Moving out of poverty: Expanding mobility and choice through tenant‐based housing assistance

Abstract

Historically, federal housing policy has contributed to the concentration of poverty in urban America. Moving out of poverty is not the right answer for every low‐income family, but tenant‐based housing assistance (Section 8 certificates and vouchers) has tremendous potential to help families move to healthier neighborhoods. This article explores the role of tenant‐based housing assistance in addressing the problem of concentrated inner‐city poverty.

The Section 8 program by itself does not ensure access to low‐poverty neighborhoods, particularly for minority families. Supplementing certificates and vouchers with housing counseling and search assistance can improve their performance; a growing number of assisted housing mobility initiatives are now in place across the country. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) should continue to fund these initiatives and increase their number over time. HUD should also strengthen incentives for all housing authorities to improve locational outcomes in their Section 8 programs.     

Microenterprise development and the entreprenurial poor: including the excluded?

Microenterprise develpment has received much attention as being a participatory strategy that can potentially alleviate poverty by including the excluded in the process of development. But recent controversies regarding the purposes, processes and profitability of alternative microenterprise development techniques suggest that participation means different things to different people. A review of three types of microenterprise development institutions suggests that while some programme policies discourage participation, others encourage ‘inclusion’ only in token. Only a few programmes support genuine participation of the entreprenurial poor. Key policy issues related to the participatory principles, benefits and costs of microenterprise development are discussed. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Governance within public–private partnerships and the politics of urban development

Public-private partnerships are the preferred vehicles for the planning, financing and implementation of contemporary urban development. Scholarship on public-private partnerships tends to examine their activities in advancing development. Less attention is accorded to their internal dynamics or governance. While partnerships are intended to build internal consensus and obtain consent in order to carry out urban development, this premise assumes that coordinated public and private interests are in play. This paper examines the internal governance of two public-private partnerships in Rochester, New along three dimensions: conformity to a collective purpose or vision, leadership structure and organizational style.     

Is trust the missing root of institutions, education, and development?

We report evidence that trust is the missing root relating education, institutions, and economic development. We observe that more trust both increases education and improves legal and bureaucratic institutions, which in turn spurs economic development. We substantiate this intuition with a series of regressions that provide evidence that trust determines both education and the quality of institutions, and that education and institutions in turn affect GDP per capita.     

Perils of development funding? The tale of EU Funds and grand corruption in Central and Eastern Europe

Given the unprecedented scale of intergovernmental development funding and the importance of institutional quality for human well‐being, it is imperative to precisely understand the impact of development funds on corruption. In Europe, European Union (EU) Funds provide a boost to public spending in recipient member states while introducing additional corruption controls. We investigate whether EU Funds increase high‐level corruption in the Czech Republic and Hungary in 2009–2012. We analyze newly collected data from over 100,000 public procurement contracts to develop objective corruption risk indicators and link them to agency level data in the public sector. Propensity score matching estimations suggest that EU funds increase corruption risk by up to 34 percent. The negative effects are largely attributable to overly formalistic compliance and EU Funds overriding domestic accountability mechanisms in public organizations entirely dependent on external funds. The policy implications are profound: governments should reduce barriers to market entry by lowering red tape and prevent excessive concentration of funds.     

Spanish NGOs’ discourses and practices in migration and development: A critical discussion from a global perspective

ABSTRACT

The concept of migration and development (M&D) and practices in that area have lain on many countries’ political agendas for decades, with no clear focus or coherent strategy knitting together the various stakeholders working in the sphere. This article analyzes the main conceptions of M&D in the discourses and practices of Spanish NGOs and compares them with the focuses that have arisen in the academic sphere, for a look into primarily five issues: whether NGOs have their own focus on the migration-development nexus or are swayed by public institutions’ guidelines; whether NGOs steer their actions more toward preventing and restricting migration or toward promoting development; whether NGOs also consider potential effects on development in receiving countries; whether NGOs entertain the idea of participatory actions where immigrant persons hold centre stage; and whether NGOs fulfil their civic and political function as a propounding force to contribute to democratic governance in migration matters.     

Income inequality,development and electoral turnout – New evidence on a burgeoning debate

In this article, we comprehensively analyze the macro-level link between income inequality and electoral turnout. First, we re-examine prior studies which affirm that higher inequality puts a drain on electoral turnout in wealthy industrialized Western countries. Second, we evaluate whether there is an association between the two concepts in a larger, more representative sample of democratic elections around the world. Third, we analyze if income inequality has a different influence on participation in the Western and non-Western countries. Controlling for nine theoretically informed covariates, we assess these claims in a multilevel framework with evidence from more than 550 democratic elections between 1970 and 2010. We find little evidence that electoral turnout is affected by income inequality. Our results also indicate that this “null” effect does not differ between the Western- and the non-Western world. However, we do find evidence that mandatory voting laws and more decisive elections boost turnout considerably.     

