances that occurs as a result of systematic drug use. In the course of drug addiction, a pathological dependence on any narcotic substance develops, which is accompanied by physical and mental addiction to the drug, which in turn negatively affects the psychophysiological functioning of the body.
 It has been argued that the key problems of drug addiction in Ukraine are the following: socio-economic problems in the country; insufficient preventive work among the population; perception of drugs as a means of social interaction; lack of alternatives in solving personal problems; unproductive justice system; high level of corruption; low level of self-awareness; open borders.
 It has been stated that the criminological characteristic of drug addiction in Ukraine can be revealed through a combination of the following factors: drug addiction is a factor that contributes to the commission of crimes in order to obtain funds to buy drugs; drug addiction causes changes in the behaviour and thinking of the addict, and therefore may lead to an increase in the likelihood of committing crimes; it may be the cause of violence or other crimes, as it promotes aggressive behaviour and reduces inhibition; it reduces the social adaptation of the addict, which increases the likelihood that the person will become a criminal; drug addiction can cause a loss of control over one's own behaviour and a decrease in self-esteem, which, in turn, is a determining factor in crime.
 It has been summarised that crime and drug addiction are directly interrelated, which requires a comprehensive approach to counteract them. To combat this problem, it is necessary not only to provide medical care for drug addicts, but also to develop social and criminal policies that will help reduce the spread of drug addiction and the number of crimes committed.

Why do Labour Migrants Cross their Border? : A Comparative Analysis between Nepal and India

Cross-border labour migration is the livelihood strategy between Nepal and India for a long. The purpose of this research is to compare and contrast the causes of cross-border labor migration between Nepal and India, with a particular focus on Nepal’s Sudurpaschim Province. Research is designed inthe post-positivism paradigm, using a mixed method with a strong emphasis on quantitative methods, i.e. QUAN-qual mixing. Field survey and Key Informant Interview (KII) including Focus Group Discussions (FGD) were conducted. The sample size was determined statistically where 370 samples (Nepali labour-migrants to India) and 280 samples (Indian labour-migrants to Nepal) were calculated. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics for both groups of migrants and then compared between Nepali labour migrants to India and Indian labour migrants to Nepal. The main causes of labour migration between Nepal and India are observed as a short distance, easy entry exit, open border, social net work, travel cost, easily communicable, language similarities, climate match and migration decision. The job insecurity and irregularities of getting employment at origin seems major pushing factors in case of Nepali labour migrants but in case of Indian labour migrants, they choose their destination for better opportunities. About 93.0 percent of Nepali labour-migrants and 100 percent of Indian labour-migrants are migrated due to economic causes (i.e. lack of better opportunities, unemployment, poverty) while seven percent of Nepali labour-migrants are found migrate due to the political conflict in Nepal. The result of this study is applicable to understand the current situation of cross border labour migrants which can be supportive to develop the new strategies for economic and safer migration between two countries.

China-Pakistan Economic Corridor: A Comprehensive Guide to Enhancing Economic and National Security, Stability, and Sustainability

A strong economy is the backbone of a strong nation. Pakistan has experienced security challenges since the beginning that has shifted its attention to defense, which diverted its focus from economic stability. And from the standpoint of independence, Pakistan has territorial disputes with neighboring countries such as Afghanistan and India. This has made it difficult for the country to maintain strong trade relations with them and has hindered diplomatic relations with Pakistan. Programs like China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) have provided the country with an opportunity to improve its economic conditions. The CPEC can be a game changer for Pakistan. It is a project of regional connectivity, a part of China's Belt and Road initiative (BRI) This would assist not just Pakistan but also Iran, Afghanistan, and Central Asian countries and in some way Middle Eastern states. Under this program, these countries will have improved roads, railways, air transportation, and the frequent and free exchange of goods so that they will have open borders like European countries as a result of which Pakistan will have less security issues and more economic opportunities. Pakistan's current budget (2022-23) allocates 58 percent of its budget to loan repayment and defense, the remaining 42%(News, 2022) is very less for making the country stable or sustainable. The CPEC is a long-term program that will help Pakistan achieve economic and national stability and sustainability. The CPEC model is a win scenario that will result in a linked and integrated area that shares harmony and growth.

