Glossary

Definitions of terms used throughout CountryReports.

This glossary contains 1,144 terms used throughout CountryReports — political, economic, cultural, historical, and geographic terminology referenced in country profiles and articles. Terms are drawn from authoritative sources including the Library of Congress.

apartheid: ""Separateness,"" (Afrikaans, Dutch); policy implemented by National Party government (1948-94) to maintain separate development of government-demarcated racial groups; also referred to as ""separate development,"" and later ""multinational development""; abolished by Constitution of the Republic of South Africa of 1993.
birta: Nepalese tax-free land tenure granted by the government primarily as a pension or as a reward to political supporters and family members, important especially during the Rana period; abolished 1959.; Source: Library of Congress
CFZ: Colón Free Zone. Free-trade zone in Panama. Goods from foreign countries are landed and stored or repackaged there and shipped onward without being subject to Panama’s customs duties.
Colombo Plan for Cooperative, Economic, and Social Development in Asia and the Pacific (Colombo Plan): Founded in 1951, originally under a slightly different name, to coordinate and aid development among newly independent countries. Members include nations throughout the Asia-Pacific region (Nepal joined in 1952; Bhutan in 1962). Donor countries include Australia, Britain, Canada, India, Japan, New Zealand, and the United States. The organization’s headquarters are in Colombo, Sri Lanka.; Source: Library of Congress
Cossacks: Originally peasants (primarily Ukrainian and Russian) who fled from bondage to the lower Dnepr and Don river regions to settle in the frontier areas separating fifteenth-century Muscovy, Poland, and the lands occupied by the Tatars. They later organized themselves into military formations to resist Tatar raids. Renowned as horsemen, they were absorbed into the army of the Russian Empire (q.v.) by the late eighteenth century. In the early 1990s, there were attempts to reestablish a Cossack military tradition in Ukraine.; Source: Library of Congress
debt service: Cash requirement to meet annual interest and principal repayment obligations on total external debt.; Source: Library of Congress
DENI: Departamento Nacional de Investigaciones (National Department of Investigations). Undercover secret police.
Devanagari: Literally, ""the script of the city of the gods."" Script used in the written forms of Hindi, Marathi, Nepali, Tibetan, Sanskrit, and in some forms of Konkani. In use in North India throughout the second millennium A.D.
Dual Monarchy: The dual Austro-Hungarian monarchy established by the Compromise of 1867 and lasting until 1918. Austria and Hungary were virtually separate states, each having its own parliament, administration, and judicial system. They shared a common ruler, a joint foreign policy, and finances.
Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC): A United Nations regional economic commission established on February 25, 1948, as the Economic Commission for Latin America (ECLA). More commonly known in Latin America as Comisión Económica para América Latina (CEPAL). In 1984 ECLAC expanded its operations and title to include the Caribbean. Main functions are to initiate and coordinate policies aimed at promoting economic development. In addition to the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean, ECLAC’s forty-one members include Britain, Canada, France, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, and the United States. There are an additional five Caribbean associate members.; Source: Library of Congress
eparchy: An administrative district of the Orthodox and Uniate (q.v.) churches, usually headed by a bishop. Equivalent to a diocese in the Roman Catholic Church. A group of eparchies constitute a metropolitan see.
Ethiopian calendar year: The Ethiopian year consists of 365 days, divided into twelve months of thirty days each plus one additional month of five days (six in leap years). Ethiopian New Year’s falls on September 11 and ends the following September 10, according to the Gregorian (Western) calendar. From September 11 to December 31, the Ethiopian year runs seven years behind the Gregorian year; thereafter, the difference is eight years. Hence, the Ethiopian year 1983 began on September 11, 1990, according to the Gregorian calendar, and ended on September 10, 1991. This discrepancy results from differences between the Ethiopian Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church as to the date of the creation of the world.
