In 2021, an internal document leak from the company then known as Facebook (now Meta Platforms, or Meta) showed it was aware of harmful societal effects from its platforms, yet persisted in prioritizing profit over addressing these harms. The leak, released by whistleblower Frances Haugen, resulted in reporting from The Wall Street Journal in September, as The Facebook Files series, as well as the Facebook Papers, by a consortium of news outlets the next month.

Primarily, the reports revealed that, based on internally-commissioned studies, the company was fully aware of negative impacts on teenage users of Instagram, and the contribution of Facebook activity to violence in developing countries. Other takeaways of the leak include the impact of the company's platforms on spreading false information, and Facebook's policy of promoting inflammatory posts.
Furthermore, Facebook was fully aware that harmful content was being pushed through Facebook algorithms reaching young users. The types of content included posts promoting anorexia nervosa and self-harm photos.

In October 2021, Whistleblower Aid filed eight anonymous whistleblower complaints with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on behalf of Haugen alleging securities fraud by the company, after Haugen leaked the company documents the previous month. After publicly revealing her identity on 60 Minutes, Haugen testified before the U.S. Senate Commerce Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, Product Safety, and Data Security about the content of the leaked documents and the complaints. After the company renamed itself as Meta Platforms, Whistleblower Aid filed two additional securities fraud complaints with the SEC against the company on behalf of Haugen in February 2022.

Background

In mid September 2021, The Wall Street Journal began publishing articles on Facebook based on internal documents from unknown provenance. Revelations included reporting of special allowances on posts from high-profile users ("XCheck"), subdued responses to flagged information on human traffickers and drug cartels, a shareholder lawsuit concerning the cost of Facebook (now Meta) CEO Mark Zuckerberg's personal liability protection in resolving the Cambridge Analytica data scandal, an initiative to increase pro-Facebook news within user news feeds, and internal knowledge of how Instagram exacerbated negative self-image in surveyed teenage girls.

Siva Vaidhyanathan wrote for The Guardian that the documents were from a team at Facebook "devoted to social science and data analytics that is supposed to help the company's leaders understand the consequences of their policies and technological designs." Casey Newton of The Verge wrote that it is the company's biggest challenge since its Cambridge Analytica data scandal.

The leaked documents include internal research from Facebook that studied the impact of Instagram on teenage mental health. Although Facebook earlier claimed that its rules applies equally to everyone on the platform, internal documents shared with The Wall Street Journal point to special policy exceptions reserved for VIP users, including celebrities and politicians. After this reporting, Facebook's oversight board said it would review the system.

On October 3, 2021, the former Facebook employee behind the leak, Frances Haugen, revealed her identity on 60 Minutes.

The reports

Beginning October 22, a group of news outlets began publishing articles based on documents provided by Haugen's lawyers, collectively referred to as The Facebook Papers.

2020 U.S. elections and January 6 U.S. Capitol attack

The New York Times pointed to internal discussions where employees raised concerns that Facebook was spreading content about the QAnon conspiracy theory more than a year before the 2020 United States elections. After the election, a data scientist mentioned in an internal note that 10 percent of all U.S. views of political content were of posts alleging that the election was fraudulent. Among the ten anonymous whistleblower complaints Whistleblower Aid filed with the SEC on behalf of Haugen, one complaint alleged that Facebook misled the company's investors and the general public about its role in perpetuating misinformation related to the 2020 elections and political extremism that caused the January 6 United States Capitol attack. Haugen was employed at Facebook from June 2019 until May 2021, starting within the company's Civic Integrity Team that was focused on investigating and addressing worldwide elections issues on the platform, as well as how the platform could be used to spread political disinformation and misinformation, to incite violence, and be abused by malicious governments until the company dissolved the team in December 2020.

In the weeks after the 2020 U.S. presidential election, Facebook began rolling back many content policy enforcement measures it had in place during the election despite internal company tracking data showing a rise in policy-violating content on the platform, while Donald Trump's Facebook account had been whitelisted in the company's XCheck program. Another of the whistleblower complaints Haugen filed with the SEC alleged that the company misled investors and the general public about enforcement of its terms of service due to such whitelisting under the XCheck program. Haugen was interviewed by videoconference by the U.S. House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack in November 2021 about her tenure at Facebook, the company documents she provided to Congress, the company's corporate structure, and her testimony before Congress the previous month, but none of the information she provided to the Committee was included in its final report.

Instagram's effects on teenagers
The Files show that Facebook (now Meta) has been conducting internal research of how Instagram affects young users for the past three years. While the findings point to Instagram being harmful to a large portion of young users, teenage girls were among the most harmed. Researchers within the company reported that "we make body issues worse for one in three teenage girls". Furthermore, internal research revealed that teen boys were also affected by negative social comparison, citing 14% of boys in the US in 2019. Instagram was concluded to contribute to problems more specific to its app use, such as social comparison among teens. Facebook published some of its internal research on September 29, 2021, saying these reports mischaracterized the purpose and results of its research.

Studying of preteens
The Files show that Facebook formed a team to study preteens, set a three year goal to create more products for this demographic, and commissioned strategy papers about the long-term business prospects of attracting the preteen demographic. A 2020 document from Facebook states: "Why do we care about tweens?" and answers that question by saying that "They are a valuable but untapped audience."

Violence in developing countries
An internal memo seen by the Washington Post revealed that Facebook has been aware of hate speech and calls for violence against groups like Muslims and Kashmiris, including posts of photos of piles of dead Kashmiri bodies with glorifying captions on its platform in India. Still, none of their publishers were blocked. Documents reveal Facebook has responded to these incidents by removing posts which violate their policy, but has not made any substantial efforts to prevent repeat offenses. As 90% of monthly Facebook users are now located outside of the US and Canada, Facebook claims language barriers are one obstacle that is preventing widespread reform.

Promoting anger-provoking posts
In 2015, in addition to the Like button on posts, Facebook introduced a set of other emotional reaction options: love, haha, yay, wow, sad and angry. The Washington Post reported that for three years, Facebook's algorithms promoted posts that received the 'angry' reaction from its users, based on internal analysis showing that such posts lead to five times more engagement than posts with regular likes. Years later, Facebook's researchers pointed out that posts with 'angry' reactions were much more likely to be toxic, polarizing, fake or low quality.

In 2018, Facebook overhauled its News Feed algorithm, implementing a new algorithm which favored "Meaningful Social Interations" or "MSI". The new algorithm increased the weight of reshared material - a move which aimed to "reverse the decline in comments and encourage more original posting". While the algorithm was successful in its efforts, consequences such as user reports of feed quality decreasing along with increased anger on the site were observed. Leaked documents reveal that employees presented several potential changes to fix some of the highlighted issues with their algorithm. However, documents claim Mark Zuckerberg denied the proposed changes due to his worry that they might cause less users to engage with Facebook. Documents have also pointed to another 2019 study conducted by Facebook where a fake account based in India was created and studied to see what type of content it was presented and interacted with. Results of the study showed that within three weeks, the fake account's newsfeed was being presented pornography and "filled with polarizing and graphic content, hate speech and misinformation", according to an internal company report.

Employee dissatisfaction
Politico quotes several Facebook staff expressing concerns about the company's willingness and ability to respond to damage caused by the platform. A 2020 post reads: "It's not normal for a large number of people in the 'make the site safe' team to leave saying, 'hey, we're actively making the world worse FYI.' Every time this gets raised it gets shrugged off with 'hey people change jobs all the time' but this is NOT normal."

Apple's threat to remove Facebook and Instagram
In 2019, following concerns about Facebook and Instagram being used to trade maids in the Middle East, Apple threatened to remove their iOS apps from the App Store.

XCheck
The documents have shown a private program known as "XCheck" or "cross-check" that Facebook has employed in order to whitelist posts from users deemed as "high-profile". The system began as a quality control measure but has since grown to protect "millions of VIP users from the company's normal enforcement process". XCheck has led to celebrities and other public figures being exempt from punishment that the average Facebook user would receive from violating policies. In 2019, football player Neymar had posted nude photos of a woman who had accused him of rape which were left up for more than a day. According to The Wall Street Journal, "XCheck grew to include at least 5.8 million users in 2020" according to Facebook's internal documents. The goal of XCheck was "to never publicly tangle with anyone who is influential enough to do you harm".

Collaboration on censorship with the government of Vietnam
In 2020, Vietnam's communist government has threatened to shut down Facebook if the social media company does not co-operate on censoring political content in the country, Meta's (then known as Facebook) big market in Southeast Asia. The decision to comply was personally approved by Mark Zuckerberg.

Suppression of political movements on its platform
In 2021, Facebook developed a new strategy for addressing harmful content on their site, implementing measures which were designed to reduce and suppress the spread of movements that were deemed hateful. According to a senior security official at Facebook, the company "would seek to disrupt on-platform movements only if there was compelling evidence that they were the product of tightly knit circles of users connected to real-world violence or other harm and committed to violating Facebook's rules". As part of their recently coordinated initiative, this included less promotion of the movement's posts within users' News Feed as well as not notifying users of new posts from these pages. Specific groups that have been highlighted as being affected by Facebook's social harm policy include the Patriot Party, previously linked to the Capitol attack, as well as a newer German conspiracy group known as Querdenken, who had been placed under surveillance by German intelligence after protests it organized repeatedly "resulted in violence and injuries to the police".

Facebook's AI concern
According to The Wall Street Journal, documents show that in 2019, Facebook reduced the time spent by human reviewers on hate-speech complaints, shifting towards a stronger dependence on their artificial intelligence systems to regulate the matter. However, internal documents from employees claim that their AI has been largely unsuccessful, seeing trouble detecting videos of cars crashing, cockfighting, as well as understanding hate speech in foreign languages. Internal engineers and researchers within Facebook have estimated that their AI has only been able to detect and remove 0.6% of "all content that violated Facebook's policies against violence and incitement".

