The Gambling Act 2005: Regulatory Containment and Market Control

The Act marks a fundamental shift from legislative to market control of gambling. While plans for Las Vegas style casinos and internet gambling sites in Britain have suffered setbacks, restrictions on the availability, advertising and stimulation of demand for gambling, enshrined in the Gaming Act 1968, have been abandoned. In their place, a new regulatory body, the Gambling Commission, has been established to take primary responsibility for ensuring that three licensing objectives are promoted. These objectives are the prevention of crime and disorder, the conduct of gambling in a fair and open way and the protection of children and the vulnerable. The Commission has been given strong and wide ranging powers to regulate gambling, but can the safeguards proposed meet the challenge presented by a gambling industry released from restraints?     

Sanctioned violence: development and the persecution of women as witches in south Bihar

In South Bihar, India, socially sanctioned witch-hunting and persecution led to the deaths of 15 women in 1994 and 24 women and children in 1994. This article presents case studies to suggest that the underlying causes of this behavior are not superstition and illiteracy but are efforts to maintain women's inferior status by enforcing female economic subjugation, sexual exploitation, and the persecution of widows and independent, vocal women. In these cases, superstitious beliefs were exploited by community members with ulterior motives who compensated village witch doctors for collaborating with any accusation made against a local woman. After an introduction and presentation of the issues, the article describes the social and economic context and presents four case studies of women accused of witchcraft. The women involved were either forced to consume human excreta and then banished; raped and left for dead when five other family members were murdered, including a year-old baby; or protected through the intervention of a nongovernmental organization or a district welfare officer. The article then discusses the implications of this phenomenon for development work through a look at the power of social sanction, the role of witch doctors, the gender dimension, the power of the village headmen and the traditional administration system, and the larger motives behind the behavior. The article ends by suggesting interventions such as focusing on eliminating atrocities towards women, forming support groups, sensitizing officials, incorporating gender sensitivity in development efforts, and increasing access to health and education.     

Le ministère de l'Education du Québec et la gestion de l'enseignement supérieur

Sommaire. Dans cet article portant sur la gestion de l'enseignement supérieur, au Québec, l'auteur fait porter l'essentiel de son analyse sur le rôle du ministère de l'Education comme principal gestionnaire du système universitaire québécois. Dans une première partie, il situe le ministère dans l'ensemble de ce système et décrit globalement le type de relations qui existent entre les divers agents ou intervenants en matière de planification et de gestion. L'accent y est mis, en particulier, sur la planification des ← missions → universitaires et sur le contrôle exercé par le ministère dans le cadre de la gestion de celles-ci. S'inspirant, dans une seconde section, d'une certaine typologie des contrôles, l'auteur tente d'en préciser la nature et d'en mesurer l'étendue dans un contexte où les établissements universitaires jouissent d'une large autonomie de gestion. Enfin, dans une troisième partie, plusieurs interrogations sont soulevées par auteur notamment à propos de l'efficacité des contrôles exerés par le ministère et des effets de ceux-ci sur le fonctionnement du système et son environnement. La démarche retenue par l'auteur amène le dernier, à faire quelques suggestions en matière de planification, budgétisation et contrôle de l'enseignement supérieur québécois. Présenté, pour la première fois, à la Commission d'etude sur les universités, en 1978, cet article a, par la suite, fait l'objet de modifications importantes, notamment au chapitre de l'évaluation de l'efficacité des contrôles exerés parle ministère de l'Education. Abstract. In this article on the management of higher education in Quebec, the author concentrates his analysis on the role of the Ministry of Education as principal administrator of Quebec's university system. He first establishes the ministry's place within the system and broadly describes the relationships between the various agents or interveners in the field of planning and management. Particular emphasis is given to the planning of university ‘missions’ and the extent of ministerial control over their management. In a second section, the author, on the basis of a certain typology of controls, seeks to define their nature and measure their extent in a context within which universities enjoy considerable administrative autonomy. Finally, the author poses a number of questions as to the effectiveness of the controls exercised by the ministry and their effect on the system's functioning and its environment. The method chosen by the author leads him to make a number of suggestions at the levels of planning, budgeting and control of higher education in Quebec. Submitted to the Commission d'étude sur les universités for the first time in 1978, this article has undergone major modifications, particularly in the section dealing with the effectiveness of the controls exercised by the Ministry of Education.     

Links with the past: mainland China's online literary communities and their antecedents

This article compares Chinese literary journals from the early twentieth century with a Mainland Chinese literary website from the early twenty-first century. In both these periods, literary practice underwent significant changes as a result of major changes in the technological processes involved in the production and distribution of texts. Five aspects of these changes are examined: the mixed media environment, the provision of information about authors' identities, engagement with social issues, community building, and the relationship with serious literature. The article argues that a very traditional Chinese view of literature as a socially embedded act of communication continued to play a significant role in both periods, and was even further enhanced through interaction with the new technologies. Despite the fact that both types of publication appeal(ed) to large readerships, it is argued that it is not helpful simply to consider them as ‘popular literature’. Both the journals from 100 years ago and the website of today represent literary communities that share a serious view of literature, albeit one that is not compatible with the familiar New Literature paradigm.     

Noam Chomsky,neoliberalism, and the new war on Iraq

This article was originally presented as an address on May 31, 2003, when Ms. Roy received the 2003 Noam Chomsky Award at the annual conference of the Justice Studies Association in Albany, New York.     

Natural Resource Production and the Risk of Conflict Recurrence

Do different types of natural resources have varying impacts on the risk of conflict recurrence? Using a classification of high-value natural resources according to their lootability and obstructability, this article develops a framework bridging research on natural resources and conflict recurrence. I find evidence for the destabilizing character of easily lootable resources that is coherent across different conflict data. Non-lootable resources show little robust effects at first sight; but when introducing a measure of obstructability, the analysis uncovers varying effects of obstructable and non-obstructable resources that interact with the mode of conflict termination. Overall, the results underline the importance of attending to the lootability and obstructability dimension of natural resources when researching post-conflict risks in resource endowed states.     

Flemish immigration in wallonia and in france:

Flemish emigration during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries is too complex to be dealt with definitively in a single article. Our main objective is to provide an overview of the migration towards France and Wallonia by looking at its chronology, and the spatial distribution of emigrants and their descendants. In this effort, patronym distribution is very helpful. As markers of migratory movements, patronyms from a collection of nominative lists give us a handle on migration flows as no other evidence can. Comparing France and Wallonia, the two destination areas, it is possible to see similarities between types of migrants: workers in heavy industry, workers in the agricultural sector, and workers engaged in domestic services. In addition, three phases may be identified in the arrival of a Flemish population in France and Wallonia: an emigration phase, an integration phase, and a redistribution phase. The last phase is also part of the urbanization process and is linked with upward social mobility.