April 5, 1996

After several years of throwing open its economy, Mexico has recently tried to shut some doors to American and other foreign investors, contending that national interests come before trade agreements. The latest attempt to restrict investment came this week as Mexican legislators, backed by the nation's strongest labor unions, demanded that foreign companies be prohibited from managing new pension funds that will be established next year as part of sweeping changes in the Mexican social security system.

Companies would have to shed more light on their use of derivatives, the often enigmatic and occasionally risky financial instruments, under a compromise proposal adopted yesterday by the Financial Accounting Standards Board. The board, a private-sector group that sets rules on how companies keep their books, has been wrestling with how to account for derivatives for four years, putting forth various approaches that have all been roundly criticized.

It was, perhaps, the ultimate illustration of style over substance. Just beyond the glitter of the Seventh on Sixth fashion shows in Bryant Park last week, a more mundane operation was trudging ahead, but one likely to affect New York for far longer. As designers and their fast-aging models displayed the pricey wares that will be out of date by next fall, movers were trucking 1.2 million books dealing with business, economics, chemistry, physics and mathematics, plus microfilm and microfiche -- 31 miles of material, if you stacked it up side by side -- from the central research edifice of the New York Public Library at Fifth Avenue and 42d Street to their new home, the Science, Industry and Business Library, at Madison Avenue and 34th Street. There, ostensibly, it will never be beyond the reach of everyday citizens, nor will it go out of style.

The tip came the way the F.B.I. had long expected, from a family member with misgivings. But the search for the man investigators believe is the Unabomber still had months to go before the suspect was arrested on Wednesday, as his deeply torn family struggled with its loyalties and then as an elite team of agents stood vigil for weeks in the Montana snows. And even now the case is far from finished, postal inspectors and other law-enforcement officials said today. With the arrest of Theodore J. Kaczynski in Montana, hundreds of agents, held back in recent weeks for fear of somehow tipping their hand to a fugitive who had eluded them for nearly 18 years, are now fanning out to airports, bus stations, homeless shelters and universities nationwide. They are trying to fill the many blanks in the life of Mr. Kaczynski, a Harvard-educated recluse.

Busy school administrators will have an opportunity to receive a doctorate in two years through a new program at Seton Hall University's College of Education and Human Services, officials have announced. The program is to begin in the spring of 1997. Participants will have to fulfill the same requirements as doctoral candidates in traditional programs, which usually take four or five years, James M. Caulfield, an adjunct professor of education, said this week. A group of 30 students will meet for six weekends each year and for four weeks each July, Mr. Caulfield said.