The Wall Street Journal podcast
For The Facebook Files series of reports, The Wall Street Journal produced a podcast on its The Journal channel, divided into eight episodes:
 Part 1: The Whitelist
 Part 2: 'We Make Body Image Issues Worse'
 Part 3: 'This Shouldn't Happen on Facebook'
 Part 4: The Outrage Algorithm
 Part 5: The Push To Attract Younger Users
 Part 6: The Whistleblower
 Part 7: The AI Challenge
 Part 8: A New Enforcement Strategy

Facebook's response
In the Q3 2021 earnings call, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg discussed the recent leaks, characterizing them as coordinated efforts to paint a false picture of his company by selectively leaking documents.

According to a leaked internal email seen by The New York Times, Facebook asked its employees to "preserve internal documents and communications since 2016", a practice called a legal hold. The email continues: "As is often the case following this kind of reporting, a number of inquiries from governments and legislative bodies have been launched into the company's operations."

Lobbying
In December 2021, news broke on The Wall Street Journal pointing to Meta's lobbying efforts to divide US lawmakers and "muddy the waters" in Congress, to hinder regulation following the 2021 whistleblower leaks. Facebook's lobbyist team in Washington suggested to Republican lawmakers that the whistleblower "was trying to help Democrats," while the narrative told to Democratic staffers was that Republicans "were focused on the company's decision to ban expressions of support for Kyle Rittenhouse," The Wall Street Journal reported. According to the article, the company's goal was to "muddy the waters, divide lawmakers along partisan lines and forestall a cross-party alliance" against Facebook (now Meta) in Congress.

See also
 Criticism of Facebook
 Comparison of user features of messaging platforms
 Instagram's impact on people
 Problematic social media use
 Twitter Files

References

Further reading

 A whistleblower's power: Key takeaways from the Facebook Papers (WaPo, October 25, 2021)
 The Facebook Papers and their fallout. (NYT, October 25, 2021)
 'HISTORY WILL NOT JUDGE US KINDLY' (Adrienne LaFrance, Atlantic, October 25, 2021)
 The Facebook Papers: Documents reveal internal fury and dissent over site's policies (NBC News, October 25, 2021)
 Not stopping 'Stop the Steal:' Facebook Papers paint damning picture of company's role in insurrection (CNN, October 24, 2021)
 Facebook documents offer a treasure trove for Washington's antitrust war (Politico, October 25, 2021)
 Here are all the Facebook Papers stories (Protocol)

External links
  (The Facebook Files, The Wall Street Journal)

News leaks
Facebook criticisms and controversies
Corporate scandals
2021 scandals

2021 Facebook leak


The two Ad hoc Divans were legislative and consultative assemblies of the Danubian Principalities (Moldavia and Wallachia), vassals of the Ottoman Empire. They were established by the Great Powers under the Treaty of Paris. By then, the Crimean War had taken the two states out of Russia's sphere of influence, and had nullified the Moldo-Wallachian Regulamentul Organic regime. Officially, the two assemblies were provisional replacements for the traditional assemblies, the Sfaturi (or Divanuri). The term "divan", is derived from the Ottoman rule, being the name of a high governmental body in a number of Islamic states.

The elections for the two Divans confronted two local movements: the National Party, which supported the unification of Moldavia and Wallachia, as "Romania"; the anti-unionists, which sought to maintain the status quo. The National Party emerged as the victor in 1859, when its candidate Alexandru Ioan Cuza was crowned Domnitor over both countries. The resulting United Principalities were the political embryo of modern Romania.

References

National legislatures
History of Moldavia (1822–1859)
History of Wallachia (1821–1859)
Government of the Principality of Wallachia
Crimean War

Ad hoc Divans


Meadow Lea is one of Australia's leading brands of polyunsaturated margarine spreads, founded in Sydney in 1932 and owned since 1986 by the Australasian food company Goodman Fielder. In 1995 it had a 25% share of margarine sales, and was the top-selling margarine brand since 1973.

History
Meadow Lea Margarine was founded by Oliver Triggs in early 1932, when manufactured in Edgeware Road Newtown, Sydney. However its origins go back four years earlier, when Triggs made copha butter and then margarine in Melbourne, while running a small grocery shop at 6 Elizabeth Street, Richmond. In about April 1932 Triggs moved to Sydney, which had more favourable margarine regulations, and sales of Meadow Lea grew rapidly. Later in 1932 the factory was moved to 34 Wellington Street, Newtown. By March 1933 there were 70 employees working in the factory. In 1934 Triggs hired James (Jim) Andrew Armstrong as a sales manager, on commission, for country regions in New South Wales. In 1941 Triggs and Armstrong reached an agreement whereby Armstrong would sell his roughly 25% sales commission share in the Meadow Lea Margarine Company to Triggs' son Ken in 1945 when he turned 21. In 1941 the factory was moved to 1 Alice Street, Newtown, leased from Sydney Confectionery Limited, with the fit-out costing £15,000.

In 1945 Armstrong sold his 25% share of Meadow Lea to Ken Triggs, and retired from the company. In 1956, Oliver and Ken Triggs sold the Meadow Lea Margarine Company to Vegetable Oils Proprietary Limited, a subsidiary of the publicly listed company Allied Mills Limited.

On 30 April 1986 Allied Mills was taken over by Fielder Gillespie Davis Limited, part of the Goodman Group Limited (New Zealand), to create Goodman Fielder Limited. In 2015 Goodman Fielder was purchased by Wilmar International and First Pacific, and in 2019 First Pacific's half share was acquired by Wilmar, one of the largest listed companies by market capitalisation on the Singapore Exchange.

Products
In 2010 the MeadowLea product range consisted of six varieties:
 Original
 Salt Reduced
 Canola
 Light
 Extra Light
 Dairy Free

Oliver Triggs
Oliver Francis Triggs (21 March 1895 – 28 August 1962) founded the Meadow Lea table margarine brand in 1932 and claimed to be the first person in Australia to manufacture table margarine, finally selling Meadow Lea to Allied Mills in about 1956. Triggs was born in Ascot Vale in Melbourne and grew up on a small farm, fought with the Light Horse in World War I, then trained as a tailor, before opening a corner grocery shop and making copha butter. After copha butter was banned in Victoria to support the butter industry and pure butter sales, Triggs moved to Sydney in early 1932. He was married in September 1922 to Nita Alice Beck (or Bek, 13 April 1895 – 16 June 1974), a seamstress, and had four children, Kenneth, Audray and Marian (non-identical twins, born 20 June 1930), and Jill.

From August 1935 until 1975, the family home was Edgewater, 3-5 Sutherland Crescent, Darling Point, bought from George Wirth of Wirth Brothers Circus which cost £30,000, and was then-called Margworth, built for Wirth in about 1929-30 in the Spanish style. Its water front gardens (including a tennis court and swimming pool) were sold to the neighbouring Carthona in the 1950s, when Edgewater was divided into three homes (one on each floor) with Triggs retaining the top floor. Triggs also owned the cruiser Sea Mist circa 1939-41 (possibly  which sank the Japanese midget submarine M-21 in the attack on Sydney Harbour in 1942, but there may have been two cruisers called  made by Lars Halvorsen Sons in 1937-39, hence the confusion).

From 1939 to 1946 Triggs owned the approximately  Kyalla Park sheep farm and horse stud near Orange, which had the first electrified sheep-shearing shed in Australia (built in about 1910 by the previous owners, the Stuart family, builders of Luna Park Sydney). Subsequently the property was slowly subdivided and sold off by the Dutton family, so that it was around  when owned by the Napier family from 1982 to 2021. In 1939 Triggs' racehorse Gilltown won the Moonee Valley Cup (and again in 1940) and City Tattersall's Gold Cup, and ran in the Melbourne Cup (leading almost to the home turn).

Ken Triggs
Kenneth Oliver Triggs OAM (5 April 1924 – 11 July 2022), the only son of Oliver Triggs, was a director and 25% shareholder in Meadow Lea from 1945 until the company's sale to Vegetable Oils Proprietary Limited in about 1956. He subsequently became a farmer and Chairman of the NSW Egg Board, a manufacturer of polystyrene containers, Chairman of Mutual Home Loans Fund of Australia Limited and Information Electronics Limited. In 2003 he became the Secretary of the Auburn sub-Branch of the Returned and Services League of Australia (RSL), and was made a life member of the RSL in 2008. He received an Order of Australia in 2011 for service to veterans and their families. He married Ruth Carol Donnison (2 August 1926 - 4 May 2023) on 4 July 1950 and they had two sons, David and Andrew. The couple divorced in about 1976, and on 20 June 1986 Triggs married Lesley-Anne Woodward, who had 4 children from a previous marriage.

Meadow Lea house
The art deco heritage listed residential home named Meadow Lea at 22 Sydney Road, East Lindfield, Sydney, was built on four housing lots and completed in about 1941 for James Andrew Armstrong, at the time co-proprietor (25%) of the Meadow-Lea Margarine Co. In 1945 the pool and grounds were used in the filming of A Son is Born (released 1946), which included in its cast John McCallum, whose brother Ian later married Oliver Triggs' daughter Audray. The house was sold in 1948 for £17,000 to Azzalin Romano, of the nightclub restaurant Romanos, who had sold his racehorse Bernborough in 1946 to Louis B. Mayer for £93,000. In 1955 the house was sold for £25,000. In 1996 it was purchased by Daniel Kalanderian, the co-founder of the Sydney store, Victoria's Basement, for $1.415 million, who added a new wing and put it on the market in September 2010 for $7.5 million. It was for sale in 2014 for $10 million, and in 2020 the south gardens were sub-divided by Kalanderian into a 1,162sqm block with a new five-bedroom house, numbered 22A Sydney Road, which was for sale in April 2022 for $8.5 million as never-been-lived-in.

