Virtually all African autocrats now govern with parliaments and organize regular, multiparty elections. They have little choice. Since the end of the Cold War, Western governments have required nominally democratic institutions in exchange for aid, investment, and debt relief. With violent repression impossible to conceal from the international community, life as an autocrat has grown more difficult. Since 1989, autocrats forced to govern with nominally democratic institutions have been 80% more likely to lose power than their counterparts. Between 1986 and 2000, the number of autocracies in Africa fell from 45 to 30. The rate of democratization has slowed, for Africa's autocrats learned to survive democratic institutions. To understand how, this dissertation focuses on the Republic of Congo, ruled by Denis Sassou Nguesso for all but five years since 1979. Using original data on the Congolese elite, their political parties, elections, and the security apparatus, this dissertation finds that Africa's autocrats confront challenges old and new with different constraints. Accordingly, they find different solutions. Whereas autocrats once relied on single parties to prevent elite coups, they now secure compliance with social tools. By redefining the pool of candidates for the regime's critical positions, Africa's autocrats employ a "politics of hope," which induces loyalty when elites are excluded from the regime. To monitor appointees, Africa's contemporary autocrats create social institutions, in which new recruits interact with trusted aides. Autocrats supplement these with parallel governments, which force elites separated by cleavages to compete against each other. When Africa's autocrats deploy these monitoring devices effectively, they forgo arbitrary purges in favor of tenure policies that reward competence. The international community's insistence on elections creates "focal moments," when citizens sense their shared discontent. Since they believe international attention will shield them from repression, opposition leaders mobilize unrest. This institutional landscape compels autocrats to fashion electoral alliances with opposition leaders. By joining the regime they once impugned, opposition leaders sacrifice public credibility for ministerial perquisites. Popular goodwill constitutes an insurance policy, and so Africa's autocrats commission surrogates to generate it. With repression less credible, autocrats construct their security apparatuses to threaten violence without provoking it. / Government

This commentary details the methods and ideas involved in creating the seven portfolio works. The portfolio is comprised of stereo acousmatic works, one mixed work and a multi-channel work, forming the practice-based research completed during the PhD programme at the University of Manchester. The works explore a number of aesthetic concepts encompassing instrumental timbres, cultural sound objects, rhythm incorporation, habitual spaces (the kitchen), imaginary and real objects (jukebox), and visual art sculpture (origami). Uniting the portfolio works is the use of Denis Smalley’s spectromorphology (1997). In its intended function, this tool provides the listener of electroacoustic music with thorough and accessible sets of vocabulary to describe sound events, structures and spaces. The use of this descriptive tool need not stop here. Fortunately, and often unconsciously for the composer, it does not, since all composers create music that is spectromorphological with or without an awareness of its presence at work. In a reversal of conventional practice, my research approaches spectromorphology from an alternate angle, viewing the vocabulary as the informer upon sound material choice and creation. In this reversal, vocabulary no longer functions descriptively; instead the vocabulary precedes the composition, directing my compositional pathway in each piece. This new application, used as a method for selecting and creating sound in the creation of each portfolio work, is an attempt at systemisation and an effort to partly remedy the seemingly endless choice of possibilities we are faced with when beginning a new work.

No description available.

No description available.

Mémoire numérisé par la Direction des bibliothèques de l'Université de Montréal.

Deux entités composent le centre de Saint-Denis : d’un côté, l’ensemble monumental de l’ancienne abbaye qui, comme haut lieu de l’histoire nationale et de l’art gothique, revêt un caractère sacré ; de l’autre, l’espace urbain, à la fois populaire et commerçant, dont la mutation est inéluctable à cause, en particulier, de son état d’insalubrité. L’État, émanation de la souveraineté nationale, et la municipalité, représentation du peuple de Saint-Denis, sont happés, après l’épisode vichyste, qui constitue une nouvelle crise politique dans l’histoire de France, par l’urgence de la Reconstruction. C’est à partir du milieu des années 1950 que la reconfiguration de la centralité dionysienne peut être envisagée. La rénovation des abords de la basilique impose un dialogue entre histoire et modernité. Il semble contenir les ferments d’un renouveau politique : une « modernité à la française ». Les débats qui animent les pouvoirs publics et les spécialistes de la ville en proposent une retranscription. Quelles sont les valeurs convoquées dans cette opération d’urbanisme ? Que nous enseigne-t-elle de la reconstruction du récit national depuis la Libération en 1944 ? / Saint-Denis’ city center is twofold: on the one hand stands the sacred monumental complex of the ancient abbey, Mecca of the French national history and Gothic art, while on the other hand, the urban area is both a working-class and commercial environment, which mutation is unavoidable, in particular due to its overall degradation. In the aftermath of the great political crisis of the Vichy period, both the State, as an emanation of national sovereignty, and the municipality, as the representation of the people of Saint-Denis, are confronted with the city’s urgent need for reconstruction. It is only as of the mid-1950s that the reorganization of the Dionysian centrality becomes possible. Yet, the renovation of the surroundings of the basilica calls for a dialogue between history and modernity. This debate appears as the catalyst for a political renewal: a modernity à la française, highlighted by the heated debates between public authorities and specialists of the city. What are the values at stake in this urban renewal process? What are the key lessons triggered by such a project with regards to the reconstruction of the French national narrative since France’s liberation in 1944?