Moral Bushwhacking and Political Quantrellism: Thomas Ewing Jr. and the Clamor of Guerrilla Politics

Moral Bushwhacking and Political QuantrellismThomas Ewing Jr. and the Clamor of Guerrilla Politics Jeremy Neely (bio) By the spring of 1863, no military commander seemed capable of suppressing the irregular violence that raged along the Kansas-Missouri border. The partisan warfare that began five years before Fort Sumter had exploded in scale and intensity with the outbreak of the Civil War. A succession of Union generals cycled through Kansas and Missouri, each devising more stringent policies than the last, but the danger posed by Confederate guerrillas who burned, killed, and roamed the western countryside with apparent impunity only grew worse. “There seems to be no concerted plan,” exclaimed one exasperated Missourian. “Very little is being accomplished now, while every interest of loyal and peaceable citizens is suffering severely from the ravages of these wretches. Is there not a man somewhere equal to the emergency?”1 Thomas Ewing Jr. believed he was such a man. An unlikely champion, he had no military experience before the Civil War, but like many former novices who came to lead Union or Confederate forces he moved quickly through the ranks due to some combination of performance, luck, and political influence. The namesake of a former Ohio senator, Ewing was familiar with the rough-and-tumble of midcentury Washington and the factionalism of his adopted Kansas home. In 1861 he won election to the state supreme court but a year later resigned to help raise the Eleventh Kansas Cavalry. “During the war the [End Page 11] Chief Justice of Kansas should be an old man or a cripple,” he explained to his father.2 Their family included three future Union generals—brothers Hugh and Charles Ewing, plus foster brother William Tecumseh Sherman—and by April 1863, the younger Thomas became a brigadier general himself.3 His appointment to lead the District of the Border nonetheless caught observers by surprise, particularly in Kansas, where most expected the position would fall to Maj. Gen. James G. Blunt, Ewing’s commander during the Union army’s victory at Prairie Grove, Arkansas.4 Click for larger view View full resolution Brigadier General Thomas Ewing Jr. (Courtesy Library of Congress) Eager to prove himself, Thomas Ewing Jr. rode twenty miles southwest from district headquarters in Kansas City to deliver an address that set forth [End Page 12] his intentions for the new command. His jurisdiction included the Missouri counties south of the Missouri River, where no natural barrier separated the states, and all of Kansas north of the 38th parallel. The Kansas town where he chose to speak, Olathe—just five miles from the open border—was an apt spot to confront the challenge before him. Almost a year earlier Rebel guerrillas, led by William Clarke Quantrill, sacked the village, killing two people and pillaging every store. The perception that citizens must rely on themselves for mutual self-defense stretched back to the earliest days of Kansas Territory, but after Quantrill’s 1862 attack, doubts grew about the ability of Union troops to protect noncombatants. T. Dwight Thacher, a newspaper editor in nearby Lawrence, expressed confidence in Blunt, then the Federal commander, but cautioned his readers, “Let our other towns take warning. The success of this raid will encourage similar ones on a bolder scale.”5 At Olathe, Ewing announced there was little for civilians to fear, as he would employ a “rough hand” to halt the plunder of innocent households. Kansas and Missouri had previously been put in separate military departments but now were under the command of a single general, who vowed to aggressively pursue the raiders who once eluded capture as they slipped between jurisdictions. “I will keep a thousand men in saddle daily in pursuit of [guerrillas],” said Ewing, “and will redden with their blood every road and bridle path of the border, until they infest it no more.” Such thieves, he added, “will be compelled to quit stealing, or get out of this District, or get me out of it.”6 In the weeks that followed, the general noted with satisfaction that the wide circulation of his June 27 speech “made a decided impression” among newspaper editors in each state. Confident that he had earned...