References

External links
Meadow Lea – official website
Goodman Fielder – Meadow Lea web page
Spread the Facts – website by Goodman Fielder
Kyalla Park – official website

Companies based in Sydney
Australian brands
New Zealand brands
Goodman Fielder brands
Australian condiments
Brand name condiments
Margarine brands
Dairy products companies of Australia
1932 establishments in Australia
Food and drink companies established in 1932
Products introduced in 1932
Australian  companies established in 1932

Meadow Lea


Tongahiti is one of Tāwhaki's enemies in a Māori tradition which White (1887-1891) attributes to the Ngati Hau iwi.  In this tale, Tāwhaki blocks up all the chinks in the house of his enemies, a house of which his grandmother Whaitiri is the doorkeeper. Before sunset, the enemies - who are like small birds -  flock into the house in great numbers. Tongahiti is among them. When morning comes, the enemies sleep on, because no light can enter the house. Tongahiti makes a remark about the length of the night, and suggests that Whaitiri may be deceiving them. Tāwhaki now lets the light in, and then kills all the creatures except Tongahiti, who manages to escape through a small hole he pierces through the base of one of the posts at the back of the house.

Tongahiti is called 'god of headaches' by White (1887-1891) in his English translation of the story. The reference to headaches does not appear in the Māori text. (Tongahiti is also mentioned by Tregear as 'the god of Headache', giving White I:101 as his source).

References
R. D. Craig, Dictionary of Polynesian Mythology (Greenwood Press: New York, 1989), 288.
E. R. Tregear, Maori-Polynesian Comparative Dictionary (Lyon and Blair: Lambton Quay), 1891, 531.
J. White, The Ancient History of the Maori, 7 Volumes (Government Printer: Wellington), 1887–1891, I, English pp. 101–102, Māori pp. 89–90.

Legendary Māori people

Tongahiti


Judith Aller is an American-born violinist, the daughter of pianist Victor Aller.

Aller started taking lessons on the violin at seven, and as a teenager, she began her studies with Jascha Heifetz in his master class at the University of Southern California. After three years with Heifetz, Aller married a Finnish musician, Ilkka Talvi, and relocated to Finland, residing first in Helsinki and subsequently in Pori. She toured Europe in recital and with the Pori Symphony Orchestra, in which she performed as soloist and served as concertmaster and assistant conductor. From Helsinki she toured as soloist with the Finnish Radio Symphony, made recordings for Finnish radio, and taught at the Sibelius Academy.

The fatal illness of her father brought Aller and her family back to America. In Los Angeles she performed as a principal and frequent soloist with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra and the Oregon Bach Festival Orchestra, and played on sound tracks for motion pictures, television productions, and popular music recordings. She first conducted with the Los Angeles Accademia Filarmonica.

After remarrying, she moved to Paris with her husband, Bruce Cook, a novelist whose pen name was Bruce Alexander. While dividing her time between Paris and Los Angeles, Aller recorded "Archangel!" (on the USA Music Group label), a selection of the Opus 5 violin sonatas by the Italian Baroque master, Arcangelo Corelli. These sonatas, which she described "music that exists outside of time," were recorded in a single day. After that recording, Aller returned to England, and soloed on a soundtrack for a film, titled "Maestro," about a violinist. She continued to perform recitals in France with pianists from the Paris Conservatory, and in Los Angeles with the Aller Quartet.

References

External links

 Performances
 Chicago Quarterly Review Vol 15 "Beast With Five Fingers"
 The Story Of That Marvelous Hero, The Huffington Post

Living people
American classical violinists
American women violinists
21st-century classical violinists
Year of birth missing (living people)
Women classical violinists

Judith Aller


Just the Two of Us is the 2013 and 8th album by Secret Garden.

The purely instrumental album features Secret Garden  playing some of their most popular songs re-envisioned as duo arrangements along with two new pieces: the title-track "Just the Two of Us" and "En Passant".

Rolf Løvland described the album, "Our music always starts with just the two of us – Rolf & Fionnuala; even when we're performing with a full production on stage. So it feels natural and good to perform some of our music in the most intimate and stripped-down version – that musical place where Secret Garden was born."

The album debuted at number seven on the Billboard Top New Age Albums chart.

Track listing

References

Secret Garden (duo) albums
2013 albums

Just the Two of Us (Secret Garden album)


Inge Staldvik (born 6 January 1955) is a Norwegian politician, first for the Labour Party and later for the Socialist Left Party.

Staldvik was mayor of Røyrvik from 1983 to 1985. He sat as the Labour Party's first deputy member from Nord-Trøndelag in the Parliament of Norway from 1981 to 1985. In 1985, he was elected to parliament, and re-elected in 1989. He left the Labour Party concerning disagreements about Norwegian membership in the European Union, and joined the Socialist Left Party afterwards. He sat in parliament from 1993 to 1997 as the Socialist Left Party's first deputy member. While in parliament, Staldvik sat on the Standing Committee on Agriculture. From 1999 to 2007, he also sat on Nord-Trøndelag County Council.

References

Labour Party (Norway) politicians
Socialist Left Party (Norway) politicians
Members of the Storting
Mayors of places in Nord-Trøndelag
People from Røyrvik
1955 births
Living people
20th-century Norwegian politicians

Inge Staldvik


Frederick Wallace Smith (born August 11, 1944) is an American business magnate and investor. He is the founder and chairman of FedEx Corporation, the world's largest transportation company. On June 1, 2022, Smith stepped down as CEO to become executive chairman, and was replaced by Raj Subramaniam. He is considered one of the most successful transportation entrepreneurs in the world.

He has an estimated net worth of $5.3 billion (as of June 2023).

Early years
Frederick Smith was born in Marks, Mississippi, the son of James Frederick "Fred" Smith, the founder of the Toddle House restaurant chain and the Smith Motor Coach Company (renamed the Dixie Greyhound Lines after The Greyhound Corporation bought a controlling interest in 1931). The elder Smith died when his son was only 4, and the boy was raised by his mother and uncles.

Smith was crippled by bone disease as a small boy but regained his health by age 10.

He attended elementary school at Presbyterian Day School in Memphis and high school at Memphis University School, and became an amateur pilot as a teen.

In 1962, Smith entered Yale University for pursuing economics. According to some sources, he wrote a paper for an economics class, outlining overnight delivery service, on which he received a "C". In fact, in an interview, he said he doesn't remember the grade.

Additionally, Smith became a member and eventually the president of the Delta Kappa Epsilon (DKE) fraternity and the Skull and Bones secret society. He received his bachelor's degree in economics in 1966. In his college years, he was a friend and DKE fraternity brother of future U.S. president George W. Bush.  Smith was also friends with future U.S. Senator and Secretary of State John Kerry; the two shared an enthusiasm for aviation and were flying partners.

Marine Corps service
After graduation, Smith was commissioned in the U.S. Marine Corps, serving for three years (from 1966 to 1969) as a platoon leader and a forward air controller (FAC), flying in the back seat of the OV-10.

He served two tours of duty in Vietnam and was honorably discharged in 1969 with the rank of captain, having received the Silver Star, the Bronze Star, and two Purple Hearts.

His Silver Star citation reads:

The President of the United States of America takes pleasure in presenting the Silver Star to First Lieutenant Frederick Wallace Smith, United States Marine Corps, for conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity in action while serving as Commanding Officer of Company K, 3rd Battalion, 5th Marines, 1st Marine Division in connection with operations against the enemy in the Republic of Vietnam. On the morning of 27 May 1968, while conducting a search and destroy operation, Company K became heavily engaged with a North Vietnamese Army battalion occupying well-entrenched emplacements on Goi Noi Island in Quang Nam Province. As Lieutenant Smith led his men in an aggressive assault upon the enemy positions, the North Vietnamese force launched a determined counterattack, supported by mortars, on the Marines' left flank. Unhesitatingly rushing through the intense hostile fire to the position of heaviest contact, Lieutenant Smith fearlessly removed several casualties from the hazardous area and, shouting words of encouragement to his men, directed their fire upon the advancing enemy soldiers, successfully repulsing the hostile attack. Moving boldly across the fire-swept terrain to an elevated area, he calmly disregarded repeated North Vietnamese attempts to direct upon him as he skillfully adjusted artillery fire and air strikes upon the hostile positions to within fifty meters of his own location and continued to direct the movement of his unit. Accurately assessing the confusion that supporting arms was causing among the enemy soldiers, he raced across the fire-swept terrain to the right flank of his company and led an enveloping attack on the hostile unit's weakest point, routing the North Vietnamese unit and inflicting numerous casualties. His aggressive tactics and calm presence of min [sic] under fire inspired all who observed him and were instrumental in his unit accounting for the capture of two hostile soldiers as well as numerous documents and valuable items of equipment. By his courage, aggressive leadership and unfaltering devotion to duty at great personal risk, Lieutenant Smith upheld the highest traditions of the Marine Corps and of the United States Naval Service."

Business career
In 1970, Smith purchased the controlling interest in an aircraft maintenance company, Ark Aviation Sales, and by 1971 turned its focus to trading used jets. On June 18, 1971, Smith founded Federal Express with his $4 million inheritance (approximately $23 million in 2013 dollars) and raised $91 million (approximately $525 million in 2013 dollars) in venture capital. In 1973, the company began offering service to 25 cities, and it began with small packages and documents and a fleet of 14 Falcon 20 (DA-20) jets. His focus was on developing an integrated air-ground system.  Smith developed FedEx on the business idea of a shipment version of a bank clearing house where one bank clearing house was located in the middle of the representative banks and all their representatives would be sent to the central location to exchange materials.

