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The Fall of the Roman Empire (film)

The Fall of the Roman Empire is a 1964 American epic historical drama film directed by Anthony Mann and produced by Samuel Bronston, with a screenplay by Ben Barzman, Basilio Franchina and Philip Yordan. The film stars Sophia Loren, Stephen Boyd, Alec Guinness, James Mason, Christopher Plummer, Mel Ferrer, and Omar Sharif.

When the filming of El Cid (1961) had finished, Anthony Mann saw a copy of Edward Gibbon's 1776–1789 six-volume series The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire inside Hatchards bookshop. He pitched a film adaptation of the book to Samuel Bronston, who then agreed to produce the project. Philip Yordan was enlisted to write the script while Charlton Heston was initially set to star. However, Heston backed out of the film and agreed to star in 55 Days at Peking (1963). Prominent actors were cast to portray multiple roles in the film. The final screenplay was written by Ben Barzman and Basilio Franchina with a prologue written by historian Will Durant. Filming began in January 1963 and wrapped in July. The film featured the largest outdoor set in the history of film at that time, a 92000 m2 replica of the Roman Forum.

The film's name refers not to the final fall of the Roman empire, which did in fact survive for centuries after the period depicted in the film, but rather to the onset of corruption and decadence which led to Rome's demise. It deals extensively with the problem of imperial succession, and examines both the relationship between father and son on the background of imperial politics as well as the nature and limits of loyalty and friendship.

On March 24, 1964, the film premiered at the London Astoria. Critics found the script lacking in emotion and humanity and the direction misguided, but accorded a degree of praise for the large spectacles. The film was a financial failure at the box office.

Plot
In the winter of 180 AD, the ailing Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius fights to keep Germanic tribes from invading his northern territories on the Danube frontier. His deputies are the Greek ex-slave Timonides and the stern and honest general Gaius Livius. Privately Aurelius holds egalitarian ideals, and wants a successor who will reform the empire and grant equal rights to all its subjects; this disqualifies his son Commodus, who prefers to rule by force. Instead, Aurelius decides to nominate Livius, Commodus' closest friend and the lover of the emperor's daughter Lucilla.

Before Aurelius can announce his plan, he is poisoned by Commodus' cronies, who hope to secure their own political future by putting their friend on the throne. Feeling that a plebeian such as himself would never be accepted as emperor without Aurelius' explicit backing, Livius lets his old friend take the position instead. Commodus was not part of the murder plot, but nonetheless hated his father for trying to deny him the throne. He dedicates himself to undoing all of Aurelius' policies of equality, and to extracting heavy taxes from the provinces to enrich the city of Rome.

Meanwhile, Livius' army defeats the Germans on the frontier. Among the captives are the chieftain Ballomar and his court. Timonides and Lucilla convince Livius to advocate for mercy towards the conquered barbarians, thus perpetuating the legacy of Aurelius. Timonides wins the Germans' trust by successfully undergoing an ordeal, having his hand held in the flame of a torch without crying out, and they agree to submit to the judgement of the Roman Senate. Despite hostility from Commodus, speeches by Livius and Timonides persuade the senators to let the German captives become peaceful farmers on Italian land, thereby encouraging their fellow barbarians to cooperate with Rome instead of fighting it. Thwarted, Commodus sends Livius back to the northern frontier and Lucilla to Armenia, with whose king, Sohaemus, she shares a loveless political marriage.

Lucilla joins a revolt in Rome's eastern provinces, where a famine has been exacerbated by the new taxes. Commodus sends his northern army against the rebels, knowing that Livius will put aside personal feelings and fight to preserve the unity of the Empire. As the opposing Roman armies meet for battle, Sohaemus arrives and attacks Livius with both the Armenian army and troops borrowed from Rome's archenemy, the Persians. The rebels patriotically decide to fight Persia instead of Rome, joining with Livius and helping him to vanquish Sohaemus. As a reward Commodus declares Livius his co-emperor, but only on condition that the northern army inflicts harsh punishments on the rebellious provinces.

Rejecting this piece of brutality, Livius and Lucilla take their army to Rome, intending to make Commodus abdicate. The emperor responds by bribing away the soldiers' loyalty and massacring Timonides and the population of the German colony. Lucilla tries to hire Verulus, Commodus’ gladiator bodyguard, to assassinate her brother; Verulus declines, confessing that he slept with Aurelius’ wife and that Commodus is his illegitimate son.

The Senate declares Commodus a god, and Livius and Lucilla are sentenced to be burned alive as human sacrifices to the new deity as the Roman citizens drunkenly celebrate. In consideration of their former friendship, Commodus offers Livius a duel for the throne. The two fight with javelins in the Roman Forum, where Livius eventually runs Commodus through. At last Livius is free to become emperor, but he has lost faith in Rome's ability to reform. He departs the city with Lucilla, as Commodus' old advisers fight over the throne and offer competing bribes to the army in an attempt to gain military support.

A voice-over epilogue states that though the Roman Empire did not fall immediately, internal corruption led to its eventual collapse.

Cast

 * Sophia Loren as Lucilla
 * Stephen Boyd as Livius
 * Alec Guinness as Marcus Aurelius
 * James Mason as Timonides
 * Christopher Plummer as Commodus
 * Mel Ferrer as Cleander
 * Omar Sharif as Sohaemus, King of Armenia
 * Anthony Quayle as Verulus
 * John Ireland as Ballomar
 * Eric Porter as Julianus
 * Finlay Currie as Senator
 * Andrew Keir as Polybius
 * Douglas Wilmer as Pescennius Niger
 * George Murcell as Victorinus
 * Norman Wooland as Virgilianus

Development
The idea for The Fall of the Roman Empire originated with Anthony Mann who had just finished directing El Cid (1961). In London, while waiting for a taxi cab, he spotted an Oxford concise edition of Edward Gibbon's six-volume series The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire near the front window at the Hatchards bookshop. Mann then considered a film adaptation of the book as his next project after reading the book on a flight trip to Madrid. There, he pitched the idea to Samuel Bronston to which the producer agreed. In July 1961, Bronston told The New York Times that The Fall of the Roman Empire would be his next project, but he had also ruled out filming on location in Rome. He stated that upon "checking I found the Eternal City was not the 'city' of the time of the fall of the empire, so we'll build our 'Rome' in Madrid." Additionally, Philip Yordan had been tasked to write the script while Charlton Heston was being offered the role of Marcus Aurelius.