Editorial

We write this editorial in mid-February 2023 as the first anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine fast approaches. The war has so far led to over eight million people fleeing Ukraine to seek refuge across neighboring countries, 1 an unprecedented situation in Europe since the end of WWII. While the hospitality and solidarity extended to Ukrainian refugees was widely commended from the onset, commentators, including the UN Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, Tendayi Achiume, have widely denounced and critiqued the racist and orientalist double standards and “racial tiering” inherent in popular and political responses to displacement from Ukraine (OHCHR 2022; Bayoumi 2022; Jackson Sow 2022; Ray 2022). Ukrainian refugees were welcomed with open borders and “open arms” while racialized third nationals fleeing from the same conflict, including 76,000 students from diverse African countries studying in Ukraine, were forcibly prevented from crossing the same borders, as an extension of institutionalized discriminatory policies which continue to frame migrants and refugees from Africa and the Middle East through the lens of hostility and suspicion (Zaru 2022; Banerjee 2023). Indeed, while Ukrainians have been welcomed across Europe, often explicitly because they have been racialized as white and Christian, people fleeing other conflicts, including wars in which European governments have played an active part, notably Afghanistan, have been met with soldiers and push-backs, in violation of international and regional rights frameworks, including the European Convention on Human Rights, in some cases at the very same borders, notably those of Poland, Latvia, and Lithuania (see Sanderson 2022).

Biotic Borders: Transpacific Plant and Insect Migration and the Rise of Anti-Asian Racism in America, 1890–1950 by Jeannie Shinozuka

In Biotic Borders, Shinozuka investigates how immigration exclusion affected both race and species during the rise of the U.S. nation-state. Drawing interdisciplinary methods and frameworks primarily from Asian American studies and histories of science, Shinozuka artfully demonstrates how national fears about Asian immigration not only concerned migrant human bodies but also folded nonhuman forms into racial and exclusionary policies. Although “open border” policies prior to the Page Act of 1875 and the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 applied to both human and nonhuman migrant species, xenophobia stoked by the rise of Asian immigration constructed new “categories of native- and invasive-defined groups as bio-invasions that must be regulated or somehow annihilated during American empire-building” (11, emphasis added). Thus, the management of species at the U.S. border, as Shinozuka demonstrates, was predicated on the racial logics of exclusion that governed immigration during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Biotic Borders powerfully expands critiques of the history of U.S. immigration to encapsulate the transpacific movement of nonhuman insect and plant species, revealing how race and species have productively co-constituted one another as categories of social and political difference.In recent years, work in Asian American studies has productively engaged the theoretical and conceptual implications of the entwinement between race and species, such as in the work of Lee, Chen, Huang, and Ahuja, among others.1 More broadly, Asian American studies have always been invested in the dehumanizing rhetoric that casts Asian immigrants as infectious alien invaders, in what is commonly referred to as Yellow Peril discourse.2 More than merely revealing xenophobic rhetoric as dehumanizing, this work underscores the material and historical processes of Asian American racial formation as a political project contingent on U.S. nation-building—the consolidation of the U.S. empire through the degradation of Asian bodies at its borders. Within this genealogy of robust intellectual inquiry, Shinozuka reveals how the imaginaries of entomologists, botanists, and other scientists produced the social and political conditions for the Yellow Peril rhetoric, thus implicating scientific knowledge in the creation of racial meaning.Moving through different moments in entomological and botanical history that cast foreign plants and insects as racialized invaders threatening the biotic ecosystem of the United States, Biotic Borders insists that the regulation of plant and insect immigration was integral to the racial exclusion that contributed to building the U.S. empire. Science, as Bahng argues, is a cultural, not an objective, form of knowledge that “participate[s] in the construction of national and international ideas about modernity and futurity.”3 Shinozuka’s careful reading of immigration policy alongside intellectual exchanges between scientists aptly demonstrates the cultural and political force behind the intertwined formations of race and species as nodes of difference. By bringing these histories together, Biotic Borders is an important intervention into ideas about immigration and the function of race and species in nation-building. This book offers urgent contributions to Asian American studies, the history of science, environmental studies, and posthumanism. Its interdisciplinary engagement sheds new light on the histories of race, species, and immigration.

