Portuguese Trade Research Articles

English

BACKGROUND: Tobacco was introduced into Europe in the late 15th century. Portuguese traders introduced it to India in late 16th or early 17th century. Since then, tobacco use has spread with remarkable rapidity, into all sections of people. Now tobacco is used in different forms out of which some are in form of smoking like cigarette, bidi whereas some are smokeless e.g., chewing, application over the teeth & the gingiva. Among tobacco habituated Indian population, about 70% are in the smoking form. 1 Passive smoking is also a significant health hazard. There is a vital role of dental practitioners in identifying individuals at risk of mucosal disease, the importance of public education about the risk factors, and the necessity for counseling patients with precancerous lesions on avoiding further risk.2 AIMS AND OBJECTIVE: To study clinico-pathological & cytological changes in oral mucosal cells of people with the habit of smoking tobacco by using exfoliative cytology and PAP stain. MATERIAL AND METHODS: The oral exfoliative cytology smears are taken from 60 person (30 smoking habit & 30 control) from the oral pathology department of K M Shah Dental College & Hospital. The smears are spread on the glass slide and are fixed with 95% ethyl alcohol. The slides are stained with papanicolaou stain and observed under microscope. RESULTS: The result showed that the anucleated cells (Precancerous feature) are increased in patient with smoking habit as compared to control group. Anucleated cells are highest in oral sub mucous fibrosis group of patients.

A typology of trade union websites with evidence from Portugal and Britain

Information and communication technologies can provide an important contribution to revitalizing trade unions, since the internet is faster, cheaper and more far-reaching than traditional communication methods. We propose a typology for analysing trade union websites, and apply this by comparing two national cases. The empirical research is limited to the websites of Portuguese and British civil service trade unions. We find that British unions take more advantage of the internet than those in Portugal; not only do they enable interactivity but above all promote the website as a space for sociability. We believe this typology opens up enhanced capacity to monitor, diachronically and synchronically, the relationship between trade unions and the internet.

Book Review: Hugo Grotius, the Portuguese, and Free Trade in the East Indies

Book Review: Hugo Grotius, the Portuguese, and Free Trade in the East Indies

Cracking the Mysteries of “China”: China(ware) in the Early Modern Imagination

This essay explores early modern views of China as they were expressed through European representations of Chinese porcelain. Analyzing a range of artistic, printed, and dramatic texts, I show how sixteenth-and seventeenth-century western mythologies surrounding the production of chinaware offer a striking contrast to the more denigrating discourse of chinoiserie that developed in the eighteenth century. Focusing particularly on descriptions of chinaware that circulated in early modern England, I demonstrate how writers ranging from Mandeville to Hakluyt to Shakespeare and Jonson foster ideas about the mysteries of Chinese porcelain that emphasize its virtuous and magical properties. I also consider contemporary English translations of Marco Polo, the Portuguese trader Duarte Barbosa, and the Italian Jesuit Matteo Ricci, as well as Italian paintings by Andrea Mantegna and Giovanni Bellini, revealing an admiration for chinaware that circulated throughout Europe. Examining the shifting ways that commodification affected perceptions of chinaware and vice versa, I draw attention to a particular period of transition over the first half of the seventeenth century when Chinese porcelain became increasingly available to moneyed English consumers. During this time, the myths surrounding porcelain’s creation were both demystified and reclaimed, while on the public stage diverse perceptions of chinaware offered a way to arbitrate social competency. Throughout, I chart an early modern discourse of chinaware in relation to an evolving history of East-West trade, revealing how the mysterious origins of Chinese porcelain both resisted and played into its commodification.

Golden-Silk Smoke: A History of Tobacco in China, 1550-2010 (review)