Comment on William M. Rohe and Rachel G. Bratt's “failures,downsizings, and mergers among community development corporations”: Defending community development corporations or defending communities?

Abstract

An overemphasis on preserving community development corporations (CDCs) may confuse the ends with the means. The end is empowered, self‐sustaining communities of place and identity. CDCs are one means of trying to get there, and there are many communities in which CDCs are helpful, and, indeed, empowering. However, the trends we are seeing—failures, downsizings, and mergers—may tell us that it is time to look for alternatives to CDCs.

If we truly care about poor communities, those of us with the resources to find the best community development models should be searching for them. We do not have good data to show whether community organizing is a better strategy than CDCs for achieving community development, but it is a strategy that merits exploration.     

Utilizing Ostrom’s institutional analysis and development framework toward an understanding of crisis-driven policy

Policy Sciences - This paper examines the institutional dynamics of policymaking in a crisis. Crises have been termed a “perceptual category,” events that at least seem to be...     

Dispersion versus decentralization: British location of industry policies and regional development 1945–60

The 1945 Labour government launched two major location of industry intiatives-Development Area plicy, to maintain full employment in Britain's formerly depressed areas, and the decentralization of London's population and industry, partly via the development of eight London New Towns. Conflict between these policies was inevitable. Despite initial safeguards, the Conservative administrations of the 1950s allowed the industrial needs of the London New Towns to take precedence over those of the Development Areas. Furthermore, while the growth-orientated development objectives and strategy of the London New Towns produced a capital-intensive, mutually reinforcing industrial base of high-tech firms, Development Area policy emphasized short-term employment creation, encouraging the growth of low-wage, labour-intensive ‘overspill’ production. These differences in policy objectives and strategy had important consequences for the relative long-term success of the two initiatives.     

Are they really so different? Climate change rule development in the USA and UK

Climate change is an increasingly complex and global environmental issue. As a result, scholars have begun to compare the efforts of specific countries such as the UK and the USA in dealing with climate change. However, missing within this comparative literature is a discussion of the important role that administrative agencies play in implementing climate change policy through rulemaking. More specifically, it is unclear how administrative processes may impact or explain variations in the policy implemented within a given country. In fact, it has been over 25 years since Vogel's work compared the regulatory processes of the USA and UK. As a result, this paper's interviews with agency rule writers in both countries provide an updated comparison of their rulemaking processes, which is essential to understanding why countries may vary in the climate change policy they implement. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Irresolvable cultural conflicts and conservation/development arguments: Analysis of Korea’s Saemangeum project

This paper examines, through argument analysis & grid-group model, how cultural bias, as the frame of reference of an advocacy coalition (AC), brings about irresolvable conflicts and produces divided arguments between coalitions for development and conservation in Koreas Saemangeum project. Based on different cultural biases, two ACs – the advocacy coalition for development (ACD) and the advocacy coalition for conservation (ACC) – interpreted the same facts differently in line with their cultural orientations and ways of life. The dynamic argument patterns reflected each coalitions cultural bias, which restricted the frame of reference of actors in each AC. After reviewing argument analysis as an analytic tool, we introduce cultural theoryin which ways of life, consisting of cultural biases and social relations, amplify the irresolvable conflicts between two ACs. Second, to show the culturally constructed nature of the conflicts, we analyze the contrasting arguments between the ACD (dominated by a hierarchy bias) and ACC (led by egalitarianism) in the Saemangeum project. Third, we discuss the implications of Mary Douglas and Aaron Wildavskys cultural theoryto advocacy coalition framework (ACF) as follows: 1) constraining effects on inter-coalitional learning by cultural biases, 2) coexistence of different solidarities under a coalition, and 3) asymmetric relationships between parties in a coalition.     

What about the politics? Sustainable development,transition management,and long term energy transitions

This article is concerned with governance of long term socio-technical transitions required to orient development trajectories of advanced industrial counties along more sustainable lines. It discusses the contribution that ‘transition management’ can make to such processes, emphasizes the irreducibly political character of governance for sustainable development, and suggests that the long-term transformation of energy systems will prove to be a messy, conflictual, and highly disjointed process.     

