Ba'labakk See Baalbek
Balaguer \,ba-la-'ger\ (y Ricardo), Joaquin (Vidella) (b. Sept. 1, 1907, Villa Bisono, Dom. Rep.—d. July 14, 2002, Santo Domingo) Presi¬ dent of the Dominican Republic (1960-62, 1966-78, 1986-96). He held numerous government posts during Gen. Rafael Trujillo’s 30-year dicta¬ torship. Balaguer was vice president under Trujillo’s brother Hector and became president when Hector resigned, but Trujillo continued to wield actual power until assassinated in 1961. Balaguer’s subsequent attempts at liberalization caused his overthrow by the military. Elected president in 1966 after the U.S. military intervention in 1965, he achieved steady economic growth and modest social reforms. He was reelected repeat¬ edly, but his last term was shortened by two years amid political violence and charges of electoral fraud and corruption.
Balakirev \bo Ta-kyi-ryif\, Mily (Alekseyevich) (b. Jan. 2, 1837, Nizhny Novgorod, Russia—d. May 29, 1910, St. Petersburg) Russian composer. As a youth he met and was influenced by the nationalist com¬ poser Mikhail Glinka. Balakirev himself later became the mentor of Cesar Cui (1835-1918) and Modest Mussorgsky; in 1861-62 their group expanded to become The Five. In 1862 Balakirev cofounded the Free School of Music. His works include two symphonies, the piano fantasy Islamey (1869), music for King Lear (1858-61), and a piano concerto. With his colourful imagination and use of folk themes, he was perhaps the most influential proponent of Russian nationalism. After a nervous breakdown in 1871, he adopted a fervent and bigoted form of Orthodoxy and was thereafter involved in musical life only sporadically.
Balaklava \b9-l3-'kla-v9\, Battle of (Oct. 25, 1854) Indecisive mili¬ tary engagement of the Crimean War. The Russians sought to capture the Black Sea supply port of Balaklava, which was controlled by the British, French, and Turks. The Russians occupied positions on the heights above a nearby valley. To disrupt the Russian troop movements, Baron Raglan gave an ambiguous order for Lord Cardigan’s Light Brigade to attack. Instead of leading his cavalry against the Russian guns on the heights.
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balalaika ► Balch I 153
Cardigan swept down the valley after the retreating Russian cavalry. The battle ended with the loss of 40% of the Light Brigade and inspired the 1855 poem “Charge of the Light Brigade” by Alfred, Lord Tennyson.
balalaika X.ba-ls-'lI-koV Russian stringed instrument with a triangular body, three strings, and movable frets on its fingerboard. It comes in six sizes, from piccolo to double bass. It developed in the 18th century from the dombra. It has been prima¬ rily a solo folk instrument for accom¬ panying song and dance, but is also played in large balalaika orchestras.
balance Instrument for comparing the weights of two bodies, usually for scientific purposes, to determine the difference in mass. The equal-arm balance dates back to the ancient Egyptians, possibly as early as 5000 bc. By the early 20th century, it had been developed into an exquisitely precise measuring device. Electronic balances today depend on electrical compensation rather than mechani¬ cal deflection. The ultramicrobal¬ ance is any weighing device that serves to determine the weight of even smaller samples than can be weighed with the microbalance (which can weigh samples as small as a few milligrams), that is, total amounts as small as a few micro¬ grams.
balance of payments System¬ atic record of all economic transac¬ tions during a given period between
residents (including the government) of one country and residents (includ¬ ing the governments) of other countries. The transactions are presented in the form of double-entry bookkeeping. The U.S. balance of payments, for example, records the various ways in which dollars are made avail¬ able to foreigners through U.S. imports, U.S. tourist spending abroad, for¬ eign lending, and so on. These expenditures are shown on the debit side of the balance. The credit side shows the various uses to which foreign¬ ers put their dollars, including paying for U.S. exports, servicing debts to the U.S., and the like. Foreign countries may acquire more dollars than they need to spend on U.S. goods and services and may hold the surplus or purchase gold or securities; or they may have fewer dollars than they need to purchase U.S. goods and services, and may acquire additional dollars by transferring gold, selling holdings in the U.S., and so on. Cer¬ tain forms of transferring funds (e.g., large outflows of gold) are less desirable as a way of settling foreign debts than others (e.g., transfers of currency acquired through international trade). The International Mon¬ etary Fund helps address problems relating to balance of payments. See also BALANCE OF TRADE.
Russian tenor balalaika, 20th century; in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City
COURTESY OF THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART, NEW YORK CITY, THE CROSBY BROWN COLLECTION OF MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS, 1889
balance of power In international relations, an equilibrium of power sufficient to discourage or prevent one nation or party from imposing its will on or interfering with the interests of another. The term came into use at the end of the Napoleonic Wars to denote the power relationships in the European state system. Until World War I, Britain played the role of balancer in a number of shifting alliances. After World War II, a North¬ ern Hemisphere balance of power pitted the U.S. and its allies (see NATO) against the Soviet Union and its satellites (see Warsaw Pact) in a bipolar balance of power backed by the threat of nuclear war. China’s defection from the Soviet camp to a nonaligned but covertly anti-Soviet stance pro¬ duced a third node of power. With the Soviet Union’s collapse (1991), the U.S. and its NATO allies were recognized universally as the world’s para¬ mount military power.
balance of trade Difference in value over a period of time between a nation’s imports and exports of goods and services. The balance of trade is part of a larger economic unit, the balance of payments, which includes all economic transactions between residents of one country and those of other countries. If a nation’s exports exceed its imports, the nation has a
favourable balance of trade, or a trade surplus. If imports exceed exports, an unfavourable balance of trade, or a trade deficit, exists. Under mercan¬ tilism a favourable balance of trade was an absolute necessity, but in clas¬ sical economics it was more important for a nation to utilize its economic resources fully than to build a trade surplus. The idea of the undesirabil¬ ity of trade deficits persisted, however, and arguments against deficits are often advanced by advocates of protectionism.
balance sheet Financial statement that describes the resources under a company’s control on a specified date and indicates where they have come from. It consists of three major sections: assets (valuable rights owned by the company), liabilities (funds provided by outside lenders and other creditors), and the owners’ equity. On the balance sheet, total assets must always equal total liabilities plus total owners’ equity.
Balanchine Vba-la^'sheM, George orig. Georgy Melitonovich Balanchivadze (b. Jan. 22, 1904,
St. Petersburg, Russia—d. April 30,
1983, New York, N.Y., U.S.)
Russian-born U.S. choreographer.
After studying at the Imperial Ballet School, he left the Soviet Union in 1925 to join the Ballets Russes, where his choreography of Apollo (1928) exemplified the spare neoclassical style that became his trademark. His work impressed the impresario Lin¬ coln Kirstein, who in 1933 invited “Mr. B.” to form the School of American Ballet and its performing group, the American Ballet. The group became the Metropolitan Opera’s resident company (1935—
38) but disbanded in 1941. In 1946 Kirstein and Balanchine founded the Ballet Society, from which emerged the New York City Ballet in 1948. Bal¬ anchine created more than 150 works for the company, including The Nutcracker (1954), Don Quixote (1965), and Jewels (1967), and he also choreographed musicals and operas. He collaborated closely with the composer Igor Stravinsky, setting more than 30 works to his music. Balanchine’s work remains in the rep¬ ertoires of many companies worldwide, and he is widely considered the greatest choreographer of the 20th century.