Reviewed by: Golden-Silk Smoke: A History of Tobacco in China, 1550-2010 Matthew P. Romaniello Golden-Silk Smoke: A History of Tobacco in China, 1550-2010. By Carol Benedict. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2011. 352 pp. $49.95 (cloth and e-book). In recent years there has been an undeniable turn toward the history of commodities. As an approach, it offers the opportunity to examine cross-cultural contacts, technology transfers, and the transmission of medical knowledge, among other attributes. At the same time, commodities history can uncomfortably straddle the intersections of economic and cultural history, as well as domestic and international history. It is a challenge at which few have excelled, but Carol Benedict is undoubtedly among those who have. Her study of the long history of China's experience with tobacco considers both national and international implications, the introduction and dissemination of foreign knowledge, and the remarkable progress by which tobacco became a "Chinese" product with its own cultural connotations. The book relates its history through the various tobacco products China consumed. Beginning with a long section on the arrival and spread of pipe tobacco, the narrative then discusses the differentiation of tobacco consumption with the rising popularity of snuff and water-pipe tobacco, and ends with the mass consumption of the machine-rolled cigarette. Though unquestionably a history of tobacco, the shifts in consumption reveal the underlying stages of commoditization. Borrowing Sidney Mintz's terminology, the early era is one of "extensification," when a new product is accepted and its consumption spreads throughout the social ranks. Snuff and water-pipe tobacco became popular with Chinese elites in the eighteenth century, and this class differentiation was "intensification" in which the commodity became a marker of elite social status. The cigarette, by comparison, was first consumed as a hand-rolled tobacco product among the urban poor, but, with the rise of machine-rolled cigarettes in the late nineteenth [End Page 426] century, modern marketing targeted all social groups, inventing new ways of appealing to elite consumers. Its overall popularity marks the cigarette as a prime example of an extensified commodity, but the connection between marketing and status meant it remained intensified as well. While the overarching narrative of tobacco's consumption resembles numerous other commodities, the depth of Benedict's research still offers new insights into the peculiarities of tobacco and Chinese society. China adopted a number of new crops from the New World, via the Spanish trade through Manila. First to be domesticated were maize and the sweet potato in the late sixteenth century, and tobacco arrived soon thereafter. Reflecting the diversity of the early modern global economy, tobacco appears to have arrived from Spanish and Portuguese traders along the coasts, from Korean merchants over land, and along Central Asian caravan routes. The Chinese reaction to tobacco has its similarities to and differences from that of the West. Unlike in Europe, there was little concern with the foreign nature of tobacco or of any particular association with "barbaric" peoples. Also unlike most Western societies, there was no particular fear of women smoking. Rather, overindulgence was condemned "as a wasteful extravagance." Furthermore, the criticism "was directed at all tobacco producers and consumers, not at female smokers in particular. To smoke was to indulge one's own pleasure at the expense of one's extended family and, by extension, the imperial order" (p. 85). Unquestionably, this is quite different from in the West, where a woman smoking was widely seen as a moral danger, even if female smokers were hardly unknown. The evaluation of the Chinese medical community, however, would have been familiar to Western doctors. Overindulgence placed patient's "health at risk by crossing moral boundaries of frugality and abstinence into the hedonism of overindulgence" (p. 97). While this verdict was the product of Chinese knowledge of "systematic correspondences," learning to moderate tobacco use was also the verdict of seventeenth-century English and Dutch medical authorities, whose knowledge came from Galenic principles. The mixture of Eastern and Western agreement and marked differences makes tobacco a template for comparing cross-cultural exchanges. Furthermore, one of the great strengths of Benedict's work is that the era of global exchange...

Peter Mark and José da Silva Horta . The Forgotten Diaspora: Jewish Communities in West Africa and the Making of the Atlantic World . New York: Cambridge University Press. 2011. Pp. xv, 262. $80.00.

Peter Mark and José da Silva Horta have written an engaging history of the emergence and fading away of Jewish communities in the Petite Côte region of Senegal. Jewish communities differentiated themselves from a larger Portuguese trading diaspora, formed by merchants who established themselves on the mainland away from major centers of Portuguese power. This diaspora contained a substantial number of New Christians (forced converts), some of whom took advantage of new conditions in the early seventeenth century to publicly embrace and reaffirm their identities as Jews. These conditions were the protection offered by African rulers to all merchants from Europe, regardless of nation or religion, and the breach of the Portuguese trading monopoly with the arrival of Dutch, English, and French merchants. While the presence of Jewish merchants has been noted by previous studies, this is the first full examination of their history and their connections with the Atlantic world. Their story appears in documents of the Portuguese Inquisition, which denounced both their religious activities and their “illegal” trade. They also figure in documents dealing with trade and in notarial records in Amsterdam, where a Sephardic Jewish community with ties to both Portugal and the Petite Côte emerged during this period of time.