In September 1961, Bronston formally announced he was planning a trilogy of historical spectacles in Spain, which included The Fall of the Roman Empire with Mann and Heston returning to direct and star in. Filming was initially set in February 1962, with the production design for the recreated Roman Forum supervised by Veniero Colasanti and John Moore. Months later, by December, Heston had disliked Yordan's script for the film. At the premiere of El Cid (1961), in Madrid, Heston told Bronston associate Michael Waszynski that he was not interested in The Fall of the Roman Empire. On the next day, during a jet flight back to Los Angeles, Yordan, who was seated next to Heston, and director Nicholas Ray pitched 55 Days at Peking (1963) to him. Subsequently, 55 Days at Peking went into production while Roman Empire was placed on hold. The elaborate sets for Roman Empire were later demolished and replaced with the Forbidden City sets for 55 Days at Peking.

Writing
In April 1963, Mann explained to the Los Angeles Times that while the film was not a direct adaptation of Gibbon's volume series, the focus on a fifteen-year period from Marcus Aurelius' reign to Commodus' death was backed by historians as "the turning point in the history of the empire and by concentrating our story on it we can keep the same group of characters within the range of our drama." Having selected a focal point for the film, screenwriter Basilio Franchina was hired for his broad knowledge of the period while Ben Barzman would handle the actual writing of the script. Together, they subsequently wrote a 350-page film treatment.

After this, Mann consulted with the screenwriters on further developing the characters, in which they wrote six drafts in total. The sixth draft was developed during filming. Mann later explained, "The writing took us more than one year. We did not have artists in mind when we were writing; but we wanted characters with memorable scenes to attract artists of the calibre of Guinness to want to play them."

As the script was being written, the Roman Forum was constructed on Bronston's studio backlot although their script had made no mention of it. Under Yordan's supervision, the action was re-written for scenes they had not written for the Forum to occur there, which brought much dismay from Barzman. In January 1963, it was reported that historian Will Durant had written a prologue for the film.

Casting
It was envisioned that Heston was cast as Livius, but he turned it down. The part had also been offered to Kirk Douglas, who turned it down as well following an offer of $1.5 million. In 1971, he later said he regretted this "because with $1.5 million there are lots of things you can do that you want to." In May 1962, it was announced that Stephen Boyd, who had played opposite to Heston in Ben-Hur (1959), was cast as the lead opposite Gina Lollobrigida as Lucilla. In September 1962, it was announced that Sophia Loren had been cast as Lucilla, in which she was paid $1 million.

In August 1962, it was reported that Alec Guinness had been cast as Marcus Aurelius, while Richard Harris, Albert Finney, John Gielgud, and Terence Stamp were being considered for other roles. Later that same month, it was reported that Harris had been cast as Commodus. However, in January 1963, he was replaced by Christopher Plummer who had pulled out of The V.I.P.s (1963) to do so. Harris later portrayed the role of Marcus Aurelius in the similarly themed 2000 film Gladiator. By the time filming was set to begin, Anthony Quayle, Omar Sharif, John Ireland, and Mel Ferrer had been cast in supporting roles.

Filming
Principal photography began on January 14, 1963. Marcus Aurelius's winter camp on the Danube was shot on location in the snow along the Sierra de Guadarrama in northern Madrid. By the next month, filming in the area was suspended due to a severe blizzard. The battle sequence between the Romans and Persians involved 8,000 extras, and was shot on an undulating plain near Manzanares el Real, which allowed for legions of soldiers to be visible over a long distance.

Meanwhile, Yakima Canutt was hired as the second unit director at the insistence of Mann. As previously done in El Cid (1961), Canutt performed his own stunts while his son Tap served as the stunt double for Stephen Boyd. Jack Williams served as the body double for Christopher Plummer. Among the first scenes shot was the chariot race sequence between Livius and Commodus. Canutt was also tasked to gather 1,500 horses from Spain and Portugal, for which they were trained to fall safely during the battle sequences.

Interior scenes were shot in Madrid at the Samuel Bronston Studios (formerly known as the Chamartín Studios) and at the Cinecittà Studios in Rome where Commodus's baths and gymnasiums were constructed. Filming had been arranged to shoot at Cinecittà in order to make it eligible for government subsidies. In July 1963, filming was finished after 143 days. Second unit directors Canutt and Andrew Marton spent an additional 63 days shooting the action sequences.

Production design

Veniero Colasanti and John Moore served as the art directors overseeing the production design with the guidance of Will Durant. Actual construction began on October 1, 1962, using 1,100 men who labored for seven months. About 400 art students and craftsmen throughout Spain worked on the statuary, tiles, frescoes, and details of the set. The film's reconstruction of the Roman Forum was constructed in Las Matas near Madrid, approximately sixteen miles from Bronston's studio. The entire set was measured at 400 x 230 metres (1312 x 754 feet), which holds the record for the largest outdoor film set. Uniquely for the film, the set was not extended through the use of matte paintings.

The Temple of Jupiter was constructed on a 29 m high hill along the plains of Las Matas by which craftsmen built the 50 m temple on it. The bronze equestrian figures at the top of the temple were 24 m above the pavement of the forum set. For the statuary, 350 statues had to be constructed. There were 76 life-size statues, more than a thousand sculpted bases for the remaining figures and victory columns, and a series of the aforementioned equestrian statues that were 7.6 m high. Ultimately, more than 3,000 sketches were drawn to illustrate the 27 structures that would comprise the sets. The various ancient Rome settings covered 22 ha. After much of the set was pulled down, the remaining sections were reused in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (1966).

Music
Dimitri Tiomkin's score, which is one of the notable features of the film, is more than 150 minutes in length. It is scored for a large orchestra, including an important part for cathedral organ. Several cues are extended compositions in their own right. These include Pax Romana in which Marcus Aurelius summons the governors of all the Roman provinces. Although Christopher Palmer stated in his book on film music, The Composer in Hollywood, that it was a march, the cue is actually in the style of a bolero.

Other notable cues include those for The Roman Forum, composed to accompany Commodus's triumphal return to Rome as the newly installed Emperor; a percussive scherzo for a barbarian attack by Ballomar's army; the Tarantella danced by the Roman mob on the evening presaging the gladiatorial combat between Livius and Commodus (which seems to be modelled on the Tarantella movement from the Piano Concerto of Tiomkin's teacher Ferruccio Busoni).

