The Futures of Old Age. edited by John A. Vincent,Chris R. Phillipson,and Murna Downs

Poetry by older women is now appearing with increasing frequency in journals, magazines, and newsletters. It reaches a wide audience and defines areas of experience formerly ignored: the pains and pleasures of women as they grow older and their various attitudes and solutions to the aging process. The news is positive; their poems are affirmative, strong, and inspiring.     

Population,Development and Global Warming: Averting the Tragedy of the Climate Commons

Carbon emissions from fossil fuel use and other human activity are predicted to cause a significant warming of the global climate, according to a growing consensus of scientists. Global warming would have substantial negative effects on the world environment and economy. Human population and economic growth continue to drive both energy use and carbon emissions. While the developed countries are the largest source of present and past emissions, developing countries are rapidly catching up. China will probably surpass the United States as the largest carbon emitter early in the next century. The global warming treaty signed in Rio in 1992 relies entirely on voluntary emission caps for developed countries and has had little or no apparent effect on emissions. Much stronger steps must be taken to avoid or lessen potential climate change. A globally determined but nationally imposed carbon tax should be adopted to internalize the future costs of carbon emissions into the present cost of fossil fuel and other carbon sources. This would allow the maximum use of free market forces and individual choice to determine how carbon emission reductions are achieved. In addition, national emission caps for all countries should be established. International trade mechanisms can be used to support universal implementation of these measures. Where possible, global warming policy should include strong but equitable incentives for sustainable development and population stabilization, important goals in themselves regardless of the extent of future climate change.     

The Politics of Refugee Protection

This article looks back to the 1920s, and tries to tease outthe politics of refugee protection as it evolved in the practiceof States and international organizations in a period of growingideological divide. The question addressed is whether the politicsof protection at any particular moment are humanitarian or whetherthey serve primarily other purposes, in which the refugee ismerely instrumental. It is unrealistic to imagine that the problemof refugees can ever be entirely non-political. What the historyof the 1920–55 period confirms is the continued vitalityof self-interest as a motivating factor in the responses ofStates to refugee flows. The international refugee regime thatemerged in the late 1940s and early 1950s defined refugees throughthe politics of denunciation in a persecution-oriented definitionthat continues to limit and confuse, not only at the internationaloperations level, but also in national asylum procedures. Inthis context, the article concludes that the art for UNHCR isnot to allow solutions or assistance to have priority over protection.For if it cannot provide protection, it will be judged a failureand accountable, and not merely excused because it tried hardin difficult political circumstances.