In the early days of FedEx, Smith had to go to great lengths to keep the company afloat. In one instance, after a crucial business loan was denied, he took the company's last $5,000 to Las Vegas and won $27,000 gambling on blackjack to cover the company's $24,000 fuel bill. It kept FedEx alive for one more week.

In 2003 Smith, along with Robert Rothman and Dwight Schar, purchased a minority share of the Washington Commanders, an American football franchise belonging to the National Football League. The three owned a total of 40% of the team until 2021, when they sold their stake to majority owner Dan Snyder following discontentment with Snyder. Smith also owns or co-owns several other entertainment companies, such as Alcon Entertainment.

In 2000, Smith made an appearance as himself in the Tom Hanks movie Cast Away, when Tom's character is welcomed back, which was filmed on location at FedEx's home facilities in Memphis, Tennessee. A DKE Fraternity Brother of George W. Bush while at Yale, after Bush's 2000 election, there was some speculation that Smith might be appointed to the Bush Cabinet as Defense Secretary.
While Smith was Bush's first choice for the position, he declined for medical reasons — Donald Rumsfeld was named instead. Although Smith was friends with both 2004 major candidates, John Kerry and George W. Bush, Smith chose to endorse Bush's re-election in 2004. When Bush decided to replace Rumsfeld, Smith was offered the position again, but he declined in order to spend time with his terminally ill daughter.

Smith was a supporter of Senator John McCain's 2008 Presidential bid, and had been named McCain's National Co-Chairman of his campaign committee.

Smith was inducted into the Junior Achievement U.S. Business Hall of Fame and also awarded the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement in 1998. He was inducted into the SMEI Sales & Marketing Hall of Fame in 2000. His other awards include "CEO of the Year 2004" by Chief Executive Magazine and the 2008 Kellogg Award for Distinguished Leadership, presented by the Kellogg School of Management on May 29, 2008.  He was also awarded the 2008 Bower Award for Business Leadership from The Franklin Institute in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He is the 2011 recipient of the Tony Jannus Award for distinguished contributions to commercial aviation.

While CEO of FedEx in 2008, Frederick W. Smith earned a total compensation of $10,434,589, which included a base salary of $1,430,466, a cash bonus of $2,705,000, stocks granted of $0, and options granted of $5,461,575.
In June 2009, Smith expressed interest in purchasing the controlling share (60%) of the St. Louis Rams from Chip Rosenbloom and Lucia Rodriguez. In 2009, Frederick W. Smith earned a total compensation of $7,740,658, which included a base salary of $1,355,028, a cash bonus of $0, stocks granted of $0, options granted of $5,079,191, and other compensation totaling $1,306,439.

In March 2014, Fortune Magazine ranked him 26th among the list of "World's 50 Greatest Leaders"

In March 2022, Smith announced that he will step down as CEO and become executive chairman. He named long-time FedEx executive Raj Subramaniam as his successor.

Forgery indictment and car crash
On January 31, 1975, Fred Smith was indicted for forgery by a federal grand jury. The suit was filed by Smith's two half-sisters. The lawsuit alleged Smith had forged documents to obtain a $2 million bank loan and he and executives of his family's trust fund had sold stock from the fund for a loss of $14 million. A warrant for Smith's arrest was issued for which Smith posted bond with federal authorities in Memphis. Smith was later found not guilty on the forgery charge.

The same evening of his forgery indictment Smith was involved in a fatal hit and run in which he killed a 54-year-old handyman named George C. Sturghill. Smith was arrested and charged with leaving the scene of a crash and driving with an expired license. He was released on a $250 bond. All charges were later dismissed.

This was not the first time Smith was involved in a fatal car crash. During his first summer break from Yale, Smith was back in Memphis driving out to a lake with friends when he lost control of the car he was driving, causing the vehicle to flip and killing the passenger in the front seat. The cause of the crash was never determined.

Personal life
Smith has ten children, including photographer Windland Smith Rice, film producer Molly Smith and Atlanta Falcons head coach Arthur Smith. His eldest son, Richard W. Smith, is a high level executive at FedEx. His youngest son, Frederick Buchanan "Cannon" Smith, married Leigh Anne and Sean Tuohy's daughter Collins in 2016.

Notes

References

Profile in Fortune Magazine's Innovators Hall of Fame
Article by Smith on how Fedex came to be, includes the story of the paper he wrote while at Yale.
USA Today Q&A on his love of history
Chief Executive Magazine Names Fred Smith 2004 CEO of the Year

External links

1944 births
Living people
20th-century American businesspeople
21st-century American businesspeople
American billionaires
American chief executives
United States Marine Corps personnel of the Vietnam War
FedEx people
Military personnel from Mississippi
Businesspeople from Memphis, Tennessee
Recipients of the Silver Star
Tennessee Republicans
United States Marine Corps officers
United States Naval Aviators
Yale University alumni
People from Quitman County, Mississippi
Washington Redskins owners
Washington Football Team owners
Delta Kappa Epsilon
Memphis University School alumni
Members of Skull and Bones
Benjamin Franklin Medal (Franklin Institute) laureates

Frederick W. Smith


Henryk Grynberg (born 1936 in Warsaw) is a Polish writer and actor who survived the Nazi occupation. He is a novelist, short-story writer, poet, playwright and essayist who had authored more than thirty books of prose and poetry and two dramas.  Grynberg, known as the "chronicler of the fate of the Polish Jews", tackled in his writings the Holocaust experience and the post-Holocaust trauma.

Personal survival
Grynberg and his mother were the only survivors from their family.  He spent the years 1942 to 1944 in hiding places, saved from German Nazis by the Polish families. After the war, he lived in Łódź and Warsaw.
In the early 1990s Grynberg returned to Poland with film maker Paweł Łoziński. The latter filmed Grynberg as he interviewed people in his native village in search of what happened to his father Abram Grynberg during the war. The documentary was released in 1992 under the name "Miejsce urodzenia" (Birthplace).

Post-War
On 11 October 1956 he signed as an undercover agent of the 1st Department (Intelligence) of Polish Agency for Internal Security - code name "reporter" as documented by Polish Historical Institute (or IPN), but the report in "Życie Warszawy" of 1 December 2006 is distorted and unreliable. Grynberg was pressured by the SB, denied that he informed on any one, and reportedly revealed his recruitment to the FBI. See Ted Lipien

From Henryk Grynberg:
I did sign a cooperation agreement with Polish intelligence (not military intelligence) on October 11, 1956 and received a one-time assignment to bring to the next meeting written characteristics (in Polish opinie) of three fellow students (two of them Jewish), no more than a page each. I presented those three persons as good intelligent students loyal to the state ideology and those were the only "reports" I was asked to do or have done in writing or otherwise. My contacts with the Polish intelligence or whatever secret services lasted no more than five months during which time I did nothing else for them. A document in my files at the IPN says, "His recruitment assumed future utilization in Israel and subsequently in the USA. After finishing his studies, Grynberg showed unwillingness to further collaboration. For this reason, the 1st Dep. resigned from further contacts with him." That ultimate "unwilingness" I expressed in 1959 when an intelligence agent wanted me to take with me a letter to Israel and I refused. I revealed my recruitment – or rather attempt at recruitment – to the FBI when applying for U.S. citizenship and for a sensitive position with U.S. Information Agency (which I held for 20 years). The note "Collaboration with Communists," so prominently placed, directs undue attention to a very short and meaningless episode in my biography.

The beginnings of a writer
In 1959, Grynberg graduated from Warsaw University with a master's degree in journalism.  As an actor, Grynberg had connections with the Jewish Theatre in Warsaw.  It was during this time when he started publishing prose and poetry.

While the Jewish State Theater company was on tour in the United States in late 1967, he refused to return to Poland.  This defection was an act of protest against the communist regime's anti-Jewish propaganda, and against the censorship of his writings.

In 1971, after two years of attending graduate studies at UCLA, Grynberg received an M.A. in Russian Literature and moved to Washington, D.C., where Grynberg worked for the U.S. Information Agency (particularly for Voice in America) for a period of twenty years.

Works and achievements
Grynberg published his first story in 1959, which was later included in his debut collection, The Antigone Crew in 1963.  In his works - written both while in Poland and in the United States – Grynberg narrated the stories of "those who died during the war and of those who survived to live afterwards in Lodz, Warsaw, or New York, struggling to come to terms with their own memory and with the fact that others did not remember."  His works were described as characteristically abundant in "biographical and autobiographical material", where his Jewish protagonists are the narrators whose personal experiences were "supplemented by the experiences of other 'survivors'".

Grynberg was a recipient of all major Polish literary prizes, and of the 2002 Koret Jewish Book Award. He also contributed to the Polish press and English-language journals.  His essays and articles appeared in publications such as the Commentary, the Midstream, and the Soviet-Jewish Affairs in London.  Grynberg's books have been published in English translation, namely novels, Child of the Shadows (Vallentine Mitchell, London, 1969) - reedited as "The Jewish War and the Victory" (Northwestern University Press, 2001); the sequel, The Victory (Northwestern University Press, 1993); documentary prose, Children of Zion (Northwestern University Press, 1997), translated by Jacqueline Mitchell, and "Drohobycz, Drohobycz and Other Stories" (Penguin Books, 2002) translated by Alicia Nitecki, edited by Theodosia Robertson.

Grynberg's books were also translated into the French, German, Italian, Hebrew, Dutch, as well as Czech, Hungarian, and Swedish languages.

Grynberg's books: "Drohobycz, Drohobycz," "Memorbuch," "Monolog polsko-żydowski" ("Polish-Jewish Monolog") and "Uchodźcy" ("Refugees") were nominated for Poland's Nike Literary Award.