Open doors: The impact of border reforming and opening policies on the regional border economies of China

AbstractThe openness and security of a country's borders is a matter of concern for countries worldwide. Since its reform and opening up in 1978, China has implemented reforming and opening policies in border regions, as represented by the “Xingbian Fumin Xingdong” (Revitalize Border Areas and Enrich Residents' Lives Policy [RBAERL Policy]) to achieve economic prosperity and stability. This study evaluated the impacts of the RBAERL policy in terms of outcomes related to county‐level economic growth in China's border regions. Using China's county‐level panel data from 1999 to 2016, we applied a spatial discontinuity design with the geographical boundary serving as the running variable. We found that the RBAERL policy contributed significantly to the economic growth of the border counties. These results were shown to be robust when measured against a series of test procedures. Through a by‐segment analysis of the border regions, we found that the policy had the strongest effect in northeastern China. Further mechanism analysis showed that the effect of per capita GDP growth primarily resulted from the expansion of the industrial sector along with physical and human capital investment rather than the promotion of employment and the growth of total factor productivity. The findings of this study can provide references for the importance of open borders for economic development and national security.

Defending our borders: Metaphor scenarios in Hungarian and Romanian political discourse on migration

Metaphor in political discourse has been described as a device for persuasion and providing legitimacy for political action. Besides these roles, however, Andreas Musolff draws attention to the dialogic potential of metaphors in public discourse when used as variations of universally accepted metaphorical frames applied and tailored in accordance with the specific ideologies, attitudes, and values of the discourse community addressed. Such subcategories, named scenarios, not only convey the target domain in terms more familiar to the audience, but they also invite evaluation and assessment on the part of the audience. In this role, metaphors, and their subcategories, and scenarios, allow expression of alternative viewpoints and particular perspectives within the frame of a public debate. This study proposes to track such reformulations in Hungarian and Romanian political discourse during the migrant crisis in 2015 concerning the CONTAINER metaphor. Conceptualizations of various discourse communities as containers are common in political discourse, circumscribing the ingroup as homogenous and compact, entailing elements like boundaries and possibilities of approach or, on the contrary, keeping away outside elements. In the concrete situation of the migrant crisis, entailments like closing or opening borders or conditions on crossing that border are common features. The corpus is composed of declarations from Romanian President Klaus Iohannis and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán related to events that occurred during the crisis, not only formulating attitudes and positioning toward the migrants but also towards the European Union and its policies regarding the issue. The metaphor scenarios are traceable in these speeches are means of self-presentation, defining the role and the position assumed by the two countries as members of the organization.

Democracy and Adult ESL Education during COVID

The silence of teachers of English as a Second Language in the face of a disastrous open border policy is deafening.

The Institutional Trap of the Reproduction of Intellectual Capital

Purpose of the study. The inability to avoid digital segregation in access to educational technologies and content at the level of individuals, families, communities, and states plunges entire nations and peoples into an institutional trap (lock-in effect) of the reproduction of intellectual capital. To understand the degree of immersion in such an institutional trap, it is necessary to search for appropriate indicators and develop a new index based on them, which would increase the ability of the UN Human Development Index to reflect the level of development of society, considering the realities of the fourth technological revolution.Materials and methods. One of the essential parts of the Human Development Index is the composite index “Education for universal development”, which includes such quantitative indexes as the average duration of education and the expected duration of education of the population. Unfortunately, these indexes do not give an idea of the quality of the education provided: the availability of modern educational technologies, the accessibility to the latest educational content, the ability to interactively change national educational content, the possibility of using information and communication technologies for education, and more. The “Digital segregation of access to education” index, proposed by the authors, is closely related to the “Education for all development index” and expands its scope by including individuals with higher education who can form the core of research in the future specific country.Results. The insignificant fact of uncontrolled migration of an individual as a carrier of some particle of national intellectual capital creates a problem much more systemic than a simple “brain drain”. The countries from which the brain drain occurs not only lose specific gifted individuals and the individual intellectual capital associated with them but also lose the ability to reproduce the joint intellectual capital of the nation within the country. In the conditions of open borders and general globalization, there are one-sided transfer funnels that allow the holder of individual intellectual capital to leave the donor country and be integrated into the scientific and production structure and the general national capital of the recipient country without any obstacles. At the same time, the reverse movement of intellectual capital, as a rule, is impossible. The authors describe the mechanism of a one-sided funnel during the migration of intellectual capital (individual and national), which triggers positive feedback that prevents the donor country from increasing national intellectual capital and forms an institutional trap for the reproduction of intellectual capital.Conclusion. The authors continue to work on optimizing and supplementing a set of indicators for inclusion in the composite index “Digital segregation of access to education” and establish the weight of indicators in the index. The open questions are as follows: the search for a set of indicators, the formation of a necessary and sufficient set of indicators, the identification of correlation dependencies and the establishment of a close relationship between indicators, the development of a hypothesis about the unevenness of indicators, an expert assessment of establishing the weight of indicators in the index, determining the method for aggregating a set of indicators into an index.