Southeast Asia. Hugo Grotius, the Portuguese and free trade in the East Indies. By Peter Borschberg. Singapore: NUS Press, 2011. Pp. xxv + 482. Maps, Illustrations, Appendix, Notes, Bibliography, Index.

Hugo Grotius, the Portuguese and free trade in the East Indies By PETER BORSCHBERG Singapore: NUS Press, 2011. Pp. xxv + 482. Maps, Illustrations, Appendix, Notes, Bibliography, Index. In this scholarly and tightly-argued book, Peter Borschberg re-examines Hugo Grotius's De Iure Praedae (and that part of it that appeared as Mare Liberum in particular), considering why and how the jurist composed the work, what sources he used, and what long-term impact resulted. Grotius is usually assumed to have been a champion of freedom of navigation and access to markets, but Borschberg suggests this image needs considerable qualification. De Iure Praedae was nota product of independent scholarship, having been commissioned by the VOC (Dutch East India Company). Its purpose was to demonstrate that the Dutch seizure in the Johor River estuary in February 1603 of the Portuguese carrack Santa Catarina off Singapore was just and lawful rather than an act of piracy. Fundamental to Grotius's argument was that, because the Portuguese had denied the Dutch their natural right to access Asian markets via the maritime highways, which were open to ali and over which no sovereign lawfully exercised lordship, the VOC was entitled to retaliate with force. Moreover, the seizure of the Santa Catarina was demonstrably lawful because the company was acting in support of the king of Johor--an ally with full sovereign rights, who was, at the time, at war with the Portuguese. As well as finding that De Iure Praedae was a tendentious work, Borschberg concludes that it was based on unacceptably 'sloppy' research. This he deduces from careful and telling analysis not only of the text of De lure Praedae itself, but also of Grotius's seldom-consulted notes and working fragments, which are now in the Leiden University Library. These sources are particularly revealing on how Grotius went about his work. They show that he did not undertake any independent research in the VOC archives. Nor did he have access to any substantial Portuguese sources, relying instead on just a limited range of Spanish material, particularly the writings of the celebrated sixteenth-century theologian and jurist, Francisco de Vitoria of Salamanca--who was, however, writing not about maritime Asia but the quite different situation in Spanish America. As Borschberg clearly demonstrates, Grotius had minimal knowledge and understanding of Portuguese commercial structures in maritime Asia and of the theoretical and legal concepts that underlay them. He knew even less about Malay kingship and ideas of sovereignty, and about Southeast Asian geography. …

THECAPITÃES MORESOF THE JAPAN VOYAGE: A GROUP PORTRAIT

Starting from the premise that all empire building involves ideological constructs justifying the violence that accompanies such efforts, this article concentrates on elucidating the case of the Portuguese in Asia, specifically in Japan. Although well beyond the formal Portuguese thalassocracy in Asia, the Japanese islands were exposed for about a century, between 1543 and 1640, to the informal presence of Portuguese traders and missionaries. The symbiotic relationship between these two groups was based on the experience that, in Japan, the trade was difficult to conduct, for violence was always lurking beneath the surface of the trading relationship. We know of several instances when such violence actually exploded into major armed clashes, and many other times violence was narrowly averted through the mediation of the missionaries.Based on original research in the archives of Portugal and Spain, this article analyzes the records that the leaders of the Portuguese who came to Japan in the sixteenth century, the so-called capitães mores,have left behind. Finding that a significant number of these men were or later became members of the Order of Christ or were closely related to such members, it then explores their mindset through a survey of the function of this military order in Portuguese society of the late Middle Ages. The result is a group portrait of thirty-seven men who may be considered a representative sample of the Portuguese leading both the formal and informal empires in Asia. This portrait will clarify why both Japanese and Portuguese authorities agreed, at least during the second half of the sixteenth century, that the Jesuit missionaries were an indispensable presence in Japan.