References

Specific

General

Henryk Grynberg: Biography, Extracts and Articles, Polish Writing, PolishWriting.net (undated), retrieved on: July 27, 2007
Grynberg, Henryk. Drawing in Memory, Polish Writing, PolishWriting.net (undated), retrieved on: July 27, 2007
Manetti, Christina. Recording a Lost World: Henryk Grynberg's Memorbuch, W A B (Warsaw), 2000  and Central Europe Review, CE-Review.org, January 8, 2001, retrieved on: July 27, 2007
Henryk Grynberg, Polish Wikipedia, pl.wikipedia.org, 2007, retrieved on: July 27, 2007
Adamczyk-Garbowska, Monika.  Tales from the Guardian of the Graves, A Review of Drohobycz, Drohobycz and Other Stories/True Tales from the Holocaust and Life After by Henryk Grynberg, translated from the Polish by Alicia Nitecki, edited by Theodosia Robertson, 275 pages, Penguin Books, The Online Jewish Books Company, Good Search, JBooks.com and JFLMedia.com, 2004, retrieved on: July 27, 2007
Grynberg, Henryk. Children of Zion, Google Book Search, Books.Google.com (undated), retrieved on: July 27, 2007
Grynberg, Henryk. Children of Zion, Close-Up, Northwestern University Press and Northwestern.edu (undated), retrieved on: July 28, 2007
Holtzman, Ada. The Children of Zion:"The Tehran Children", JewishGen, Inc. and The Yizkor Book Project, June 2004, retrieved on: July 28, 2007
Grynberg, Henryk. Children of Zion (Synopsis), Amazon.co.uk, 2007, retrieved on: July 28, 2007
Ackerfeld, Lance and Joyce Field. List of the Children (Original list of the children who arrived to Eretz Israel in the middle of World War II, after escape from occupied Poland to Russia), JewishGen, Inc., 2004, retrieved on: July 28, 2007

1936 births
Polish journalists
20th-century Polish novelists
Polish male novelists
20th-century Polish Jews
21st-century Polish Jews
21st-century Polish writers
Living people
Jewish theatre
20th-century Polish male writers
People associated with the magazine "Kultura"

Henryk Grynberg


Dartans is a townland in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland. It is situated in the barony of Omagh West and the civil parish of Urney and covers an area of 367 acres.

The name derives from the Irish: dartan (A place where cows or herds graze) or dartain (Knolls or hillocks).

The population of the townland declined during the 19th century:

See also
List of townlands of County Tyrone

References

Townlands of County Tyrone
Civil parish of Urney

Dartans


"Got to Be Free" is a song written by Ray Davies and performed by British rock band the Kinks. It was released on their 1970 LP Lola versus Powerman and the Moneygoround, Part One, which included the Top 10 hit song "Lola". "Got to Be Free" plays a key role in the concept album, as the album borrows its first verse as an introduction, and closes with the full song. The song was also used in the first of the BBC's Play for Today series The Long Distance Piano Player (1970), which featured the song's own writer, Ray Davies, in the lead role.

Overview
Overall, the lyrics express a feeling of longing for a better world, or one devoid of all the troubles and restrictions of this one ("We've got to get out of this world somehow"). The lyrics also act as a commentary on the music business, a recurring theme in Lola versus Powerman and the Moneygoround, Part One). "Got to Be Free" opens as a kind of lullaby ("Hush little baby/Don't you cry"), the same lyrics and tune as the album's introduction on side A, but soon changes to a more standard rock song structure, with a rousing chorus of "Got to be free to say what I want/Make what I want and play what I want" (with minor changes as the song progresses, such as "laugh when I want" and "do what I want").

Instrumentation
The song begins with some gentle strumming on Ray Davies' signature National Steel resonator guitar. Soon, a banjo joins in played by regular lead guitarist and brother to Ray, Dave Davies. As the song progresses, the drums and other electric instruments kick in. The song continues, and fades away at three minutes in length.

The song differs slightly from many of the other songs on its LP, with slight country and bluegrass accents at the beginning. It eventually evolves into a more powerful rock song feel, but these influences remain apparent throughout its length. The Kinks would go on to experiment with these genres heavily on their next LP, Muswell Hillbillies.

References

Bibliography
All Day and All of the Night, a definitive day-by-day guide to The Kinks, by Doug Hinman
The complete guide to the music of the Kinks, by Johnny Rogan

External links
Lola versus Powerman on www.discogs.com

Official Ray Davies Web Site
The Official Ray Davies Forum - "The Old Grey Board"
 The Official Ray Davies Forum on YouTube
Discogs.com Listing
Paper by Alex DiBlasi, on www.kindakinks.net

The Kinks songs
1970 songs
Songs written by Ray Davies
Song recordings produced by Ray Davies

Got to Be Free


Rujuk is the reunion of a husband and wife in a marriage bond if a husband decile with his wife both do not need to enter into a marriage contract. Merujuk can only be done during the period when the husband may refer back to his wife (talak), i.e. between one or two divorces.

Cathetan sikil

Hukum Islam Babagan Nikah

Rujuk


The European Union Agency for Railways (ERA) is an agency of the European Union (EU) that sets mandatory requirements for European railways and manufacturers in the form of Technical Specifications for Interoperability (TSI), which apply to the Trans-European Rail system. The ERA publishes a document summarising the status of the TSIs. The ERA sets common safety targets, common safety methods and common safety indicators, following Directive 2004/49/EC and amendments. The ERA also hosts a number of databases, among which a register of remaining, applicable national rules.

History
Prior to the establishment of the agency, the railway networks of each individual member state within the European Union had been unique and typically employing high levels of bespoke, self-developed working practices, rolling stock, and infrastructure; the requirements pertaining to safety, operations, signalling, and most elements were defined by each member state, resulting in substantial differences in various systems and thereby hundreds of factors for incompatibilities that deterred or outright prevented cross-border operations. Limitations to loading gauges, differing signaling apparatus, incompatible power systems, and often arbitrary standards cumulatively acted against the competitiveness of European railway operations, particularly in comparison to the relatively lower barriers present in the competing road transport sector. European officials came to recognise the need for pan-national action to address the lack of railway interoperability; this resolve would solidify in the adoption of the Directive 96/48/EC, which pertains to the interoperability of the trans-European high-speed rail network.

In successive years, additional legislation towards bolstering international cooperation and the lowering of national barriers were also implemented, such as in the Interoperability Directive of 2001 that covered the trans-European conventional rail. During 2004, legislation for the creation of a new pan-European agency was passed as a part of the Second Railway Package; one year later, this organisation commenced operations as the European Railway Agency (ERA) with the principal objective of contributing to the implementation of EU legislation aimed at improving railway competitiveness by advancing interoperability of railway systems and pursuing a common approach to safety in the railway sector. The ERA were not empowered to directly modify European legislation; it instead prepares, in cooperation with industry stakeholders and the various National Safety Authorities, new and updated legislative acts and recommend their adoption to the European Commission.

One of the ERA's most prominent long term undertakings has been the European Railway Traffic Management System (ERTMS). The specifications, comprising the European Train Control System (ETCS) and the GSM-R digital radio communication system, are enforced as European legislation, part of the Technical Specifications for Interoperability (TSI) for Control Command and Signalling, published in the Official Journal of the EU. By December 2010, deployment of GSM-R had taken place across in excess of 65,000km of track in Europe; operations of the system had commenced in five countries: Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden. By this point, the operations of ETCS had already begun as well on high speed railways in both Spain and Italy as well as on freight lines in the Netherlands and for international operations between Belgium and the Netherlands; contracts for the provision of in excess of 10,000km of track had been signed. Under the Fourth Railway Package, the ERA was formally recognised as the ERTMS system authority; as such, the agency leads specification development and implementation.

The ERA has also pursued multiple other areas of improvement, such as automatic train operations and eco-friendly railway practices. New TSIs pertaining to noise reduction in the railway sector have also been formulated; rolling stock is thus required to meet certain noise emission limitations to avoid excessively impacting the general public while a "quieter route" scheme has also been proposed. The ERA has also promoted more efficient rail freight operations, via improved logistics practices, such as optimised route planning and load consolidation, some of which having been facilitated via digital railway technologies.

In June 2016, the agency's name was changed as a result of the European Parliament's approval of the Fourth Railway Package, becoming the European Union Agency for Railways. The acronym ERA has continued to be used to refer to the agency after the renaming, even by the agency itself. The ERA's first deliverable under the framework of the Technical Pillar of the Fourth Railway Package would be a Safety Alert IT tool, which was designed to increase transparency in rail safety incident reporting in the EU and to share information among rail operators and manufacturers.

During early 2019, the ERA established its One-Stop Shop which handles all applications for single safety certificates, vehicle authorisations and ERTMS trackside approvals. In September of that year, the agency issued its first single safety certificate; at the time, multiple other applications were stated to be underway while the process was still being rolled out into early 2020. The One-Stop Shop approach has been promoted as reducing the time and cost involved in gaining required approvals by an anticipated rate of 20 percent, which is expect to yield savings of up to €500 million by 2025.

In November 2021, the ERA and the International Union of Railways (UIC) both signed a coordination framework covering the topics of railway safety, interoperability, and harmonisation; both organisations seek to bolster international cooperation and operational compatibility. Three months later, Pio Guido, ERA's Head of Railway Systems Department, publicly stated that interoperability is not only a key focus of the agency but a necessary pursuit towards a more competitive railway industry.