Open borders via natural resource egalitarianism: a failed route

Immigration restrictions close-off large portions of the earth to large proportions of the earth’s population. For those who regard the earth and its natural resources as belonging to mankind equally and in common, this is a morally impermissible state of affairs. This is because, if the earth and its resources belong to all equally, then the exclusion of anyone from any portion of the earth will be a violation of their natural ownership rights. A commitment to Natural Resource Egalitarianism (NRE) is therefore held to entail a commitment to substantially more open, or even fully open borders. This paper does not seek to directly refute the claims of NRE, but rather seeks to demonstrate the failure of arguments from NRE, to establish the moral necessity of a general opening of borders. This paper addresses the two most prominent accounts of Open Borders NRE—Equal Division NRE and Egalitarian Ownership NRE—as well as a more recent attempt to advocate for open borders by combining these two positions into a so-called ‘Combined Model’. This paper argues that none of these three positions can plausibly and coherently account for the moral necessity of open borders.

РОЗВИТОК СУЧАСНОГО ОБРАЗОТВОРЧОГО МИСТЕЦТВА ЦЕНТРАЛЬНОЇ АЗІЇ

The article examines the development of the visual arts of Central Asia from the moment the countries conquered this part of the world, from 1991 to the present day. In the context of «One Belt, One Road», there is a reinterpretation of the modern history of the visual arts of Central Asia from a global historical perspective, which has a certain strategic importance in order to carry out a joint study of the culture and art of the Silk Road. Central Asian art is a meeting place for Asian and European cultures. Although the history of the development of contemporary art in Central Asia is in the turmoil of modern world history, it is believed that it can withstand the changes of time and continue to develop dynamically. The history of contemporary art in Central Asia has experienced three important social changes and artistic trends: firstly, during the period of the Russian Empire, the artistic movement of realism influenced the strict rules and regulations of Islamic art; secondly, their own artistic style and their own cultural characteristics gradually formed; thirdly, the direction of contemporary art constantly breaks down barriers, «patterns and rules», realizing artistic aesthetics and artistic ideals in integration. During the thirty years of Central Asian independence, open borders, free external exchanges and cooperation gradually emerged from the shadow of the vast haze of Soviet art history, lifted the mysterious curtain of Central Asian contemporary art, and gradually dispelled the interest of the academic community in Central Asian art, cognitive flaws and misunderstandings. However, people’s understanding of the history of contemporary art in Central Asia cannot be achieved overnight, and its inherent shackles still influence the way the academic world thinks. Keywords: Central Asia, tradition, culture, history of modern art, fine art, painting, silk road.

International student migration: current trends and challenges for developing countries