New microsatellite markers classifying nontoxic and toxic Jatropha curcas

Jatropha curcas (jatropha) (2n = 2x = 22) is a shrub originated from Central America and spread to Africa and Asia by Portuguese traders during 18th century. This species belongs to the family Euphorbiaceae. Jatropha seed is high in oil content and considered promising as an alternative renewable and eco-friendly energy source, especially for biodiesel. Most jatropha accessions are high in seed phorbol ester (PE), a tumour inducing substance and thus called toxic accessions. There are some low PE (nontoxic) accessions in Mexico that are locally consumed as snack foods or sweets. The toxic and nontoxic accessions cannot be distinguished morphologically (Ghosh et al. 2007; Makkar et al. 2008), thus the villagers vegetatively propagate them to avoid contamination of high PE character. Currently, the only way to identify the high and low PE seeds is by seed analysis with high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). Jatropha breeders are looking for a cheaper and quicker way to distinguish them such as through molecular markers, provided that the location(s) of gene(s) controlling high PE content is known. To achieve this, a number of markers are required to cover all the 11 linkage groups. Basha and Sujatha (2007) reported that among 400 RAPD primers tested, 339 produced bands and 267 were polymorphic. They also tested a set of 207 ISSR primers and found that 100 of them produced bands, giving 29 polymorphic primers. They used this information to investigate genetic variation among 42 accessions of jatropha from India and a nontoxic accession from Mexico. Basha and Sujatha (2009) reported genetic variation and interspecific hybrids of Jatropha species using RAPD and ISSR as nuclear specific markers, and chloroplast microsatellite markers as organelle specific markers. Ganesh et al. (2008) studied genetic diversity of eight Jatropha species collected in India. Eighteen of 26 RAPD primers classified them into a group of J. curcas versus a group of other seven Jatropha spp. Gupta et al. (2008)

Slavery in Brazil

Slavery in Brazil is a comprehensive and useful survey of this most influential of American institutions in one of the countries of the Americas where its demographic and social impact was greatest. Masterful in its scope, appealing in its style, and timely in its appearance, this book should prove both a crucial addition to undergraduate reading lists and a very useful guide for scholars and researchers working in the field.The book’s first part examines the development of slavery chronologically, from its early use in the Portuguese trading empire to its adaptation in colonial Brazil, and the sugar, mining, and coffee cycles from the sixteenth through the nineteenth centuries. A final chapter in this section then assesses broader themes in the economic history of Brazilian slavery. While the narrative is, appropriately, driven by the export cycles, considerable space is also devoted to the role of slavery throughout the internal economy. This helps emphasize the sheer diversity of tasks for which slaves were used, from whaling to mule trains to escravos ao ganho (slaves who worked on their own account and paid a day wage to masters). Extensive cross-regional coverage is also provided, with the main story flowing, as we might expect, from northeast to southeast, but with “peripheral” economic areas such as the South, which also depended heavily on slave labor, given plenty of space. The authors certainly more than fulfill their promise to bring us an overview of the many regional and thematic “schools” in slavery studies (demographic history in Minas, social history in Rio, economic history in São Paulo) that have developed across this country of continental proportions.The second part provides a detailed overview of some of the main themes that have exercised Brazilian scholars of slavery over the last couple of decades: population studies, resistance and rebellion, and slave family and culture. A chapter on the free people of color gives this group, which was crucial for defining the particular characteristics of Brazilian slave society, the attention it deserves and does not always receive from slavery scholars. A final chapter discusses slavery’s ending and also briefly moves beyond 1888, sketching post-emancipation labor, migration, and ongoing racism into the twentieth century.The book’s greatest strength is that it eminently fulfills its purpose of bringing the wealth of slavery scholarship coming out of Brazil every year to the attention and use of an international readership. This provides an immense service to the scholarly community both within and outside Brazil, forging further ties between Brazilian-based and international scholars, helping scholars of slavery who are not based in Brazil to keep abreast of new developments, and giving new researchers entering the field an excellent starting point in coming up to speed with recent Brazilian literature. The extensive references and bibliography include numerous recent Brazilian master’s theses and PhD dissertations, usually available online, as well as papers presented at recent Brazilian conferences on slavery and population studies.Another great strength of the book is in providing a unique and thoroughgoing survey text for undergraduate use. For broad courses on slavery and emancipation in the Americas or Atlantic World, the book makes the important argument that, since most other American territories based their own slave systems to some degree on those developed early on by the Portuguese, the study of Brazilian slavery is crucial to understanding the operation of slavery elsewhere in the Americas. Thus the authors place Brazilian slavery squarely at the heart of American and Atlantic slavery and emancipation studies.The most effective use of the book in seminars and lectures, however, will require additional context on the seminal political developments in Brazilian history that were linked to the economic, demographic, and social trends that are the book’s focus. The chapter on the nineteenth century, for example, does not discuss the advent of Brazilian independence and thus does not address the growing Brazilian literature on issues of race, slavery, and citizenship in the 1824 constitution, for example. The chapter does not mention the downfall of the monarchy and institution of the republic in 1889, or consider the 1850 abolition of the trade and the 1871 “Free Womb” law as the key watershed moments in (inter)national politics that they were. Students, then, will need to be directed to other readings to remind them of the important links between slavery’s economic and social impact in Brazil and the political life and broader development of the nation. Leaving this comment aside, this original volume is an impressive and very welcome addition to the fields of Brazilian and Atlantic slavery and emancipation.