See also
 Rail transport in Europe
 European Rail Infrastructure Managers

Notes

External links

 European Railway Agency website

Agencies of the European Union
Transport and the European Union
Rail transport in Europe
2004 establishments in France
2004 in the European Union
Government agencies established in 2004
International organizations based in France
Valenciennes
Transport organizations based in France

European Union Agency for Railways


British rule in Burma lasted from 1824 to 1948, from the successive three Anglo-Burmese wars through the creation of Burma as a province of British India to the establishment of an independently administered colony, and finally independence. The region under British control was known as British Burma, and  officially known as Burma () from 1886. Various portions of Burmese territories, including Arakan and Tenasserim were annexed by the British after their victory in the First Anglo-Burmese War; Lower Burma was annexed in 1852 after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The annexed territories were designated the minor province (a chief commissionership) of British Burma in 1862.

After the Third Anglo-Burmese War in 1885, Upper Burma was annexed, and the following year, the province of Burma in British India was created, becoming a major province (a lieutenant-governorship) in 1897. This arrangement lasted until 1937, when Burma began to be administered separately by the Burma Office under the Secretary of State for India and Burma. British rule was disrupted during the Japanese occupation of much of the country during World War II. Burma achieved independence from British rule on 4th January 1948.

Burma is sometimes referred to as "the Scottish Colony" owing to the heavy role played by Scotsmen in colonising and running the country, one of the most notable being Sir James Scott. It was also known for the heavy role played by Indian elites in managing and administering the colony, especially while it was still a part of the British Raj; some historians have called this a case of co-colonialism.

Prior to British conquest
Because of its location, trade routes between China and India passed through the country, keeping Burma wealthy through trade, although self-sufficient agriculture was still the basis of the economy. Indian merchants travelled along the coasts and rivers (especially the Irrawaddy River) throughout the regions where the majority of Burmese lived, bringing Indian cultural influences into the country that still exist there today. As Burma had been one of the first Southeast Asian countries to adopt Buddhism on a large scale, it continued under the British as the officially patronised religion of most of the population.

Before the British conquest and colonisation, the ruling Konbaung dynasty practised a tightly centralized form of government. The king was the chief executive with the final say on all matters, but he could not make new laws and could only issue administrative edicts. The country had two codes of law, the Dhammathat and the Hluttaw, the centre of government, was divided into three branches—fiscal, executive, and judicial. In theory, the king was in charge of all of the Hluttaw, but none of his orders got put into place until the Hluttaw approved them, thus checking his power. Further dividing the country, provinces were ruled by governors, who were appointed by the Hluttaw, and villages were ruled by hereditary headmen approved by the king.

Arrival of the British

Conflict began between Burma and the British when the Konbaung dynasty decided to expand into Arakan in the state of Assam, close to British-held Chittagong in India. This led to the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–26). The British dispatched a large seaborne expedition that took Rangoon without a fight in 1824. In Danuphyu, at the Ayeyarwadddy Delta, Burmese General Maha Bandula was killed and his armies routed. Burma was forced to cede Assam and other northern provinces. The 1826 Treaty of Yandabo formally ended the First Anglo-Burmese War, the longest and the most expensive war in the history of British India. Fifteen thousand European and Indian soldiers died, together with an unknown number of Burmese army and civilian casualties. The campaign cost the British between 5 and 13 million pounds sterling (between 18 and 48 billion in 2020 U.S. dollars) which led to an economic crisis in British India in 1833.

In 1852, the Second Anglo-Burmese War was provoked by the British, who sought the teak forests in Lower Burma as well as a port between Calcutta and Singapore. After 25 years of peace, British and Burmese fighting started afresh and continued until the British occupied all of Lower Burma. The British were victorious in this war and as a result obtained access to the teak, oil, and rubies of their newly conquered territories.

In Upper Burma, the still unoccupied part of the country, King Mindon had tried to adjust to the thrust of imperialism. He enacted administrative reforms and made Burma more receptive to foreign interests. But the British initiated the Third Anglo-Burmese War, which lasted less than two weeks during November 1885. The British government justified their actions by claiming that the last independent king of Burma, Thibaw Min, was a tyrant and that he was conspiring to give France more influence in the country. British troops entered Mandalay on 28 November 1885. Thus, after three wars gaining various parts of the country, the British occupied all the area of present-day Myanmar, making the territory a Province of British India on 1 January 1886.

Early British rule

Burmese armed resistance continued sporadically for several years, and the British commander had to coerce the High Court of Justice to continue to function. Though war officially ended after only a couple of weeks, resistance continued in northern Burma until 1890, with the British finally resorting to systematic destruction of villages and appointment of new officials to finally halt all guerrilla activity.

Traditional Burmese society was drastically altered by the demise of the monarchy and the separation of religion and state. Intermarriage between Europeans and Burmese gave birth to an indigenous Eurasian community known as the Anglo-Burmese who would come to dominate the colonial society, hovering above the Burmese but below the British.

After Britain took over all of Burma, they continued to send tribute to China to avoid offending them, but this unknowingly lowered the status they held in Chinese minds. It was agreed at the Burma convention in 1886 that China would recognise Britain's occupation of Upper Burma while Britain continued the Burmese payment of tribute every ten years to Peking.

Administration
The British controlled their new province through direct rule, making many changes to the previous governmental structure. The monarchy was abolished, King Thibaw sent into exile, and religion and state separated. This was particularly harmful, because the Buddhist monks, collectively known as the Sangha, were strongly dependent on the sponsorship of the monarchy. At the same time, the monarchy was given legitimacy by the Sangha, and monks as representatives of Buddhism gave the public the opportunity to understand national politics to a greater degree.

The British also implemented a secular education system. The colonial Government of India, which was given control of the new colony, founded secular schools, teaching in both English and Burmese, while also encouraging Christian missionaries to visit and found schools. In both of these types of schools, Buddhism and traditional Burmese culture was frowned upon.

Administrative divisions

The province of Burma, after 1885 was administered as follows:
 Ministerial Burma (Burma proper)
 Tenasserim Division (Toungoo, Thaton, Amherst, Salween, Tavoy, and Mergui Districts)
 Arakan Division (Akyab, Northern Arakan or Arakan Hill Tracts, Kyaukpyu and Sandoway Districts)
 Pegu Division (Rangoon City, Hanthawaddy, Pegu, Tharrawaddy and Prome Districts)
 Irrawaddy Division (Bassein, Henzada, Thayetmyo, Maubin, Myaungmya and Pyapon Districts)
 Scheduled Areas (Frontier Areas)
 Shan States
  Pakokku Chin Hills
 Kachin tracts

The "Frontier Areas", also known as the "Excluded Areas" or the "Scheduled Areas", compose the majority of states within Burma today. They were administered separately by the British with a Burma Frontier Service and later united with Burma proper to form Myanmar's geographic composition today. The Frontier Areas were inhabited by ethnic minorities such as the Chin, the Shan, the Kachin and the Karenni.

By 1931 Burma had 9 divisions, split into a number of districts.
 Arakan Division (Akyab, Arakan Hill, Kyaukpyu and Sandoway Districts)
 Minbu Division ( Magway, Minbu and Thayetmyo Districts)
 Mandalay Division (Kyaukse, Mandalay, Meiktila and Myingyan Districts)
 Tenasserim Division (Toungoo, Thaton, Amherst, Salween, Tavoy, and Mergui Districts)
 Pegu Division (Rangoon City, Hanthawaddy, Pegu, Tharrawaddy and Prome Districts)
 Irrawaddy Division (Bassein, Henzada, Maubin, Myaungmya and Pyapon Districts)
 Sagaing Division (Bhamo, Lower Chindwin, Upper Chindwin, Katha, Myitkyina, Sagaing Districts, the Hukawng Valley and The Triangle Native areas)
 Federated Shan States (Northern, Eastern, Central, Myelat, Karenni, Kengtung and Yawnghwe)
 Pakokku Hill Tracts (Chin Hills,  Manipur, Lushai Hills, Pakokku District, Cachar and Jaintia )

Economy

The traditional Burmese economy was one of redistribution with the prices of the most important commodities set by the state. For the majority of the population, trade was not as important as self-sufficient agriculture, but the country's position on major trade routes from India to China meant that it did gain a significant amount of money from facilitating foreign trade. With the arrival of the British, the Burmese economy became tied to global market forces and was forced to become a part of the colonial export economy.

Burma's annexation ushered in a new period of economic growth. The economic nature of society also changed dramatically. The British began exploiting the rich soil of the land around the Irrawaddy delta and cleared away the dense mangrove forests. Rice, which was in high demand in Europe, especially after the building of the Suez Canal in 1869, was the main export. To increase the production of rice, many Burmese migrated from the northern heartland to the delta, shifting the population concentration and changing the basis of wealth and power.

To prepare the new land for cultivation, farmers borrowed money from Indian moneylenders called chettiars at high interest rates, as British banks would not grant mortgages. The Indian moneylenders offered mortgage loans but foreclosed on them quickly if the borrowers defaulted.

At the same time, thousands of Indian labourers migrated to Burma (Burmese Indians) and, because of their willingness to work for less money, quickly displaced Burmese farmers. As the Encyclopædia Britannica states: "Burmese villagers, unemployed and lost in a disintegrating society, sometimes took to petty theft and robbery and were soon characterized by the British as lazy and undisciplined. The level of dysfunction in Burmese society was revealed by the dramatic rise in homicides."

With this quickly growing economy came industrialisation to a certain degree, with a railway being built throughout the valley of the Irrawaddy, and hundreds of steamboats travelled along the river. All of these modes of transportation were owned by the British. Thus, although the balance of trade was in favour of British Burma, the society was changed so fundamentally that many people did not gain from the rapidly growing economy.