The music was recorded at the Royal Albert Hall. The music editor was George Korngold, son of Erich Wolfgang Korngold. A soundtrack album was released by Columbia Records to coincide with the release of the film.

Release
Prior to the film's release, columnist Hedda Hopper predicted in the Los Angeles Times that "this beautiful, honest, superbly done film will make millions." The film had its world premiere screening at the London Astoria on March 24, 1964, and ran there for 70 weeks. Two days later, the film premiered at the DeMille Theater in New York City. In April 1964, the film was screened out of competition at the 1964 Cannes Film Festival. Sophia Loren was a guest, appearing at the premiere on a chariot.

The film had been shot in Ultra Panavision 70 with a 2.76:1 aspect ratio, although it was never screened in that format. Instead, it was screened with a 2.20:1 aspect ratio for 70mm roadshow presentations, and subsequently in 35mm at 2.35:1 during the film's general release. The film's original running time had totaled 185 minutes including an overture, intermission, and exit music. However, for the film's general release, the film was reduced by half an hour.

Novelization
In conjunction with the film's release, a paperback novelization also titled The Fall of the Roman Empire was published by Fawcett Publications. The novelization was written by Harry Whittington and was based on the film's screenplay. The cover of the novel is a screenshot from the film. The text of the novel provides a more detailed exposition of the film's plot line. Other covers that were not screenshots of the film were used for this novel of the film.

Home media
The film was first released on LaserDisc in a letterboxed format during the 1990s. The most complete version of the film was released on Super 8mm in the early 1990s, extracted from a 16mm print.

On April 29, 2008, the film was released on a three-disc limited collector's edition DVD as part of the Miriam Collection by the Weinstein Company. This edition included bonus materials including an audio commentary by Bill Bronston (son of producer Samuel Bronston) and biographer Mel Martin; a reproduction of the original 1964 souvenir program; a behind-the-scenes look at the fall of the real Roman Empire; a "making of" documentary; five Encyclopædia Britannica featurettes on the Roman Empire; and a set of six color production stills. The Blu-ray disc was released in the United Kingdom on May 16, 2011.

Critical reaction
Bosley Crowther of The New York Times sharply criticized the film writing, "So massive and incoherent is it, so loaded with Technicolored spectacles, tableaus and military melees that have no real meaning or emotional pull, that you're likely to have the feeling after sitting through its more than three hours (not counting time out for intermission), that the Roman Empire has fallen on you. The reason it misses is obvious — misses as entertainment, that is, not as a mass of noisy footage that leaves the senses flattened and numbed. There isn't a character in it for whom you're made to care two hoots —or, indeed, made to feel is important, or, for that matter, made to understand. The fellows who wrote the screenplay — Ben Barzman, Basilio Franchina and Philip Yordan—have failed completely to shape a drama that has human interest or even sense." Time magazine criticized the production design as well noting "Bronston's Rome is patently too fabulous to have been built in a day, but it doesn't look lived-in either. Director Anthony Mann makes it a picture-book setting aswarm with extras behaving like extras and movie stars all dressed up to face posterity in spanking new tunics, togas, and armor."

Hollis Alpert of Saturday Review wrote: "Never before have script writers (there were three involved) written a screenplay like this one, in which the two main parts are complete voids. One must assume Mr. Bronston offered Mr. Boyd and Miss Loren huge sums to journey to Spain for the movie, they took time only to read the contract and not the script. Several others also appear to great disadvantage in the film, among them James Mason, Omar Sharif, Mel Ferrer, and Anthony Quayle." Philip K. Scheuer, reviewing for the Los Angeles Times, felt the film was "more like a recapitulation of all the great movie spectacles, historical and pseudo, than a monumental entity in itself." He further wrote "Yet the only emotion it engenders is excitement — intermittent excitement, and its art lies in its parts (the camera work, the color, a few of the performances, even the music) but not in their sum. Its triumph is the triumphs of its technicians, of matter over mind." In contrast, Variety praised the film, summarizing: "Large in theme and concept, colorful in treatment, The Fall of the Roman Empire is Sam Bronston's greatest coup de cinema."

Among later reviews, Mike Cummings from AllMovie gave the film a positive review, praising the film for its performances and musical score. Leonard Maltin awarded the film 3$1/undefined$ out of 4 stars, writing "Intelligent scripting, good direction, and fine acting place this far above the usual empty-headed spectacle". Steven H. Scheuer disliked the film at first and asked his Movies on TV readers to "excuse the divine Sophia Loren for looking so uncomfortable," but later reconsidered his opinion and rated it 3 out of 4 stars.

The film has a 92% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 13 reviews, with an average of 7.20 out of 10.

Box office
The film grossed $4.8 million at the box office in the United States and Canada, from which it returned nearly $1.9 million in distributor rentals in the United States and Canada.

Aftermath
Following the release of The Fall of the Roman Empire, Bronston was slated to release Circus World in the following June. In March 1964, it was reported that Pierre S. du Pont III took over the company, in which he had signed guarantee bonds for the films to reach completion so it would enable Bronston to raise finance. However, two months later, in June 1964, Bronston Production filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy reporting over $5.6 million in debts to du Pont.

In May 1971, Bronston attempted a comeback with a planned epic about Isabella of Spain. Glenda Jackson had signed to portray the title role while John Philip Law was to play Ferdinand II, but the film was never made. In the following June, a court ordered Bronston to pay Du Pont $3 million.

During the bankruptcy proceedings, Bronston was asked, under oath, by a lawyer for one of the creditors if he had had an account in Zürich at any time while running the company. He answered that the company had had an account there for six months. While that answer was true, later research found that Bronston personally had had an account in Zürich at another time, and the lawyers referred the case to federal prosecutors who secured a perjury conviction against Bronston. He appealed, on the grounds that while he had not told the whole truth, he had not been lying about the company's Zürich account. The Second Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the conviction, but in 1973 the United States Supreme Court agreed with Bronston, holding unanimously that "literally truthful but technically misleading" answers to questions under oath did not constitute perjury and instead examiners should ask further questions clarifying the matter.

title: The Fall of the Roman Empire (film)


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International development

International development or global development is a broad concept denoting the idea that societies and countries have differing levels of economic or human development on an international scale. It is the basis for international classifications such as developed country, developing country and least developed country, and for a field of practice and research that in various ways engages with international development processes. There are, however, many schools of thought and conventions regarding which are the exact features constituting the "development" of a country.

