The Evolution Trajectories of Voucher Funds: Towards Western-type Institutional Investors? The Case of the Czech Republic and Bulgaria

The implementation of similar mass privatization programs in the Czech Republic and Bulgaria led to the emergence of hybrid voucher funds. The contradictions stemming from this hybrid nature gave rise to the evolution of the funds' nature and of their place in the national ownership structure. The dynamics of this evolution is apprehended through a comparative study of the portfolios of a sample of funds between 1998 and 2000. We show how the interaction between the strategies of economic actors have shaped two transformation paths of the initial funds: holding companies on one hand and more ordinary collective investment vehicles on the other, the Czech and Bulgarian evolutions being divergent. We also discuss to what a degree these mutations bring these funds closer to Western-type institutional investors, showing that there is some convergence, but also the emergence of original forms.     

Crimes of Color: Risk, Profiling, and the Contemporary Racialization of Social Control

In the United States the phenomenon of racial profiling has emerged as an important and controversial issue within political and criminal justice policy debates. For the most part, these debates have assumed a sort of racism at work in order to explain law enforcement's use of criminal profiles largely determined by racial classifications. Accordingly, many have worked to expose this allegedly racist behavior in the hopes that such exposure will bring an end to the practice. This essay argues that racial profiling is embedded in much larger social developments that must be explored in order to understand the role race now plays in the maintenance of social order in contemporary American society.     

Local Government Support for Women in the Informal Economy in Durban, South Africa

This paper examines the response of the city government of Durban to the growth of the informal economy. It argues that, unlike the national government of South Africa, Durban's government has been creative in designing policies that favor informal economy workers, particularly women. These progressive policies are the result of an innovative local government and, to some extent, an emerging self-employed women worker's union that has been able to exert influence on informal economy policies.