Introduction. Globalization processes, which have developed rapidly in recent decades, are observed in all spheres of social life without exception. The opening of borders, digitalization, the development of a knowledge-based economy, and deepening economic polarization of the countries of the world have intensified such a form of international relations as educational migration. Students increasingly choose foreign educational institutions to acquire new competencies or obtain a higher education diploma. Global political and economic turbulence significantly affects student migration, creates a new system of factors and increases the challenges for educational migrants from poor countries.Purpose of the article. The purpose of the study is to determine the current trend of international migration of students from developing countries.Research methods. To achieve the goal of the article, a number of general scientific approaches and methods were used: analysis and synthesis, deduction and induction, comparison, structural-logical method, as well as special and empirical methods - scientific abstraction, elements of SWOT and comparative analysis.Results. Educational migration and international academic mobility of students are essentially close, mostly identical concepts. However, the migration of students can occur under the influence of a slightly different system of factors (exogenous and endogenous, global and national), because it involves not only studying in foreign higher education institutions, but also going abroad, finding a place of work and permanent residence. The article emphasizes that among the motivating factors, it is the improvement of the future material situation thanks to receiving a quality education at a prestigious university that occupies a prominent place, because it makes it possible to get a well-paid job in a developed country. This is especially true for students from poor countries who do not have such prospects at home. Restraining factors are language and psychological difficulties, lack of funds for study and accommodation, logistical and bureaucratic problems, etc. The challenges of the 20s of the 21st century were also the coronavirus pandemic and unprovoked Russian-Ukrainian aggression. These global factors caused significant changes in the migration policy of developed countries, which are the main recipients of educational migrants, and worsened the economic conditions for migration. Many university curricula provide online teaching for international students, and the geography of educational migration increasingly focuses on a group of the safest and most stable destinations.Prospects. Further research should be focused on finding ways to improve the effectiveness of international academic mobility programs in today’s conditions of global instability and technological development.

Racial Profiling on the U-Bahn: Policing the Berlin Gap in the Schönefeld Airport Refugee Crisis

AbstractThe German Democratic Republic (GDR) treated the Berlin Wall as an official state border, but the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) did not recognize it as an official state border and thus did not impose entry controls. This asymmetric recognition opened up a gap in the regime of border policing and turned divided Berlin into one of the most significant sources of unauthorized migration into the FRG, creating tensions in Berlin, West Germany, and western Europe more broadly. Countries including France, Denmark, and the Netherlands all pressured the FRG to shut the open border in Berlin. This article examines how West German authorities sought to respond to their demands without recognizing the Berlin Wall as a state border. West German authorities pursued two broad strategies. The first involved internalizing the border through institutionalized racial profiling in West Berlin. The second entailed externalizing the border by asking the GDR to enforce FRG visa and passport requirements. Although both forms of border policing have often been associated with the end of the Cold War, this article shows that they were adopted earlier, and in response to Cold War imperatives.

Health impact of borders: general reflections and a case study from the Polish–German border

Background and objectivePolitical, economic, communicative and cultural borders still limit the accessibility of acute healthcare services for patients so that they frequently have to accept longer distances to travel to the next provider within their own country. In this paper, we analyze the impact of borders and opening of borders on acute medical care in hospitals and on patients in border regions.MethodsWe develop a conceptual framework model of cross-border healthcare and apply it to the Polish–German border area. The model combines the distance decay effect, a catchment area analysis, economies of scale and the learning curve.ResultsBorders have a major impact on acute medical care in hospitals and on patients. Setting of new borders will reduce the accessibility of health facilities for patients or require the establishment of new hospitals. Reopening borders might induce a vicious circle leading to the insolvency of a hospital which might result in poorer health for some patients.ConclusionStrong effort should be invested to overcome political and cultural borders to improve the health of the population in border regions. Similarly, increased cross-border acute healthcare must be seen in the context of rural health and the special situation of small rural hospitals in rural peripheral areas.

The Contestation of Profanity and Sacral at Taman Bungkul Landscape

Since its inauguration in 2007, the development of Bungkul Park has been very conspicuous from a tomb to a tourist attraction. As a historical place, Bungkul Park is not as famous as Wali Songo. Geographically, the tomb of Sunan Bungkul and the green open space's Bungkul border the wall to distinguish the location's layout. This place is better known as a recreational place. Changes in function are more creative than religious. This study tries to answer (1) How is the Sacred culture that occurs in religious tourism? (2) How is the Profan culture in the bungkul ParkPark? (3) What is the impact of cultural differences in religious tourism in Sunan Bungkul and Bungkul Park? These problems are explained by analyzing the data and sources obtained through the stages of qualitative descriptive research methods, which include ethnography, criticism, interpretation, and historiography. Based on the data analysis and sources received, the development of Bungkul Park, which is getting better, brings the Surabaya city government to revitalize Bungkul Park. The City Government should pay more attention to the religious aspect than the profane aspect of using Bungkul. This is because of Bungkul's care, most of which pays more attention to the ParkPark than his burial. Visitors are also more familiar with the ParkPark than bungkul's tomb.