Historically, development was largely synonymous with economic development, and especially its convenient but flawed quantification (see parable of the broken window) through readily gathered (for developed countries) or estimated monetary proxies (estimated for severely undeveloped or isolationist countries) such as gross domestic product (GDP), often viewed alongside actuarial measures such as life expectancy. More recently, writers and practitioners have begun to discuss development in the more holistic and multi-disciplinary sense of human development. Other related concepts are, for instance, competitiveness, quality of life or subjective well-being.

"International development" is different from the simple concept of "development". Whereas the latter, at its most basic, denotes simply the idea of change through time, international development has come to refer to a distinct field of practice, industry, and research; the subject of university courses and professional categorisations. It remains closely related to the set of institutions—especially the Bretton Woods Institutions—that arose after the Second World War with a focus on economic growth, alleviating poverty, and improving living conditions in previously colonised countries. The international community has codified development aims in, for instance, the Millennium Development Goals (2000 to 2015) and the Sustainable Development Goals (2015 to 2030).

Sustainable Development Goals (2015 to 2030)
The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) served a successful framework to guide international development efforts, having achieved progress on some of the 8 goals. For example, by 2015 the extreme poverty rate had already been cut into half. Other targets achieved include access to safe drinking water, malaria, and gender equality in schooling. Yet, some scholars have argued that the MDGs lack the critical perspectives required to alleviate poverty and structures of inequality, reflected in the serious lags to achieving numerous other goals.

As the MDG era came to an end, 2015 marked the year that the United Nations General Assembly adopted a new agenda for development. Former UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon referred to this as a "defining moment in history" calling on states to "act in solidarity". Succeeding the MDG agenda, 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were created, with 169 indicators. UN resolution 70/1 adopted on September 25, 2015, was titled "Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development", solidifying 17 new goals that had been in motion since 2014. The goals came into force in January 2016, focusing on areas of climate change, economic inequality, democracy, poverty, and peacebuilding.

Although the SDGs were built on the foundation of the MDGs, there are some key differences in both processes. Before adoption, unlike the MDGs, the SDGs had been in discussion for months, involving civil society actors, NGOs, as well as an opening summit involving intergovernmental negotiations. The new global development agenda places a greater emphasis on collective action, combining the efforts of multiple stakeholders to increase the sustainability of the goals. This emphasis on sustainability has also led to more cross-sector partnerships, and combined international efforts across areas of environmental, social, cultural, political, and economic development.

Millennium Development Goals (2000 to 2015)
In 2000, United Nations signed the United Nations Millennium Declaration, which includes eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) to be achieved by 2015. This represented the first time that a holistic strategy to meet the development needs of the world has been established, with measurable targets and defined indicators.

Because the MDGs were agreed as global targets to be achieved by the global community, they are independent of, but by no means unrelated to, individual national interests. The goals imply that every state has a set of obligations to the world community to meet and that other states, who have achieved those goals, have an obligation to help those who have not. As such they may represent an extension of the concept of human rights.

The first seven Millennium Development Goals present measurable goals, while the eighth lists a number of 'stepping stone' goals – ways in which progress towards the first seven goals could be made. Each goal uses indicators based on statistical series collected and maintained by respected organisations in each relevant field (usually the UN agency responsible but also the OECD, IMF and World Bank)

The MDGs have catalysed a significant amount of action, including new initiatives such as Millennium Promise. Most of these initiatives however work in small scale interventions which do not reach the millions of people required by the MDGs.

Recent praise has been that it will be impossible to meet the first seven goals without meeting the eighth by forming a Global Partnership for Development. No current organisation has the capacity to dissolve the enormous problems of the developing world alone – especially in cities, where an increasing number of poor people live – as demonstrated by the almost nonexistent progress on the goal of improving the lives of at least 100 Million slum dwellers.

The Institution of Civil Engineers Engineering Without Frontiers panel and its recommendations, and the 2007 Brunel Lecture by the ICE's 2009–2010 president Paul Jowitt, are representative of a change of approach in the UK at least to start drawing together the huge capacity available to western governments, industry, academia and charity to develop such a partnership.

Other goals
International development also aims to improve general government policies of these developing countries. "State building" is the strengthening of regional institutions necessary to support long-term economic, social, and political development. Education is another important aspect of international development. It is a good example of how the focus today is on sustainable development in these countries; education gives people the skills required to keep themselves out of poverty.

Concepts
International development is related to the concept of international aid, but is distinct from, disaster relief and humanitarian aid. While these two forms of international support seek to alleviate some of the problems associated with a lack of development, they are most often short term fixes – they are not necessarily long-term solutions. International development, on the other hand, seeks to implement long-term solutions to problems by helping developing countries create the necessary capacity needed to provide such sustainable solutions to their problems. A truly sustainable development project is one which will be able to carry on indefinitely with no further international involvement or support, whether it be financial or otherwise.

International development projects may consist of a single, transformative project to address a specific problem or a series of projects targeted at several aspects of society. Promoted projects are ones which involve problem solving that reflects the unique culture, politics, geography, and economy of a region. More recently, the focus in this field has been projects that aim towards empowering women, building local economies, and caring for the environment.

In context of human development it usually encompasses foreign aid, governance, healthcare, education, poverty reduction, gender equality, disaster preparedness, infrastructure, economics, human rights, environment and issues associated with these.

During recent decades, development thinking has shifted from modernization and structural adjustment programs to poverty reduction. Under the former system, poor countries were encouraged to undergo social and economical structural transformations as part of their development, creating industrialization and intentional industrial policy. Poverty reduction rejects this notion, consisting instead of direct budget support for social welfare programs that create macroeconomic stability leading to an increase in economic growth.

The concept of poverty can apply to different circumstances depending on context. Poverty is the condition of lacking economic access to fundamental human needs such as food, shelter and safe drinking water. While some define poverty primarily in economic terms, others consider social and political arrangements also to be intrinsic – often manifested in a lack of dignity.