Five Relationships: The Confucian concept of ideal social relationships, formulated by classical Chinese philosophers such as Mencius (372-289 B.C.), which states that there should be affection between father and son, righteousness between ruler and minister, attention to their separate functions between husband and wife, proper order between old and young, and faithfulness between friends.
franco valuta: A system permitting the private repatriation of hard currency by traders and overseas workers.
Gurkha: the British derivative of Gorkha evolved from the name Gorkha, which originally was applied to the soldiers of that region. The Gurkha soldiers of Nepal, who became famous for their service in the British and Indian armies in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, principally were composed of members of the Magar, Gurung, Limbu, and Rai tribes, and were not a single ethnic group, tribe, clan, or caste.; Source: Library of Congress
Habsburg Empire: Also known as the House of Austria, one of the principal European dynasties between the fifteenth and twentieth centuries. Controlled a variety of separate monarchies, reaching its most powerful stage in the sixteenth century under Emperor Charles V of the Holy Roman Empire (q.v.). After 1867 what remained of the empire was commonly known as Austria-Hungary.
hujar (collective pl.): Refers to the agricultural settlements of the Ikhwan (q.v.), which combined features of religious missions, farming communities, and army camps. Word from same root as hijra; has sense of separation from previous affiliation.
jagir: A type of land tenure in Nepal granted primarily to military personnel, allowing them tax-free access to produce from the land in return for military service. This tenure was a basic feature of military service in northern India and in Nepal during late medieval times, and disappeared in Nepal only in the twentieth century.
juku: Privately established schools that teach either academic or nonacademic subjects. Academic juku offer tutorial, enrichment, remedial, and examination preparatory classes that supplement regular school work. Most hold classes after school and/or on weekends.
kebatinan: An amalgam of animist, Hindu-Buddhist, and Islamic (especially Sufi) mystical elements that combine to form Javanese mysticism. As a body of belief, kebatinan is officially recognized in the 1945 constitution and is administered by the Department of Education and Culture rather than by the Department of Religious Affairs. Also known as kejawen, agama Jawa, or Javanism.
Khasa: A term applied to the peoples and languages in the western parts of Nepal, closely related to the cultures of northern India.
Kirata: A Tibeto-Burman ethnic group inhabiting eastern Nepal since before the Licchavi Dynasty, just prior to and during the early years of the Christian era.
Maronites: The largest Christian sect in Lebanon, the Maronite Church is one of a group of Christian churches known as Uniate, which are in full communion with the Holy See in Rome but are separately organized and adhere to an Eastern rite. Maronites settled in the mountains of northern Lebanon in the mid-seventh century; many continue to live there and in East Beirut. Maronites traditionally have looked to the West for cultural inspiration. Maronites tend to be better educated and wealthier than other segments of Lebanese society. By custom, the president of the republic is a Maronite.
moderating power (poder moderador): The constitutional function of the emperor during Brazil’s monarchy era to oversee or moderate the political system by intervening at times of political crisis or institutional deadlock. From the fall of the monarchy in 1889 to the 1964 military coup, the military assumed and delegated the moderating power on an extra-legal basis. Political scientist Alfred A. Stepan uses the term to describe the moderator model of civil-military relations in the sense of ""arbiter.""; Source: Library of Congress
Mount Lebanon: A term first used during the Ottoman era to designate the central part of the Lebanon Mountains inhabited mostly by Maronites and Druzes. After 1864 the area was administered as a separate entity and Christians prospered. Most of the region surrounding Mount Lebanon (often called simply ""the Mountain"") was considered part of Greater Syria, an area that encompassed present-day Syria, Lebanon, Israel, and Jordan. In 1920, while under the French Mandate, parts of Greater Syria (q.v.) were annexed to Mount Lebanon to create Greater Lebanon. This newly established territory eventually became the present- day state of Lebanon.
one country, two systems: A policy originating in the early 1980s that promotes reunification of Hong Kong, Macao,and Taiwan with the mainland and offers them a high degree of autonomy as special administrative regions of China. Through separate agreements with Britain and Portugal, Hong Kong and Macao are to revert to Chinese control in 1997 and 1999, respectively.