Comment on David Listokin,Barbara Listokin,and Michael Lahr's “The contributions of historic preservation to housing and economic development”

Abstract

Listokin, Listokin, and Lahr laud the economic benefits of historic preservation but fail to delve deeply enough into the negative impacts and how they might be mitigated. Preservation projects tend to displace lower‐income households and small businesses, and the jobs they generate tend to be low paying. In areas with high potential for displacement, local government and civic leaders should act cautiously and not intervene in ways that overheat these markets. We are unlikely to see new federal policies that substantially mitigate displacement. Nonetheless, the historic rehabilitation tax credit could be revised to encourage more modest and affordable preservation projects.

The extra costs associated with historic rehabilitation standards can be more burdensome than the authors describe. To reduce these costs, the administration of the Secretary of the Interior's Standards for Rehabilitation could be made more consistent and cost‐sensitive.     

Political freedom, economic freedom, and income convergence: Do stages of economic development matter?

In the literature, theory and empirical evidence on the nexus of political freedom, economic freedom, and economic growth are mixed. In this paper, we test the hypothesis that the effect of political freedom on promoting economic growth is realized and detectable at later stages of social and economic development. Using panel data for a sample of 104 countries between 1970 and 2003, we find strong support for our hypothesis. While economic freedom has greater effects on income convergence in the OECD countries, political freedom clearly promotes the convergence among those OECD countries.     

Analysing decentralised natural resource governance: proposition for a “politicised” institutional analysis and development framework

There has often been a gap between policy intentions and outcomes in the field of natural resource governance. Analysing the factors for these discrepancies requires multi-level approaches that relate policy decisions formulated at the national and international level with the decisions of local resource users. A key asset of the Institutional Analysis and Development framework is precisely its ability to link multiple governance levels. Yet most commons literature has been limited to the study of collective action among local communities without considering higher institutional and government levels. To overcome this limitation, I posit for a methodological development of the framework, which bridges the gap between institutional analysis, power-centred and historical approaches, and discourse analysis. The application of the extended framework to the study of state afforestation policies in Vietnam highlights the need to simultaneously consider institutions, the politico-economic context and discourses across governance and government levels. As illustrated in this paper, such a framework does not only facilitate the analysis of policy shortcomings but also supports the design and dissemination of policy recommendations.     

Facts versus fiction: Socio‐political and economic development of Burma under military management since 1988

The Burmese military under the command of General Saw Maung staged a coup in the name of saving the country by killing thousands of unarmed demonstrators on 18 September 1988. After forming a nineteen‐man military junta which was named the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC), Burmese generals vowed to manage the country to accomplish three tasks: the restoration of law and order, the provision of safe and secure transportation, the fulfilment of the socio‐economic needs of the people. The article examines and evaluates the accomplishment of SLORC in attending to these three tasks based upon the reports given by the military regimes and its lobbyists and by the people and outside observers of Burma. The basic conclusion of the article is that there is a tremendous gap between the fictional official reports and the factual reports given by the people on the improvements in the socio‐political and economic conditions in Burma under the military management since 1988.     

International development institutions and national ­economic contexts: neo-liberalism encounters India’s indigenous political traditions

Drawing on the case of India, which since 1991 has been undergoing a far-reaching programme of market-oriented reform, this paper argues that the World Bank and other transnational development actors have been unable to adjust themselves ­sufficiently to indigenous ideological traditions that affect the sustainability of economic liberalization. While markets are becoming increasingly embedded at the level of institutions, they are not achieving what might be termed ‘ideological embeddedness’. The paper maps the ideological context facing market reformers in India by looking at the relationship between, on the one hand, the idea of swadeshi (an indigenous form of economic nationalism), and on the other, three competing forces in Indian politics. The paper concludes by arguing that it is the mutual antipathy among these political forces, rather than any fundamental incompatibility between swadeshi’s precepts and the embedded-market framework, that prevents organizations like the World Bank from adapting swadeshi as an indigenous basis for framing its approach to market embeddedness.     

Gendering the ‘responsible risk taker’: citizenship relationships with gender-neutral social assistance policy

This paper explores the gendered relationships among reforms to social assistance policy, concurrent transformations in citizenship rights to benefits, and low-income parents' experiences of these changes in the Canadian provinces of British Columbia, Alberta, and Saskatchewan. Policy discourse in all three provinces increasingly constructs mothers and fathers as ‘responsible risk takers’ who are entitled to income support conditional on their employability efforts (for example, attendance in welfare-to-work programmes) or market citizenship. Qualitative interviews with 41 mothers and five fathers illustrate how this ‘gender-neutral worker-citizen’ model can be gendered in application and is contradicted by parents' gendered identities and everyday realities when living on social assistance. Using the theoretical perspective of gender as a social structure, the paper draws upon these findings to provide empirical support for a dominant theoretical argument in feminist scholarship – that gender-neutral policy is gendered and has deeply gendered consequences.