Theories
There are a number of theories about how desirable change in society is best achieved. Such theories draw on a variety of social scientific disciplines and approaches, and include historical theories such as:
 * Modernization Theory
 * Dependency Theory
 * World Systems Theory
 * Neoliberalism
 * Good governance
 * Capability approach
 * Postdevelopment theory

International economic inequality
International development institutions and international organisations such as the UN promote the realisation of the fact that economic practices such as rapid globalisation and certain aspects of international capitalism can lead to, and, allegedly, have led to an economic divide between countries, sometimes called the north–south divide. Such organisations often make it a goal and to help reduce these divides by encouraging co-operation amongst the Global South and other practices and policies that can accomplish this.

International development can also cause inequality between richer and poorer factions of one nation's society. For example, when economic growth boosts development and industrialisation, it can create a class divide by creating demand for more educated people in order to maintain corporate and industrial profitability. Thus the popular demand for education, which in turn drives the cost of education higher through the principle of supply and demand, as people would want to be part of the new economic elite. Higher costs for education lead to a situation where only the people with enough money to pay for education can receive sufficient education to qualify for the better-paying jobs that mass-development brings about. This restricts poorer people to lesser-paying jobs but technological development makes some of these jobs obsolete (for example, by introducing electronic machines to take over a job, such as creating a series of machines such as lawn mowers to make people such as gardeners obsolete). This leads to a situation where poorer people cannot improve their lives as easily as they could have in a less developed society. That is partially why institutions such as the Center for Global Development are searching for "pro-poor" economic policies.

Dignity
Modern poverty reduction and development programmes often have dignity as a central theme. Dignity is also a central theme of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the very first article of which starts with:

 * "All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights."

The concept of dignity in development has been extensively explored by many, and related to all of the development sectors. For example, in Development with Dignity Amit Bhaduri argues that full employment with dignity for all is both important and possible in India, while the UN Millennium Project's task force on Water and Sanitation links the sector directly to dignity in the report Health, Dignity and Development: What will it take?. The Asian Human Rights Commission released a statement in 2006 claiming that:

Human dignity is the true measure of human development.
 * Humanizing Development Global Photography Campaign

Participation
The concept of participation is concerned with ensuring that the intended beneficiaries of development projects and programmes are themselves involved in the planning and execution of those projects and programmes. This is considered important as it empowers the recipients of development projects to influence and manage their own development – thereby removing any culture of dependency. It is widely considered to be one of the most important concepts in modern development theory. The UN System Network on Rural Development and Food Security describes participation as:

one of the ends as well as one of the means of development

Local participants in development projects are often products of oral communities. This has led to efforts to design project planning and organizational development methods, such as participatory rural appraisal, which are accessible to non-literate people.

Appropriateness
The concept of something being appropriate is concerned with ensuring that a development project or programme is of the correct scale and technical level, and is culturally and socially suitable for its beneficiaries. This should not be confused with ensuring something is low-technology, cheap or basic – a project is appropriate if it is acceptable to its recipients and owners, economically affordable and sustainable in the context in which it is executed.

For example, in a rural sub-Saharan community it may not be appropriate to provide a chlorinated and pumped water system because it cannot be maintained or controlled adequately – simple hand pumps may be better; while in a big city in the same country it would be inappropriate to provide water with hand pumps, and the chlorinated system would be the correct response.

The economist E. F. Schumacher championed the cause of appropriate technology and founded the organization ITDG (Intermediate Technology Design Group), which develops and provides appropriate technologies for development (ITDG has now been renamed Practical Action).

The concept of right-financing has been developed to reflect the need for public and private financial support systems that foster and enable development, rather than hinder it.

Rights-based approach
Rights-based approach to development has been adopted by many nongovernmental organizations and the United Nations as the new approach to international development. Rights-based approach combines many different concepts of international development, such as capacity building, human rights, participation, and sustainability. The goal of the rights-based approach to development is to empower the rights-holders, or the group that does not exercise full rights, and strengthen the capacity of the duty-bearers, or the institution or government obligated to fill these rights.

Measurement
The judging of how developed a country or a community is highly subjective, often highly controversial, and very important in judging what further development is necessary or desirable.

There are many different measures of human development, many of them related to the different sectors above. Some of them are:
 * National GDP
 * Literacy rates
 * Life expectancy
 * Human Development Index
 * Gini coefficient
 * Human Security Index – see external link and mention on Human security
 * Per capita income
 * Maternal survival rate
 * HIV infection rates
 * Number of doctors per capita

An interesting way of seeing development is through modernization. This includes electronification of households and increases in phone plans. This does not accurately convey social development although it is hard to precisely measure, and institutions differ greatly in their methods. This goes into the debate on whether economic growth causes social growth or vice versa. Indicators of social change can be used to complement economic factors as indicators of development and in formulating development policies.

In a multi-country review of development progress, improved outcomes on these measures has generally been found to be driven by a combination of smart leadership, policies, institutions, and social networks, according to the Overseas Development Institute.

Migration and remittance
Migration has throughout history also led to significant international development. As people move, their culture, knowledge, skills and technologies move with them. Migrants' ties with their past homes and communities lead to international relationships and further flows of goods, capital and knowledge. The value of remittances sent home by migrants in modern times is much greater than the total in international aid given.

Sectors
International development and disaster relief are both often grouped into sectors, which correlate with the major themes of international development (and with the Millennium Development Goals – which are included in the descriptions below). There is no clearly defined list of sectors, but some of the more established and universally accepted sectors are further explored here. The sectors are highly interlinked, illustrating the complexity of the problems they seek to deal with.

Water and sanitation
In development, this is the provision of water and sanitation (toilets, bathing facilities, a healthy environment) of sufficient quantity and quality to supply an acceptable standard of living. This is different from a relief response, where it is the provision of water and sanitation in sufficient quantity and quality to maintain life.

The provision of water and sanitation is an engineering challenge, as well as a societal and political challenge as it includes education and behaviour change elements and is closely connected with shelter, politics and human rights.

The seventh Millennium Development Goal was to ensure environmental sustainability, including reducing by half the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and achieving significant improvement in lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers, by 2020. UN-Water, a body of 26 UN agencies that work on water issues, is responsible for the triennial UN World Water Development Report which monitors progress towards the Millennium Development Goals related to water. The World Water Assessment Programme, which produces the Report, has articulated how eight of the MDGs are linked to water resources.