The civil service was largely staffed by Anglo-Burmese and Indians, and the ethnic Burmese were excluded almost entirely from military service, which was staffed primarily with Indians, Anglo-Burmese, Karens and other Burmese minority groups. A British General Hospital Burmah was set up in Rangoon in 1887. Though the country prospered, the Burmese people largely failed to reap the rewards. (See George Orwell's novel Burmese Days for a fictional account of the British in Burma.) An account by a British official describing the conditions of the Burmese people's livelihoods in 1941 describes the Burmese hardships:

"Foreign landlordism and the operations of foreign moneylenders had led to increasing exportation of a considerable proportion of the country's resources and to the progressive impoverishment of the agriculturist and of the country as a whole…. The peasant had grown factually poorer and unemployment had increased….The collapse of the Burmese social system led to a decay of the social conscience which, in the circumstances of poverty and unemployment caused a great increase in crime."

Nationalist movement
 By the turn of the century, a nationalist movement began to take shape in the form of the Young Men's Buddhist Association (YMBA), modelled after the YMCA, as religious associations were allowed by the colonial authorities. They were later superseded by the General Council of Burmese Associations (GCBA) which was linked with Wunthanu athin or National Associations that sprang up in villages throughout Burma Proper. Between 1900 and 1911 the "Irish Buddhist" U Dhammaloka publicly challenged Christianity and imperial power, leading to two trials for sedition.

A new generation of Burmese leaders arose in the early twentieth century from amongst the educated classes, some of whom were permitted to go to London to study law. They returned with the belief that the Burmese situation could be improved through reform. Progressive constitutional reform in the early 1920s led to a legislature with limited powers, a university and more autonomy for Burma within the administration of India. Efforts were undertaken to increase the representation of Burmese in the civil service. Some people began to feel that the rate of change was not fast enough and the reforms not extensive enough.

In 1920 a student strike broke out in protest against the new University Act which the students believed would only benefit the elite and perpetuate colonial rule. 'National Schools' sprang up across the country in protest against the colonial education system, and the strike came to be commemorated as 'National Day'. There were further strikes and anti-tax protests in the later 1920s led by the Wunthanu athins. Prominent among the political activists were Buddhist monks (hpongyi), such as U Ottama and U Seinda in the Arakan who subsequently led an armed rebellion against the British and later the nationalist government after independence, and U Wisara, the first martyr of the movement to die after a protracted hunger strike in prison.

In December 1930, a local tax protest by Saya San in Tharrawaddy quickly grew into first a regional and then a national insurrection against the government. Lasting for two years, the Galon Rebellion, named after the mythical bird Garuda – enemy of the Nagas i.e. the British – emblazoned on the pennants the rebels carried, required thousands of British troops to suppress along with promises of further political reform. The eventual trial of Saya San, who was executed, allowed several future national leaders, including Dr Ba Maw and U Saw, who participated in his defence, to rise to prominence.

In May 1930, the Dobama Asiayone (We Burmans Association) was founded, whose members called themselves thakin (an ironic name as thakin means "master" in the Burmese language – rather like the Indian 'sahib' – proclaiming that they were the true masters of the country entitled to the term usurped by the colonial masters). The second university student strike in 1936 was triggered by the expulsion of Aung San and Ko Nu, leaders of the Rangoon University Students Union, for refusing to reveal the name of the author who had written an article in their university magazine, making a scathing attack on one of the senior university officials. It spread to Mandalay leading to the formation of the All Burma Students Union. Aung San and Nu subsequently joined the Thakin movement progressing from student to national politics.

Separation from India

The British separated Burma Province from British India on 1st April 1937 and granted the colony a new constitution calling for a fully elected assembly, with many powers given to the Burmese, but this proved to be a divisive issue as some Burmese felt that this was a ploy to exclude them from any further Indian reforms. Ba Maw served as the first prime minister of Burma, but he was forced out by U Saw in 1939, who served as prime minister from 1940 until he was arrested on 19 January 1942 by the British for communicating with the Japanese.

A wave of strikes and protests that started from the oilfields of central Burma in 1938 became a general strike with far-reaching consequences. In Rangoon student protesters, after successfully picketing the Secretariat, the seat of the colonial government, were charged by the British mounted police wielding batons and killing a Rangoon University student. In Mandalay, the police shot into a crowd of protesters led by Buddhist monks killing 17 people. The movement became known as Htaung thoun ya byei ayeidawbon (the '1300 Revolution' named after the Burmese calendar year), and 20 December, the day the first martyr Aung Kyaw fell, commemorated by students as 'Bo Aung Kyaw Day'.

World War II

The Empire of Japan invaded Burma in December 1941 and by the end of 1942 controlled much of the colony. In 1943 the State of Burma was proclaimed in Rangoon, with the government run as a puppet state under Japanese control, led by head of state Ba Maw who escaped from prison in April 1942. Japan never succeeded in fully conquering all of the colony, however, and insurgent activity was pervasive, though not as much of an issue as it was in other former colonies. By 1945, British-led troops, mainly from the British Indian Army, had regained control over most of the colony with Rangoon being recaptured in May 1945.

From the Japanese surrender to Aung San's assassination
The surrender of the Japanese brought a military administration to Burma. The British administration sought to try Aung San and other members of the British Indian Army for treason and collaboration with the Japanese. Lord Mountbatten realised that a trial was an impossibility considering Aung San's popular appeal. After the war ended, the British governor, Colonel Sir Reginald Dorman-Smith, returned. The restored government established a political programme that focused on the physical reconstruction of the country and delayed discussion of independence. The Anti-Fascist People's Freedom League (AFPFL) opposed the government leading to political instability in the country. A rift had also developed in the AFPFL between the communists and Aung San together with the socialists over strategy, which led to Than Tun being forced to resign as general secretary in July 1946 and the expulsion of the CPB from the AFPFL the following October.

Dorman-Smith was replaced by Major-General
Sir Hubert Rance as the new governor, and the Rangoon police went on strike. The strike, starting in September 1946, then spread from the police to government employees and came close to becoming a general strike. Rance calmed the situation by meeting with Aung San and convincing him to join the governor's Executive Council along with other members of the AFPFL. The new executive council, which now had increased credibility in the country, began negotiations for Burmese independence, which were concluded successfully in London as the Aung San-Attlee Agreement on 27 January 1947.

The agreement left parts of the communist and conservative branches of the AFPFL dissatisfied, sending the Red Flag Communists led by Thakin Soe underground and the conservatives into opposition. Aung San also succeeded in concluding an agreement with ethnic minorities for a unified Burma at the Panglong Conference on 12 February, celebrated since as 'Union Day'. Shortly after, rebellion broke out in the Arakan led by the veteran monk U Seinda, and it began to spread to other districts. The popularity of the AFPFL, dominated by Aung San and the socialists, was eventually confirmed when it won an overwhelming victory in the April 1947 constituent assembly elections.

Then a momentous event stunned the nation on 19 July 1947. U Saw, a conservative pre-war prime minister of Burma, engineered the assassination of Aung San and several members of his cabinet including his eldest brother Ba Win, the father of today's National League for Democracy exile-government leader Dr Sein Win, while meeting in the Secretariat. Since then, 19 July has been commemorated as Martyrs' Day in Burma. Thakin Nu, the Socialist leader, was now asked to form a new cabinet, and he presided over Burmese independence  instituted under the Burma Independence Act 1947 on 4 January 1948. Burma chose to become a fully independent republic, and not a British Dominion upon independence. This was in contrast to the independence of India and Pakistan which both resulted in the attainment of dominion status. This may have been on account of anti-British popular sentiment being strong in Burma at the time.

See also
 List of colonial heads of Burma

Notes

References

Citations

Sources

 Encyclopædia Britannica. Web. 1 March 2010. <https://web.archive.org/web/20110726001100/http://media-2.web.britannica.com/eb-media/35/4035-004-4ECC016C.gif%3E.

 Guyot, James F. "Myanmar." The World Book Encyclopedia; Vol. 13. Chicago: World Book, 2004. 970-70e. Print.
 Marshall, Andrew. The Trouser People: A Story of Burma in the Shadow of the Empire. Washington D.C.: Counterpoint, 2002. Print.
 "Myanmar (Burma) – Charles' George Orwell Links." Charles' George Orwell Links – Biographies, Essays, Novels, Reviews, Images. Web. 4 March 2010. https://web.archive.org/web/20110923185216/http://www.netcharles.com/orwell/articles/col-burma.htm
 "Myanmar." Encyclopædia Britannica. 15th ed. 2005. Print.
 Tucker, Shelby. Burma: The Curse of Independence. London: Pluto, 2001. Print.

Further reading
 Baird-Murray, Maureen [1998]. A World Overturned: a Burmese Childhood 1933–47. London: Constable.  Memoirs of the Anglo-Irish-Burmese daughter of a Burma Frontier Service officer, including her stay in an Italian convent during the Japanese occupation.

 Desai, Walter Sadgun (1968). History of the British Residency in Burma. London: Gregg International. .

 Harvey, Godfrey (1992). British Rule in Burma 1824–1942. London: AMS Pr. .

  (http://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/4729301/Cite )

External links

 Michael W. Charney: Burma, in: 1914–1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.

Former countries in Burmese history
Burma
Burma
History of Myanmar
Burmese monarchy
Former countries in Southeast Asia
19th century in Burma
20th century in Myanmar
States and territories established in 1824
States and territories disestablished in 1948
1824 establishments in Burma
1824 establishments in British India
1948 disestablishments in Burma
Scotland and the British Empire

British rule in Burma


Albert Rothenberg (born June 2, 1930) is an American psychiatrist who has carried out long term research on the creative process in literature, art, science and psychotherapy. As Principal Investigator of the research project Studies in the Creative Process, Rothenberg has focused on the creative processes of consensually recognized and defined creators. These have included Nobel laureates in physics, chemistry, medicine and physiology; Pulitzer Prize and other literary prize winners; and consensually designated young literary and artistic creators.