Ottoman Empire: Formed in thirteenth and fourteenth centuries when Osman I, a Muslim prince, and his successors, known in the West as Ottomans, took over the Byzantine territories of western Anatolia and southeastern Europe and conquered the eastern Anatolian Turkmen principalities. The Ottoman Empire disintegrated at the end of World War I; the center was reorganized as the Republic of Turkey, and the outlying provinces became separate states.; Source: Library of Congress
panchayat: In ancient times, a Nepalese public assembly, ideally comprised of the five (pancha) most important caste or occupational groups in the village. A pancha is a member of a panchayat. From 1962 until the 1990 constitution took effect, assemblies modeled on this ancient system formed the backbone of political structure in Nepal, at the village and district levels, and at the top in the National Panchayat, or Rashtriya Panchayat.; Source: Library of Congress
Paris Club: The informal name for a consortium of Western creditor countries (Belgium, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United States) that have made loans or have guaranteed export credits to developing nations and that meet in Paris to discuss borrowers’ ability to repay debts. Paris Club deliberations often result in the tendering of emergency loans to countries in economic difficulty or in the rescheduling of debts. Formed in October 1962, the organization has no formal or institutional existence. Its secretariat is run by the French treasury. It has a close relationship with the International Monetary Fund (q.v.), to which all of its members except Switzerland belong, as well as with the World Bank (q.v.) and the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). The Paris Club is also known as the Group of Ten (G-10).; Source: Library of Congress
Protocol of Rio de janeiro (Rio Protocol): An agreement concluded in Rio de Janeiro on January 29, 1942, between Peru and Ecuador with the participation of the mediatory nations of Argentina, Brazil, and the United States. It was ratified by the congresses of both Peru and Ecuador on February 26, 1942, and it established the border between the two countries as internationally recognized today. Following the discovery of the Río Cenepa between the Zamora and Santiago rivers in the Cordillera del Cóndor in 1951, Ecuador disputed the treaty demarcation, which then stopped, leaving a stretch of the border uncharted. Ecuador repudiated the treaty in 1960, but the guarantor powers ruled this repudiation invalid.
Rana: Term, used as an honorific personal name, signified strength in battle in late medieval north India. It was adopted as a title by Jang Bahadur Kunwar in the 1850s, and by his heirs after him, and became the standard name used for this Nepalese dynasty of prime ministers and their families.; Source: Library of Congress
Rastafarian(ism): An Afro-Christian revivalist cult formed in Jamaica in the early 1920s. The so-called Rastafarian Brethren emphasized rejection of both Jamaican and European culture in favor of eventual repatriation to Africa. Identifying Africa with Ethiopia, Rastafarians viewed then Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia as God incarnate. As hope of returning to Africa dwindled, Rastafarianism became more of a religious than a political movement. Rastafarians developed a system of beliefs compatible with their poverty and aloofness from society and similar to mystical experiences found in other protest religions. Rastas (as they are known in common parlance) have come to symbolize the movement away from white domination and toward a heightened black identity and pride. Rasta thought, reggae music, dance, and literature have been popularized throughout West Indian culture.; Source: Library of Congress
repartimiento: Derived from Spanish verb repartir (to divide up); a loosely regulated system under which Spanish colonial authorities were empowered to impose and regulate the labor of Indians.