Health
This is provision of access to quality healthcare to the population in an efficient and consistent manner and according to their needs. The standard and level of provision that is acceptable or appropriate depends on many factors and is highly specific to country and location. For example, in a large city (whether in a 'developing' country or not), it is appropriate and often practical to provide a high standard hospital which can offer a full range of treatments; in a remote rural community it may be more appropriate and practical to provide a visiting healthworker on a periodic basis, possibly with a rural clinic serving several different communities.

The provision of access to healthcare is both an engineering challenge as it requires infrastructure such as hospitals and transport systems and an education challenge as it requires qualified healthworkers and educated consumers.

The fourth Millennium Development Goal is to reduce by two thirds the mortality rate among children under five.

The fifth Millennium Development Goal is to reduce by three quarters the maternal mortality ratio.

The sixth Millennium Development Goal is to halt and begin to reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS and to halt and begin to reverse the incidence of malaria and other major diseases.

Reaching these goals is also a management challenge. Health services need to make the best use of limited resources while providing the same quality of care to every man, woman and child everywhere. Achieving this level of services requires innovation, quality improvement and expansion of public health services and programs. The main goal is to make public health truly public.

Examples of organizations working in health are:
 * World Health Organization
 * Partners in Health
 * Results for Development Institute
 * Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization

Education
The provision of education often focuses on providing free primary level education, but also covers secondary and higher education. A lack of access to education is one of the primary limits on human development, and is related closely to every one of the other sectors. Almost every development project includes an aspect of education as development by its very nature requires a change in the way people live.

The second Millennium Development Goal is to Provide universal primary education.

The provision of education is itself an education challenge, as it requires qualified teachers who must be trained in higher education institutions. However, donors are unwilling to provide support to higher education because their policies now target the MDG. The result is that students are not educated by qualified professionals and worse, when they graduate from primary school they are inducted into a secondary school system that is not able to accommodate them.

Shelter
The provision of appropriate shelter is concerned with providing suitable housing for families and communities. It is highly specific to context of culture, location, climate and other factors. In development, it is concerned with providing housing of an appropriate quality and type to accommodate people in the long term. This is distinct from shelter in relief, which is concerned with providing sufficient shelter to maintain life.

Examples of organisations specialising in shelter are:
 * UN-HABITAT (development)
 * UNHCR (relief)
 * Shelter Centre (relief)
 * Architecture for Humanity (relief and development)
 * Article 25 (relief and development)
 * ARCHIVE Global (development)

Human rights
The provision of human rights is concerned with ensuring that all people everywhere receive the rights conferred on them by International human rights instruments. There are many of these, but the most important for international development are:
 * The Universal Declaration of Human Rights and its associated treaties
 * The Convention on the Rights of the Child
 * The Geneva Conventions (this is of more relevance to relief and military practices than development)

Human rights covers a huge range of topics. Some of those more relevant to international development projects include rights associated with gender equality, justice, employment, social welfare and culture.

The third Millennium Development Goal was to "promote gender equality and empower women" by "eliminating gender disparity in primary and secondary education preferably by 2005, and at all levels by 2015."

Accomplishing this goal could assist in the achievement of five of the other eight Millennium Development Goals. Goals 1–6 are in direct correlation with the status of women in the communities of problem countries such as The Democratic Republic of Congo, Sub-Saharan Africa and many of the developing nations. The low social stature of a woman inhibits her abilities to truly impact her community in astonishing ways. Noting the relationship between mother and offspring, Goals 1, 4 and 5 are ones to feel the wrath of poor social status. An unhealthy mother simply cannot bear a healthy child, let alone nurse a sickly one back to health, without access to adequate nutrition. A mother characteristically takes most of the care of a child, therefore must have the resources available to not only support herself but another human as well. Without these resources, if she has not already succumbed to birthing complications, a woman cannot survive the perils of poverty and hunger and support her child simultaneously.

In a different spectrum of societal norms the Goals 2 and 6 are being threatened by an age old privilege. Historically females have been refused education in pardon of males, resulting in lesser opportunity to thrive economically. Giving women equal access to an adequate education brings the global community steps closer to achieving universal primary education. Along with this education will come proper spread of knowledge regarding safe practices in disease avoidance. Women are increasingly falling victim to HIV/AIDS for reasons easily evaded. Increasing the availability of a proper education to women will be remarkably beneficial on a variety of fronts. To promote gender equality is to promote progress towards global development.

Livelihoods
This is concerned with ensuring that all people are able to make a living for themselves and provide themselves with an adequate standard of living, without compromising their human rights and while maintaining dignity.

The first Millennium Development Goal is to reduce by half the proportion of people living on less than a dollar a day and reduce by half the proportion of people who suffer from hunger.

The concept of livelihoods is directly drawn from the Sustainable Livelihoods Approach (SLA) to international development. The approach and subsequent practical framework is credited to Robert Chambers, who, writing from the mid-1980s and onward, was interested in fostering efficiency in development cooperation. The approach was later developed and utilized by the United Kingdom's Department for International Development (DFID). The approach is considered to be more comprehensive than previous theories and methodology of "conventional" development initiatives. The core concepts include: taking a holistic view, building on community and individual strengths, focusing on linking both macro and micro-level thinking, sustainability, and maintaining a dynamic and ever-evolving framework.

Finance
Several organisations and initiatives exist which are concerned with providing financial systems and frameworks which allow people to organise or purchase services, items or projects for their own development.

The 2006 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded jointly to Muhammad Yunus and the Grameen Bank, which he founded, for their work in providing microcredit to the poor.

Concerns
The terms "developed" and "developing" (or "underdeveloped") have proven problematic in forming policy as they ignore issues of wealth distribution and the lingering effects of colonialism. Some theorists see development efforts as fundamentally neo-colonial, in which a wealthier nation forces its industrial and economic structure on a poorer nation, which will then become a consumer of the developed nation's goods and services. Post-developmentalists, for example, see development as a form of Western cultural imperialism that hurts the people of poor countries and endangers the environment to such an extent that they suggest rejection of development altogether.

Other scholars have sought to widen the notion of "developing" to encompass all countries, as even the wealthiest and most industrialised of countries face problems of social exclusion and inequality. This points to the widespread critiques of the language of development practice, from the Cold War-era terminology of "Third World" to the subsequent bifurcation of "developed" and "developing" countries. The phrases "Global North" and "Global South" are similarly imprecise (particularly from a geographical standpoint, as Australia, for instance, is considered part of the Global North). Other terms currently in use as synonyms for "Global South" include "majority world" and "low- and middle-income countries". The latter term allows for greater specificity, for instance in differentiating between lower-middle and upper-middle-income countries, but it has the downside of overemphasising the economic aspects of development at the expense of social, political and cultural rights and freedoms. These linguistic issues reflect conceptual tensions related to the framing of development.