Fostering generativity in platform ecosystems: How open innovation and complexity interact to influence platform adoption

Platform sponsors strive to govern their platform ecosystem to be generative in supplying complementary products abreast of adoption targets. A more comprehensive pool of adopters requires high value creation capacity. Leveraging the opening of borders to complementors for competing in adoption could be a winning strategy when fostering generativity. Seldom has this view been studied empirically; therefore, the present study examines the effects of supply-side openness on platform adoption and investigates generativity's role between them as a mediator. Moreover, the study explores the heterogeneity between early and late adopters in generativity's influence. We also analyze generativity in mediating the effect of openness by the moderating influence of technological complexity. Consequently, a moderated mediation analysis is employed on panel data of 8960 video games in six platforms and three regions. Results show that platforms' openness propels their adoption, and generativity mediates this effect. Specifically, this study clarifies the idea that supply-side openness, the proliferation of more open innovation strategies, enhances platforms' value generation capacity, and both enhance platform adoption. Findings also indicate that platforms' technological complexity positively moderates the mediation role of generativity, revealing that in more complex platforms, openness increases generativity more intensely.

Институты Конфуция как инструмент «мягкой силы» в культурной дипломатии Китая в Кыргызстане

Introduction. This article discusses the cultural diplomacy of China on the example of the activities of the Confucius Institutes as tools of “soft power” in the field of spreading the Chinese language and culture in Kyrgyzstan. The prerequisites for the formation of linguistic and cultural diplomacy as a foreign policy instrument of the PRC in the Kyrgyz Republic, as well as the main forms and activities of the Confucius institutes for the dissemination and support of the Chinese language and culture in Kyrgyzstan are analyzed. Methods and Materials. In the course of the study, aspects of the formation and development of the language policy program of the PRC in Kyrgyzstan and other Central Asian countries were substantiated by the method of analysis. The work used a systematic approach to form a holistic view of the activities of the Confucius institutes and the policy of promoting the Chinese language and culture in Kyrgyzstan as a tool of “soft power.” For the analysis of Chinese “soft power”, the key materials were the works of Russian, Chinese and foreign scientists. Analysis. As a result of the problem analysis, the legal and institutional frameworks for the activities of the Confucius Institutes, as well as the cultural diplomacy of the PRC to popularize the Chinese language and culture in Kyrgyzstan, were studied. The main directions and results of the “soft power” policy in the field of popularization of the Chinese language and culture in the Kyrgyz Republic and their role in shaping a positive image of China in Kyrgyzstan were also identified. Results. The study showed that in recent years, in the countries of Central Asia, including Kyrgyzstan, thanks to the active work of the Confucius Institutes and the cultural and diplomatic policy of the PRC, it was possible to spread learning of the Chinese language and culture. Today, for most of the youth of the countries of Central Asia and Kyrgyzstan, learning the Chinese language seems promising. This is explained by the fact that factors such as close geographical location, open borders and a developed transport system, etc. help to quickly master the Chinese language. It should also be taken into account that, through the system of Confucian institutes, the Chinese side seeks to train personnel who share precisely the Chinese assessment of the situation in the region and in Kyrgyzstan, which does not always coincide with our political and economic interests. Overall, we can conclude that the active promotion of Confucian institutes in Kyrgyzstan is explained, first of all, by the priorities of the Chinese side to expand its presence in the region in the scientific, educational, information and cultural spheres. Authors’ contribution. J.O. Omurova developed the general concept of the article, prepared the sections “Introduction”, “Method” and “Analysis” and a draft article for publication; Yu.A. Lysenko and A.M. Kylychev wrote the “Result” section, did scientific editing of the text, translated the article into English, and contributed significantly to the overall conclusion of the article.