The development of new polymeric materials has caused a considerable expansion in the field of reactive processing. These new materials are very competitive compared to the traditional ones with respect to production costs and performance. The reports published in this volume present the recent developments and emerging trends in the field of reactive processing and the physical properties of the resulting polymeric materials. Special attention is given to the chemical, kinetic and rheological aspects of reactive processing.

Multicomponent polymeric systems, or polymeric blends, have recently created considerable interest and they represent a new and important challenge for research. These systems have already become technologically important, but the prospects for their applications have by no means been exhausted. For thermodynamic reasons polymer blends do not usually form homogeneous mixtures but exhibit micro or macrophase separation. This incompatibility has some inherent advantages as varying the composition and the processing conditions, materials with different structures and morphologies can be obtained whose properties may be superior to those of one of the components e. g. high impact resistant plastics. Investigations of multicomponent polymer systems constitute a new branch of macromolecular science which now claims as much interest as the behaviour of dilute solutions, crystallization, statistics of chain~~ tacticity, and single crystal formation did a few years ago. The complexity of the problems related to control led preparation and properties studies of mUlticomponent polymer systems is such that it is often more practicable to conduct them on an international basis. The aim of the first Joint Italian-Polish Seminar on Multicomponent Polymer Systems was to discuss recent results obtained in that field in both countries. As the range of topics to be covered was fairly wide, we thought it advisable to invite scientists from other countries to share with us some aspects of their own studies.

Though children have never been absent from international studies discourse, they are too often reduced to a few simplistic and unidimensional framings. This book seeks to recover children’s agency and to recognise the complex variety of childhoods and the global issues that affect them. Written by an international list of contributors from Europe, Africa, North America and Australasia, chapters present highly nuanced accounts of children and childhoods across global political time and space split into three broad sections: imagined childhoods, governed childhoods and lived childhoods. Through its analysis, the book demonstrates how IR is, somewhat paradoxically, quite deeply invested in a particular rendering of childhood as, primarily, a time of innocence, vulnerability and incapacity.

This is an EXACT reproduction of a book published before 1923. This IS NOT an OCR'd book with strange characters, introduced typographical errors, and jumbled words. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.

This is an EXACT reproduction of a book published before 1923. This IS NOT an OCR'd book with strange characters, introduced typographical errors, and jumbled words. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.

This is an EXACT reproduction of a book published before 1923. This IS NOT an OCR'd book with strange characters, introduced typographical errors, and jumbled words. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.

This is an EXACT reproduction of a book published before 1923. This IS NOT an OCR'd book with strange characters, introduced typographical errors, and jumbled words. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.

This is an EXACT reproduction of a book published before 1923. This IS NOT an OCR'd book with strange characters, introduced typographical errors, and jumbled words. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.