History
Although international relations and international trade have existed for thousands of years, it is only in the past century that international development theory emerged as a separate body of ideas. More specifically, it has been suggested that 'the theory and practice of development is inherently technocratic, and remains rooted in the high modernist period of political thought that existed in the immediate aftermath of the Second World War'. Throughout the 20th century, before the concept of international development became a common word, four aspects were used to describe the idea:
 * political and economic liberalism, and the significance of "free markets"
 * social evolution in extremely hierarchical environment
 * Marxist critiques of class and imperialism
 * anti-colonial take on cultural differences and national self-determination

After World War 2
The second half of the 20th century has been called the 'era of development'. The origins of this era have been attributed to
 * the need for reconstruction in the immediate aftermath of World War II
 * the evolution of colonialism or "colonization" into globalization and the establishment of new free trade policies between so-called 'developed' and 'underdeveloped' nations
 * the start of the Cold War and the desire of the United States and its allies to prevent the Third World from drifting towards communism

International Development in its very meaning is geared towards colonies that gained independence. The governance of the newly independent states should be constructed so that the inhabitants enjoy freedom from poverty, hunger, and insecurity.

It has been argued that this era was launched on January 20, 1949, when Harry S. Truman made these remarks in his inaugural address

We must embark on a bold new program for making the benefits of our scientific advances and industrial progress available for the improvement and growth of underdeveloped areas. The old imperialism—exploitation for foreign profit—has no place in our plans. What we envisage is a program of development based on the concept of democratic fair dealing.

Before this date, however, the United States had already taken a leading role in the creation of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (now part of the World Bank Group) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), both established in 1944, and in the United Nations in 1945.

The launch of the Marshall Plan was another important step in setting the agenda for international development, combining humanitarian goals with the creation of a political and economic bloc in Europe that was allied to the U.S. This agenda was given conceptual support during the 1950s in the form of modernization theory espoused by Walt Rostow and other American economists. The changes in the 'developed' world's approach to international development were further necessitated by the gradual collapse of Western Europe's empires over the next decades; now independent ex-colonies no longer received support in return for their subordinate role.

By the late 1960s, dependency theory arose analysing the evolving relationship between the West and the Third World. In the 1970s and early 1980s, the modernists at the World Bank and IMF adopted the neoliberal ideas of economists such as Milton Friedman or Béla Balassa, which were implemented in the form of structural adjustment programs, while their opponents were promoting various 'bottom-up' approaches, ranging from civil disobedience and critical consciousness to appropriate technology and Rapid Rural Appraisal.

In response, various parts of the UN system led a counter movement, which in the long run has proved to be successful. They were led initially by the International Labour Organization (ILO), influenced by Paul Streeten, then by United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF). Then United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) put forward the concept of Human Development, thanks to Mahboub ul Haq and Amartya Sen, thus changing the nature of the development dialogue to focus on human needs and capabilities.

By the 1990s, there were some writers for whom development theory had reached an impasse and some academics were "imagining a postdevelopment era". The Cold War had ended, capitalism had become the dominant mode of social organization, and UN statistics showed that living standards around the world had improved over the past 40 years. Nevertheless, a large portion of the world's population were still living in poverty, their governments were crippled by debt and concerns about the environmental impact of globalization were rising.

In response to the impasse, the rhetoric of development is now focusing on the issue of poverty, with the metanarrative of modernization being replaced by shorter-term vision embodied by the Millennium Development Goals and the Human Development approach. At the same time, some development agencies are exploring opportunities for public-private partnerships and promoting the idea of Corporate social responsibility with the apparent aim of integrating international development with the process of economic globalization.

The critics have suggested that this integration has always been part of the underlying agenda of development. They argue that poverty can be equated with powerlessness and that the way to overcome poverty is through emancipatory social movements and civil society, not paternalistic aid programmes or corporate charity.

While some critics have been debating the end of development others have predicted a development revival as part of the War on Terrorism. To date, however, there is limited evidence to support the notion that aid budgets are being used to counter Islamic fundamentalism in the same way that they were used 40 years ago to counter communism.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: International development


text:
Kelly Gruber

Kelly Wayne Gruber (born February 26, 1962) is an American former Major League Baseball (MLB) third baseman. He played for the Toronto Blue Jays and California Angels from 1984 to 1993. He was a two-time MLB All-Star and won a Gold Glove Award and Silver Slugger Award in 1990.

Early life
Gruber was born on February 26, 1962. Gruber played baseball at Westlake High School in Austin, Texas, where his number was later retired.

Early career
He was drafted by the Cleveland Indians in the 1st round (10th pick) of the 1980 amateur draft but did not sign with the team. On December 5, 1983, the Toronto Blue Jays picked him up in the Rule 5 draft. Gruber saw his first MLB action shortly thereafter, playing in his first game on April 20, 1984. Over the next three seasons, he split time between MLB and the minor leagues, earning an everyday spot in the Toronto line-up by 1987. The Toronto media quickly nicknamed him "Xanthos" (meaning blonde) after his long flowing blonde hair. During his stay in Toronto he was voted the city's most eligible bachelor.

Best years
On April 16, 1989, Gruber was the first Blue Jay in history to hit for the cycle when he got four hits in six at–bats with six RBI and four runs scored. His cycle occurred in the following order: home run, double, triple, and single. He was told to stop at first for his single even though a double was easily attainable. Gruber had his best season in 1990, hitting .274 with 31 home runs, 118 RBIs and 14 stolen bases, winning Gold Glove and Silver Slugger awards and ending up fourth in MVP balloting that year.

Gruber was a member of the 1992 World Series-winning Blue Jay team, and was involved in one of the most controversial plays in World Series history. In the fourth inning of Game 3, Gruber appeared to make a diving tag on Braves runner Deion Sanders' foot to record the third out of a triple play, which would have been only the second such play in World Series history. However, the second-base umpire ruled Sanders safe. Gruber tore his rotator cuff on the play; however, he hit a key game-tying home run in the eighth inning, and the Jays won the game in walk-off fashion, later taking the series in six games.