Importance of «weak» states during conflicts: Portuguese trade with the United States during the Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars

AbstractThis paper focuses on the analysis of weak states in the international trading system during the Revolutionary and Napoleonic crises, especially on Portugal's trade relations with the United States. We argue that the previous studies of the trade flows during these conflicts have not paid enough attention on smaller actors. Even though the Peninsular War caused severe disruption of agricultural production in Portugal, the United States, despite its strained relations with an ally of Portugal, Great Britain, became a key supplier for the Portuguese market. Clearly, the threatened position of the peninsula, and the need to supply the troops, awarded the Portuguese some room to manoeuvre in the international markets. Total war was not a constraint for all states — economic necessities trumped political and diplomatic concerns during the era of the first real-world wars. This situation was a temporary one, only to change after the conflict.

Social capital and economic performance: trust and distrust in eighteenth-century gold shipments from Brazil

This article discusses agency problems in a period of market boom. It takes Portuguese trade with Brazil as a case study to discussthe impact of colonial market expansion on social capital. The hypothesis is that social capital depletion prompted an uneven distribution of information and a limited access to honest individuals, who might afford a premium to certain forms of agency. Given the states’ inability to provide legal sanctioning in colonial regions, this article focuses on private-order mechanisms which were effective for selecting reputable individuals. The exploration of network analysis identifies the mechanism that responds to such an adverse environment and supports the argument that business organizations which counted on the geographical mobility ofagents had comparative advantages. The approach followed in this article brings new insights on informal institutional arrangements and on itinerancy in contexts of low levels of social capital.

A primeira partilha da África: decadência e ressurgência do comércio português na Costa do Ouro (ca. 1637-ca. 1700)

Este texto tem como tema geral o declínio do comércio português na costa do Ouro depois da tomada do castelo de Elmina pelos holandeses em 1637. São tratados os seguintes temas: comércio de ouro, aumento da presença européia na região, aumento do tráfico de escravos e retorno português ao comércio da costa do Ouro em fins do século XVII. O texto demonstra que seguindo o fim do semi-monopólio comercial português, em 1637, a Costa do Ouro passou por um processo de internacionalização do comércio. As atividades de várias companhias de comércio européias não alterram as estruturas comerciais criadas pelos portugueses no período pré-1637. O comércio costeiro era dominado pelos europeus, mas as rotas internas do comércio de ouro e de escravos estavam nas mãos dos africanos. Para se estabelecerem na costa, os europeus dependiam de acordos com os africanos. O retorno português ao comércio na costa do Ouro aconteceu em fins do século, numa conjuntura que diferia radicalmente do apogeu do comércio lusitano na região. Sem acesso aos fortes e fortalezas que serviam de bases comerciais para ingleses, holandeses e outras nações européias, os capitães dos navios negreiros portugueses se valiam de acordos com os ingleses (para buscar proteção contra holandeses) e do comércio de produtos brasileiros, tais como tabaco e ouro contrabandeado do Brasil, que tinham grande demanda na costa do Ouro.

Did AIDS viruses originate in India?

Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV), the infectious agent of AIDS, is believed to have originated in non-human primates in sub Saharan Africa. The first case of HIV infection as well as first case of AIDS was reported in India 1986. Presently HIV infections were identified in 104 districts spread all over India including forest areas. The first case of HIV infection as well as first case of AIDS was reported in India 1986. Data from sentinel surveillance and national family health survey III in year 2005-6 revealed that 2-3.1 million people were living with HIV/AIDS in India in year 2006. Presently HIV infections were identified in 104 districts spread all over India including forest areas. Medical, archaeological, mythological, biological evidences point out the possibility of origin of AIDS in Indian sub continent. The man and monkey association started in India by Paleolithic period. We can find monkey paintings in various historic sites in Hindu, Buddhist literature. Monkey Gods are very common all over India, tribal and rural people built monkey god temples and preached. Many sculptures from 300 BC to 12th century AD depicted the monkey-man association. It is also depicted that the monkeys are giving medicine to the king that strengthens monkey-man association from many thousand years. In ancient Indian medicine, like Charaka Samhita (300 BC) AZOKSHYAM (degradation of immunity) an AIDS like disease was narrated. Many of the archaeological sites of period between 3000 BC to 1000 in India were displaced due to various viral diseases. Archaeological reports reveal that massive deaths occurred in those areas. In Indian culture there has been a long tradition of keeping the non human primates as pets (or) performance animals, animal markets and zoos. Indian primates are primarily captured (or) produced for various reasons i.e. biomedical research, pets, private collection, folklore medicine and food. Monkeys are sold in weekly markets India Many parts of India monkey skulls are used for witchcraft and black magic, skin used for drum making. In folklore and tribal medicine, patients are made to drink live monkey blood (Chakmas and Riangs tribes) and cat brain, for curing Asthma, fever, body ache, and abnormal blood pressure and some times for gallstones. The consumption of primate meat by certain tribal and non tribal communities is still prevalent in north east and eastern India. The use of meat from hunted primates as a bait to agricultural pests is also common in the north eastern states. Portuguese and other colonial traders transported monkeys for folklore medicines. A few of these Indian monkeys were found to be serologically and virologically positive to simian retroviruses. Assamese Macaque (Macaca assamensis) harboured SFV (simian foamy virus) and HMS 50, pigtailed macaque (Macaque nemestrins) SFV-Hem-2 strain and Rhesus macaque (Macaca mulatta) SMV-BGH-4. Natural infection by simian retrovirus (SRV-6) in hanuman languor(Semnopithecus entellus) traced in two different geographical regions of India. Natural infection by simian retrovirus (SRV-6) in hanuman languor (Semnopithecus entellus) traced in two different geographical regions of India. Analysis of HIV-1 subtype C and HIV 2 genome sequences from India showed that these sequences were closely related to each other and phylogentic analysis of these sequences clustered together and showed monophyletic lineage. Origin of AIDS in Indian peninsular should be investigated for SIV s in wild monkeys of India.

THE POLITICS OF CRIME IN TAIWAN, HONG KONG AND MACAO

THE POLITICS OF CRIME IN TAIWAN, HONG KONG AND MACAO

The Portuguese Slave Trade to Spanish Manila: 1580–1640

Catarina de San Juan was a slave woman who was brought to the Philippines in the 1610s on her way to Mexico, where she became a beata of great renown. Her experiences in the slave markets of Cochin and Manila suggest that Portuguese traders played a key role as the primary suppliers of Asian slaves to the Philippines. This paper argues that Portuguese slavers made a significant contribution to the Manila economy by providing an important labour force that helped build and maintain the colony from 1580 to 1640, the years of Iberian Union or, from the Portuguese perspective, the “Spanish Captivity”. One-crown rule gave Portuguese traders free trade access to Manila, allowing them to meet the city's demand for this important commodity. The slave trade's volume and profits testify to its social and economic significance and suggests that the Portuguese helped sustain the Philippines, even as they faced the logistical difficulties and legal barriers evident in Catarina's story. This paper shows that the forced migration of individuals like Catarina was a notable outcome of “Spain's Asian presence”—less significant in economic terms than the transfer of silver and textiles, but no less important in human terms.