He has also practiced clinical psychiatry and been administrator and therapist at the Yale Psychiatric Institute, New Haven, Connecticut; John Dempsey Hospital in Farmington, Connecticut; the Austen Riggs Center in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, as well as undertakinging private psychiatric outpatient practice in Chatham, New York.

Biography

Early life and education
Rothenberg was born in New York City on June 2, 1930, to Gabriel Rothenberg and Rose Goldberg Rothenberg. His father Gabriel was born in Romania  and came to the United States at the age of seventeen. At 23 years old, Gabriel fought in the US Army during the First World War. Other than attending night school for English, Gabriel had no formal advanced education but later become a successful manufacturing businessman in Danbury, Connecticut. His mother, born in New Haven, Connecticut, was a pianist and became a principal secretary after attending a New York City secretarial school. An eldest brother died immediately after childbirth and Rothenberg's -year-older brother, Jerome Rothenberg, who was quite sickly as a child, survived to become a distinguished American Economist. Rothenberg attended James Madison High School in Brooklyn, New York  where he graduated as Salutatorian.

Career

As an undergraduate at Harvard College, Rothenberg majored in Social Relations and graduated with honors. There, he was influenced to pursue later research in creativity through the example and thought of psychologists Henry Murray and George Klein. His medical career began at Tufts University School of Medicine where he was awarded both the annual Dermatology Prize and  Medical Alumni Award. After graduation as doctor of medicine he went on to pursue residency training in psychiatry at Yale University School of Medicine.

In 1960, he was appointed to the Yale Medical School faculty. During early years at Yale, he was supported in research and teaching by two successive 5-year federal Research Career Investigator Grants. There was an interruption of two years when Rothenberg served as Captain in the U.S. Army Medical Corps as Chief Psychiatrist for American military personnel in Puerto Rico and the Caribbean area. For this service, he received both a Letter of commendation and a Certificate of Merit. He then returned to Yale Medical School, where he remained for nearly 20 years.

In 1976, Rothenberg moved to the University of Connecticut Department Of Psychiatry at Farmington, where he served as the Clinical Director and Director of Psychiatric Residency for the next three years. In 1979, he became the Director of Research at the Austen Riggs Center, an open psychiatric hospital in Stockbridge, Massachusetts and a member of the Harvard Medical School faculty.

Rothenberg was appointed Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard in 1986. The same year, he began a course of three separate research years as a Fellow at institutes for advanced study. In 1986, he was a Fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University; In 1993, he was a Fellow at the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities and Social Sciences in Wassenaar; and he returned as a Fellow to CASBS in 2014.

In addition to his research on creativity, he has published two novels: Living Color (2001), a story about the slashing of a famous painting in the modern art museum in Amsterdam and Madness and Glory (2012), a story about Dr. Phillipe Pinel, the father of modern psychiatry.

Research
Rothenberg has carried out controlled experimental research with young writers and artists and controlled interview investigations with outstanding prize-winning authors. He found that three interrelated cognitive processes were responsible for their creative achievements. Also, through extensive and intensive research with Nobel laureates in Physiology or Medicine, Physics, and Chemistry the same processes were found to be operating in their far-reaching and outstanding creative achievements. The three cognitive processes, all of which disrupt the past and the usual and lead to creations are:

Janusian process (previously designated as janusian thinking; derived from the Roman god Janus), consists of actively conceiving and using multiple opposite or antithetical thoughts or constructions simultaneously. The janusian process leads to creation in conceptual and verbal modalities.

Homospatial process (derived from Greek homo) consists of actively conceiving and using two or more discrete entities in the same mental space, a conception leading to the articulation of new identities. The homospatial process leads to creation primarily in the metaphoric and spatial modalities.

Sep-con articulation process consists of actively conceiving and using separation (sep) and connection (con) concomitantly. The sep-con articulation process leads to integrative effects and integration in creation.

Significance
Although, as commonly used, the term creativity has been applied to a wide range of behavior, events, and practices, these have often consisted of simply different or deviant, uncommon, or unusual occurrences. Many studies have been derived from personal intuition or anecdotes, and have often focused simply on skills, divergent thinking or employment in particular types of artistic or scientific occupations. On an operational basis, however, creativity and creative activity is positively valued, usually definitively so, and the value must be consensually validated and stand the test of time.

Moreover, creativity differs from productivity or competence alone—it consists of yielding something novel or new. Rothenberg's work and findings have consistently focused on a strict definition of creativity as the state or production of both newness and value (intrinsic or instrumental). Clear-cut results and applications of these investigations have measured, in whole or in part, all types and levels of creativity. The findings produced by his research consist, for the first time, of empirically determined highly specific and operational types of creative processes. These have been described through his work in the fields of science and literature, visual art, and psychotherapy.

Personal life
Rothenberg is married to Julia Johnson Rothenberg, Emerita Professor of Education at Sage Colleges and noted visual artist and musician. They divide residence each year between homes in the U.S. and southern France.

Achievements and awards
NIMH Research Career Investigator
Fellow, American College of Psychoanalysts
Golestan Foundation Award in Psychiatry
Distinguished Life Fellow, American Psychiatric Association
Guggenheim Fellowship (1974)
Fellow, Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (1987, 2014)
Nominator, Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (1991-)
Fellow, Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study (1993)

Works and publications

Scientific

Fiction

References

American psychiatrists
Living people
Physicians from New York City
Yale University alumni
Tufts University School of Medicine alumni
Harvard Medical School faculty
1930 births
Harvard College alumni
James Madison High School (Brooklyn) alumni
Rembrandt scholars
Austen Riggs Center physicians

Albert Rothenberg


In the mathematical area of graph theory, a conference graph is a strongly regular graph with parameters v,   and   It is the graph associated with a symmetric conference matrix, and consequently its order v must be 1 (modulo 4) and a sum of two squares.

Conference graphs are known to exist for all small values of v allowed by the restrictions, e.g., v = 5, 9, 13, 17, 25, 29, and (the Paley graphs) for all prime powers congruent to 1 (modulo 4).  However, there are many values of v that are allowed, for which the existence of a conference graph is unknown.

The eigenvalues of a conference graph need not be integers, unlike those of other strongly regular graphs.  If the graph is connected, the eigenvalues are k with multiplicity 1, and two other eigenvalues,

each with multiplicity

References

Brouwer, A.E., Cohen, A.M., and Neumaier, A. (1989), Distance Regular Graphs.  Berlin, New York: Springer-Verlag.  ,

Algebraic graph theory
Graph families
Strongly regular graphs

Conference graph


The Constitutive Act of the African Union sets out the codified framework under which the African Union is to conduct itself. It was signed on 11 July 2000 at Lomé, Togo. It entered into force after two thirds of the 53 signatory states ratified the convention on 26 May 2001. When a state ratifies the Constitutive Act, it formally becomes a member of the AU. All 55 signatory states have ratified the document, with South Sudan and Morocco ratifying as the last African states.

Aims
The objectives of the AU laid down in the Act are the following:
 To achieve greater unity, cohesion and solidarity between the African countries and African nations.
 To defend the sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence of its Member States.
 To accelerate the political and social-economic integration of the continent.
 To promote and defend African common positions on issues of interest to the continent and its peoples.
 To encourage international cooperation, taking due account of the Charter of the United Nations and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
 To promote peace, security, and stability on the continent.
 To promote democratic principles and institutions, popular participation and good governance.
 To promote and protect human and peoples' rights in accordance with the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights and other relevant human rights instruments.
 To establish the necessary conditions which enable the continent to play its rightful role in the global economy and in international negotiations.
 To promote sustainable development at the economic, social and cultural levels as well as the integration of African economies.
 To promote co-operation in all fields of human activity to raise the living standards of African peoples.
 To coordinate and harmonise the policies between the existing and future Regional Economic Communities for the gradual attainment of the objectives of the Union.
 To advance the development of the continent by promoting research in all fields, in particular in science and technology.
 To work with relevant international partners in the eradication of preventable diseases and the promotion of good health on the continent.

See also

Sirte Declaration, 9 September 1999, resolving to create the African Union.

References

External links
Constitutive Act of the African Union

Treaties concluded in 2000
Treaties entered into force in 2001
Treaties of Algeria
Treaties of Angola
Treaties of Benin
Treaties of Botswana
Treaties of Burkina Faso
Treaties of Burundi
Treaties of Cameroon
Treaties of the Central African Republic
Treaties of Chad
Treaties of the Comoros
Treaties of the Republic of the Congo
Treaties of Ivory Coast
Treaties of the Democratic Republic of the Congo
Treaties of Djibouti
Treaties of Egypt
Treaties of Equatorial Guinea
Treaties of Eritrea
Treaties of Ethiopia
Treaties of Gabon
Treaties of the Gambia
Treaties of Ghana
Treaties of Guinea
Treaties of Guinea-Bissau
Treaties of Kenya
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Treaties of the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya
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Treaties of Malawi
Treaties of Mali
Treaties of Mauritania
Treaties of Mauritius
Treaties of Mozambique
Treaties of Namibia
Treaties of Niger
Treaties of Nigeria
Treaties of Rwanda
Treaties of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic
Treaties of São Tomé and Príncipe
Treaties of Senegal
Treaties of Seychelles
Treaties of Sierra Leone
Treaties of the Transitional National Government of Somalia
Treaties of South Africa
Treaties of Tanzania
Treaties of the Republic of the Sudan (1985–2011)
Treaties of Eswatini
Treaties of Togo
Treaties of Tunisia
Treaties of Uganda
Treaties of Zambia
Treaties of Zimbabwe
Treaties of Cape Verde
Treaties establishing intergovernmental organizations
2000 in Togo

Constitutive Act of the African Union