Later career
Gruber was traded to the California Angels for Luis Sojo in December 1992. Soon after his arrival, Gruber announced that he had bulging discs in his neck. Just over two months after the trade, Gruber had shoulder surgery to repair a rotator cuff tear. Gruber was expected to be sidelined for at least eight weeks. Angels manager Buck Rodgers was angered over the news of Gruber's surgery; he felt that the Blue Jays must have known about the extent of Gruber's injury before they traded him. Rodgers said that Rene Gonzales would be the team's third baseman that year.

Gruber returned to action in June, but after playing in only 18 games, Gruber went back on the disabled list with continued neck and shoulder problems the next month. In September, the team placed Gruber on waivers. He was owed $4 million for the 1993 season, but the Blue Jays agreed to pay $1.7 million of that total.

In 1997, Gruber attempted a comeback with the Baltimore Orioles. While his performance was good enough to impress coaches and staff with the Orioles, Gruber decided to retire for good due to health-related concerns.

Personal
Gruber makes public appearances as a motivational speaker for charitable organizations and holds baseball seminars throughout North America.

On June 16, 2018, he made numerous controversial and offensive remarks at a PitchTalks event in Toronto, some directed at moderator Ashley Docking, prompting his uninviting from the upcoming Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame festivities.

In 1992, Gruber published his autobiography, Kelly, At Home on Third.

title: Kelly Gruber


text:
Super high frequency

Super high frequency (SHF) is the ITU designation for radio frequencies (RF) in the range between 3 and 30 gigahertz (GHz). This band of frequencies is also known as the centimetre band or centimetre wave as the wavelengths range from one to ten centimetres. These frequencies fall within the microwave band, so radio waves with these frequencies are called microwaves. The small wavelength of microwaves allows them to be directed in narrow beams by aperture antennas such as parabolic dishes and horn antennas, so they are used for point-to-point communication and data links and for radar. This frequency range is used for most radar transmitters, wireless LANs, satellite communication, microwave radio relay links, satellite phones (S band), and numerous short range terrestrial data links. They are also used for heating in industrial microwave heating, medical diathermy, microwave hyperthermy to treat cancer, and to cook food in microwave ovens.

Frequencies in the SHF range are often referred to by their IEEE radar band designations: S, C, X, Ku, K, or Ka band, or by similar NATO or EU designations.

Propagation

Microwaves propagate solely by line of sight; because of the small refraction due to their short wavelength, the groundwave and ionospheric reflection (skywave or "skip" propagation) seen with lower frequency radio waves do not occur. Although in some cases they can penetrate building walls enough for useful reception, unobstructed rights of way cleared to the first Fresnel zone are usually required. Wavelengths are small enough at microwave frequencies that the antenna can be much larger than a wavelength, allowing highly directional (high gain) antennas to be built which can produce narrow beams. Therefore, they are used in point-to-point terrestrial communications links, limited by the visual horizon to 30–40 miles (48–64 km). Such high gain antennas allow frequency reuse by nearby transmitters. They are also used for communication with spacecraft since the waves are not refracted (bent) when passing through the ionosphere like lower frequencies.

The wavelength of SHF waves creates strong reflections from metal objects the size of automobiles, aircraft, and ships, and other vehicles. This and the narrow beamwidths possible with high gain antennas and the low atmospheric attenuation as compared with higher frequencies make SHF the main frequencies used in radar. Attenuation and scattering by moisture in the atmosphere increase with frequency, limiting the use of high SHF frequencies for long range applications.

Small amounts of microwave energy are randomly scattered by water vapor molecules in the troposphere. This is used in troposcatter communications systems, operating at a few GHz, to communicate beyond the horizon. A powerful microwave beam is aimed just above the horizon; as it passes through the tropopause some of the microwaves are scattered back to Earth to a receiver beyond the horizon. Distances of 300 km can be achieved. These are mainly used for military communication.

Antennas

The wavelength of SHF waves is short enough that efficient transmitting antennas are small enough to be conveniently mounted on handheld devices, so these frequencies are widely used for wireless applications. For example a quarter wave whip antenna for the SHF band is between 2.5 and 0.25 centimeters long. Omnidirectional antennas have been developed for applications like wireless devices and cellphones that are small enough to be enclosed inside the device's case. The main antenna used for these devices is the printed inverted F antenna (PIFA) consisting of a monopole antenna bent in an L shape, fabricated of copper foil on the printed circuit board inside the device. Small sleeve dipoles or quarter-wave monopoles are also used. The patch antenna is another common type, often integrated into the skin of aircraft.

The wavelengths are also small enough that SHF waves can be focused into narrow beams by high gain directional antennas from a half meter to five meters in diameter. Directive antennas at SHF frequencies are mostly aperture antennas, such as parabolic antennas (the most common type), lens, slot and horn antennas. Large parabolic antennas can produce very narrow beams of a few degrees or less, and often must be aimed with the aid of a boresight. Another type of antenna practical at microwave frequencies is the phased array, consisting of many dipoles or patch antennas on a flat surface, each fed through a phase shifter, which allows the array's beam to be steered electronically. The short wavelength requires great mechanical rigidity in large antennas, to ensure that the radio waves arrive at the feed point in phase.

Waveguide
At microwave frequencies, the types of cable (transmission line) used to conduct lower frequency radio waves, such as coaxial cable, have high power losses. Therefore, to transport microwaves between the transmitter or receiver and the antenna with low losses, a special type of metal pipe called waveguide must be used. Because of the high cost and maintenance requirements of long waveguide runs, in many microwave antennas the output stage of the transmitter or the RF front end of the receiver is located at the antenna.

Advantages
SHF frequencies occupy a "sweet spot" in the radio spectrum which is currently being exploited by many new radio services. They are the lowest frequency band where radio waves can be directed in narrow beams by conveniently sized antennas so they do not interfere with nearby transmitters on the same frequency, allowing frequency reuse. On the other hand, they are the highest frequencies which can be used for long distance terrestrial communication; higher frequencies in the EHF (millimeter wave) band are highly absorbed by the atmosphere, limiting practical propagation distances to one kilometer or less. The high frequency gives microwave communication links a very large information-carrying capacity (bandwidth). In recent decades many new solid state sources of microwave energy have been developed, and microwave integrated circuits for the first time allow significant signal processing to be done at these frequencies. Sources of EHF energy are much more limited and in an earlier state of development.

title: Super high frequency