Seismic Hazard in Karachi, Pakistan: Uncertain Past, Uncertain Future

The city of Karachi, Pakistan (population 14 million), sits close to a plate boundary and within reach of earthquakes on numerous tectonically active structures surrounding the city. One can draw parallels—geologic as well as demographic—with another megacity for which seismic hazard is known to be high: Los Angeles, California (figure 1). Yet with a short historical record, limited instrumental seismic data, and little geological or geodetic constraint on slip rates, seismic hazard in Karachi is poorly characterized. In this report we present a critical review of the historical record as well as an overview of potential earthquake sources in and around Karachi. Prior to 1800, the history of Karachi, the current capital of Sindh (one of Pakistan’s four provinces), is indistinguishable from that of many fishing villages on the northern shores of the Arabian Sea. It was known to Arab and Portuguese traders who sometimes stopped at the village on the way to the Malabar coast. Colonial trade with Sindh was limited in the 18th century. Exploratory surveys starting in 1808 led to the annexation of Sindh to British rule in 1843. By 1901 Karachi had grown from a village to a town with a population of fewer than 140,000 people. The population grew to 500,000 by the time Pakistan became an independent nation in 1947, at which time the city grew dramatically with the influx of a million refugees from India. By 1960 its population exceeded 2 million, a figure that had doubled by 1980 and more than doubled again to 10 million by 2000. With an estimated annual growth rate of 3.75%, its population will exceed 30 million within two decades. Karachi lies approximately 150 km east of the triple junction between the Arabian, Indian, and Asian plates (figure 2). The western and north-trending arms of the triple junction sustain convergent and transcurrent rates of 28–33 mm/ yr respectively (Apel et al. 2006). A recently discovered active fault, the Sonne fault, indicates that the Arabian plate has been fragmented across the southwest corner of the triple junction defining a triangular plate, the Ormara plate (Kukowski et al. 2000) whose velocity relative to the Arabian plate increases subduction velocities by a few millimeters per year compared to the rate to the west. In addition to these clearly defined plate boundaries, two other active structural zones have produced damaging earthquakes that have been felt in the city in the past 200 years: a thrust-and-fold belt extending northward parallel to the transform fault separating India from Asia, and the Kachchh fault system trending westward toward the city. Although residents of Karachi felt shaking from the 1945 Makran and 2001 Bhuj earthquakes, and occasional shaking from M 4–5 earthquakes on faults north and northwest of the city, no earthquake has ever produced documented damage in Karachi. The question currently faced by earthquake engineers is whether Karachi truly enjoys an aseismic setting or whether the absence of damaging earthquakes is only due to Karachi’s short and incomplete history. A review of the known historical data on earthquakes within 500 km of the city shows that the historical record prior to 1800 is limited and unreliable.

Syphilis Returns to China … With a Vengeance

Syphilis was first recognized in China in the 1500s and was most likely brought to China by Portuguese traders. By the time of the liberation of China in 1949 syphilis was one of the most common causes for medical care and prevalence surveys revealed a massive epidemic in sex workers and national minority populations. The Chinese Communist government made treatment and prevention of syphilis a priority and inspired a prolonged and successful but draconian campaign to accomplish this goal. By 1964 syphilis was very rare and the infection was probably virtually eliminated until China opened its international borders to Western tourists and commerce in the early 1980s. The first resurgent cases of syphilis were recognized in China in 1979 and a national surveillance system has demonstrated a steady and disturbing spread of the disease throughout the country. In this issue of STD 2 articles address this situation. First Lin et al review the Chinese and English literature since 2000 in an attempt to better estimate the magnitude of the syphilis epidemic. The results suggest that syphilis infections are currently being detected at relatively low prevalence (0.2-0.7%) in the general population and antenatal screening clinics but at much greater prevalence in high-risk populations. Syphilis was detected in 3% to 11% of sex workers (a sad reminder of the pre-Mao past) and 10% to 18% of men reporting sex with men (MSM). A substantial rise in yearly prevalence was noted in all groups studied reaching a 4.4% yearly increase in MSM. The rapid spread of syphilis in MSM in China is also being observed in gay communities in other parts of the world. (excerpt)

Portuguese Trade Unions and European IntegrationLessons from a Dual Vision*

Following the same course adopted towards the national issues, the positioning of the two main Portuguese trade union confederations (CGTP and UGT) vis-a-vis European integration also seems to lead to the adoption of distinct positions between them. Taking the “European challenge” as a backdrop, this paper attempts to systematize some of the most recent positions of the CGTP and UGT concerning European integration, taking into consideration not only the contributions to a Europeanization of union structures, but also the institutional evolution of the European Union.

Asian Maritime Trade - Portuguese and English Country Trade from Western India in the Eighteenth Century: A Study in Contrast

Asian Maritime Trade - Portuguese and English Country Trade from Western India in the Eighteenth Century: A Study in Contrast