Issued also as thesis, Heidelberg, 1966. / Bibliography: p. 185-191.

Diss.--Techn. Hochsch.--Aachen, 1993. / Sources et bibliogr. p. 375-415.

Th. 3e cycle--Hist. mod.--Paris--E.H.E.S.S., 1986.

Submitted by Fabio Sobreira Campos da Costa (fabio.sobreira@ufpe.br) on 2016-07-29T13:54:33Z No. of bitstreams: 2 license_rdf: 1232 bytes, checksum: 66e71c371cc565284e70f40736c94386 (MD5) Tese_RaulFerreira_BC.pdf: 1769138 bytes, checksum: fc9a08552e3536553423dbd602e17779 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-07-29T13:54:33Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 license_rdf: 1232 bytes, checksum: 66e71c371cc565284e70f40736c94386 (MD5) Tese_RaulFerreira_BC.pdf: 1769138 bytes, checksum: fc9a08552e3536553423dbd602e17779 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-03-09 / Este trabalho oferece uma reflexão sobre o discurso produzido pela crítica literária que surge na primeira metade do século XIX e se desenvolve até as últimas décadas dos oitocentos. São considerados como seus marcos históricos duas publicações: o Resumé de l'histoire litteráire du Brèsil, de Ferdinand Denis, publicado em 1826, e a História da literatura Brasileira, de Sílvio Romero, publicada em 1888. Para certa historiografia recente da literatura brasileira, a crítica praticada no final do século XIX, a chamada crítica cientificista, diferiu radicalmente da que foi produzida durante o período romântico. Entre um e outro modelo haveria uma ruptura devida sobretudo à adoção das novas ideias científicas que vinham da Europa. Outras leituras, no entanto, preferiram enfatizar a continuidade da ideologia nacionalista e viram na passagem da crítica romântica para a crítica cientificista mais uma continuidade de ideias do que um rompimento traumático. A partir de uma reflexão sobre a teoria do discurso de linha francesa, a pesquisa que aqui é conduzida investiga as diversas possibilidades de dinâmica discursiva dos enunciados de forma a verificar o funcionamento dos discursos inerentes aos dois modelos de crítica literária. Isto permitiu avaliar a pertinência das leituras que alegam a ruptura e a continuidade e concluir que nenhuma das duas abordagens consegue dar conta da complexidade da questão. Ao invés de mera ruptura ou continuidade, conclui-se que as críticas romântica e cientificista constituem dois momentos distintos de uma mesma formação discursiva sobre a literatura. Elas constituem um discurso que se dinamiza em função das vicissitudes históricas e das transformações políticas atravessadas pela nação. / This research offers a reflection on the discourse produced by literary criticism that appears in the first half of the nineteenth century and develops until the last decades of the eight hundred. It is considered as its landmarks two publications: the Resumé de l'histoire litteraire du Bresil, by Ferdinand Denis, published in 1826, and the history of Brazilian literature, by Sílvio Romero, published in 1888. For some recent historiography of Brazilian literature, the criticism practiced in the late nineteenth century, the so called scientistic critical, radically differs from what was produced during the romantic period. Between one and another model there would be a break due mainly to the adoption of new scientific ideas coming from Europe. Other readings, however, preferred to emphasize the continuity of nationalist ideology and saw in the passage of the romantic critical to the scientistic criticism more a continuity of ideas than a traumatic breakup. From a reflection on the French theory of discourse, the research that is conducted here investigates the different possibilities of discursive dynamics of statements in order to verify the behavior of the discourses inherent in two models of literary criticism. This allowed to assess the relevance of the two hypotheses and to conclude that neither approach can account for the complexity of the issue. Rather than merely break or continuity, it is concluded that the romantic criticism and scientistic are two different moments of the same discourse on literature. A speech that oscillates depending on the historical events and political transformations crossed the nation.