rupee: (Rs) or Nepalese rupee (NRs), the unit of currency, universal since the late 1960s. The Nepalese rupee is linked to the Indian rupee and is fully convertible although restrictions were imposed during the 1989-90 trade and transit dispute. The equivalency rate used in Chapter 1 is Rs2.1=US$1 in 1919. By 1973 the official exchange rate was Rs6.55=US$1; in 1991, Rs30.80=US$1. One Nepalese rupee = 100 paisa.; Source: Library of Congress
Scheduled Languages: Article 351 of the Indian constitution allows the government to compile a schedule (list) of languages recognized by the government for use in state legislatures. The Eighth Schedule, written in 1950, lists Assamese, Bengali, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Kashmiri, Malayalam, Marathi, Oriya, Punjabi, Sanskrit, Tamil, Telugu, and Urdu. Sindhi was added to the schedule in 1967, and Konkani, Manipuri, and Nepali were added in 1992. Article 343 of the constitution designates Hindi written in Devanagari (q.v.) as the official language of India. Even though it was supposed to be phased out by 1965, English continues as India’s other official language for use in Parliament, the Supreme Court, and the high courts unless otherwise authorized by the president.
Securitate: Popular term for the Departmentul Secevit#atii Statului (Department of State Security), the secret police. On a per capita basis, Romania has the largest such service in Eastern Europe.
South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC): Comprises the seven nations of South Asia: Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka; headquartered in Kathmandu. Founded as South Asia Regional Cooperation (SARC) at a meeting for foreign ministers in New Delhi on August 1-2, 1983; the group was renamed when the 1983 agreement was ratified at the inaugural summit meeting at Dhaka, Bangladesh, on December 7-8, 1985. SAARC’s goal is to effect economic, technical, and cultural cooperation, and to provide a forum for discussions of South Asia’s political problems.
Tamils: Ethnic group, predominantly Hindu, whose language is Tamil, a Dravidian language spoken by the Tamil minority in the Northern and Eastern provinces of Sri Lanka; and which is the major regional language spoken in Tamil Nadu State, southeast India. Sri Lankan Tamils are descendants of settlers and invaders and are a native minority that represented approximately 12.6 percent of the population in 1981. Indian Tamils are descendants of estate laborers imported under British sponsorship to the island primarily in the nineteenth century, and represented approximately 5.5 percent of the population in 1981. The Indian Tamil population has been shrinking because of repatriation programs to Tamil Nadu.
twin plant: Productive arrangements whereby two or more producers in separate countries complementarily share the production of a good or service. Under the Caribbean Basin Initiative (CBI), such arrangements with the government of Puerto Rico potentially benefited from special investment or 936 funds (q.v.). The operations of twin plant ventures typically entailed the delegation of assembly or other labor-intensive production stages to plants in a CBI-designated country, from which these semi-finished products would then be shipped duty-free to Puerto Rico for final processing.; Source: Library of Congress
Veddah: Last descendants of the ancient inhabitants of Sri Lanka, predating arrival of the Sinhalese. Veddahs have not preserved their own language, live in small rural settlements, and have become more of a caste than a separate ethnic group. They are generally accepted as equal in rank to the Sinhalese Goyigama (q.v.) caste.
World Bank: Name used to designate a group of four affiliated international institutions that provide advice on long-term finance and policy issues to developing countries: the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD), the International Development Association (IDA), the International Finance Corporation (IFC), and the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA). The IBRD, established in 1945, has the primary purpose of providing loans to developing countries for productive projects. The IDA, a legally separate loan fund administered by the staff of the IBRD, was set up in 1960 to furnish credits to the poorest developing countries on much easier terms than those of conventional IBRD loans. The IFC, founded in 1956, supplements the activities of the IBRD through loans and assistance designed specifically to encourage the growth of productive private enterprises in less developed countries. The president and certain senior officers of the IBRD hold the same positions in the IFC. The MIGA, which began operating in June 1988, insures private foreign investment in developing countries against such non-commercial risks as expropriation, curl strife, and inconvertibility. The four institutions are owned by the governments of the countries that subscribe their capital. To participate in the World Bank group, member states must first belong to the IMF (q.v.).; Source: Library of Congress
yobiko: A type of private school that specializes in preparing high- school graduates for university-entrance examinations, often through intensive full-time programs.