Towards a multi‐party Britain?

This article examines the rise of the minor parties since 1973. Some of the causes of this increase were common to all the minor parties in Great Britain, others peculiar to particular parties. The scope for a rise in the support of minor parties is greater than is often supposed but they face special problems in mobilising this potential. Since 1974 their support has fallen, but the nineteen‐eighties are likely to see intermittent increases in their vote; unless there are major institutional changes however, the two party system is likely to survive albeit in a modified form.     

Nation‐building or ethnic fragmentation? Frontier settlement and collective identities in Israel

The paper analyses the evolution of collective identities from a critical geographical perspective, and argues that certain territorial practices associated with nation‐building and state‐building projects may actually sow the seeds of social and ethnic fragmentation. The analysis focuses on the impact of ‘internal frontier’ settlement in settler societies and highlights the key role of space, place and social control policies in the formation of ethnic and social identities. These identities are shown to be shaped, reshaped and reproduced during the processes of settlement, migration, segregation and inter‐group territorial conflict. Within that theoretical framework, the paper explores the case of Israel, and the impact of the settlement and spatial planning in the Galilee region on the formation of regional collective identities. The analysis shows that the process of settling the frontiers has given rise to ethnic, social and institutional fragmentation, particularly between Palestinian‐Arabs, Mizrahi Jews and Ashkenazi Jews. These divisions may— paradoxically—undermine the very nation‐building and state‐building projects that had instigated the settlement of the internal frontier.     

Racial/ethnic differences in housing outcomes for first‐time,low‐income home buyers: Findings from a National homeownership education program

Abstract

Federal housing policies aimed at making homeownership more accessible through education and affordable lending have been successful in raising the homeownership rate among minorities. By marketing homeownership to underserved populations and helping them overcome financial and informational obstacles, such programs might be expected to promote equality in housing outcomes, including housing quality, neighborhood composition, and neighborhood conditions, for minority homeowners.

This article examines the experience of participants in a national home‐ownership education program. While the transition to homeownership has been associated with modest progress, it does not overcome persistent disparities in housing quality. Homeownership appears to lead to poorer neighborhood conditions for all lower‐income buyers—not just minorities—and may be exacerbating social and spatial isolation rather than helping to overcome it. Differences in neighborhood outcomes, however, may be due to locational preference rather than discrimination in housing and mortgage markets.     

Regionalism in the Asia‐Pacific — a response to Kanishka Jayasuriya

This paper is a response to the debate generated in the special issue of The Pacific Review on ‘Ideas, policy networks and international policy coordination in the Asia‐Pacific’. It suggests that an understanding of the discourses and practices of regionalism in the Asia‐Pacific has to be based on a broader account of societal discourses and a sharper delineation of the policy process specific to the region.     

Inconsistent effects of a feature on home prices—lang's two‐market explanation

Abstract

In his 2005 article “Valuing the Suburbs: Why Some ‘Improvements’ Lower Home Prices,” Robert E. Lang proposes an explanation of why improvements to a home may either add to or detract from its value. He suggests a dual housing market: “one for conventional low‐density suburbs, and one for cities and denser suburbs” (8). The former values features implying a natural or less intense use, and the latter values features adding “intensity or utility to a property” (8).

This article reinterprets Lang's explanation as an example of interaction (something having a different effect under one condition than it does under another) arising via summation followed by a nonlinear function of the result. An alternative explanation in terms of the fit between characteristics of a home and its location is also noted.     

If low‐income blacks are given a chance to live in white neighborhoods,will they stay? Examining mobility patterns in a quasi‐experimental program with administrative data

Abstract

After describing the distinctive features of various policy models of residential mobility, we examine the long‐term outcomes of the Gautreaux program. Administrative records provide baseline characteristics for all participants, and we located recent addresses for over 99 percent of a random sample of 1,506 participants an average of 14 years after original placement.

Although 84 percent of the families made subsequent moves, the racial composition of the current address is strongly related to program placement, even among movers, and after family attributes and premove neighborhood characteristics are controlled. Combined with our prior findings, these results suggest that residential mobility has an enduring, long‐term impact on the residential locations of these families. Contrary to models that assume that families’ enduring preferences will quickly erase these moves, these results suggest the need for further research to consider whether mobility alters preferences or structural barriers.     

Comment on Chester Hartman's “The case for a right to housing”: The right to “poverty with a roof"—a response to hartman

Abstract

While the goal of establishing a right to decent, affordable housing is noble, a right to housing alone ignores the variety of underlying processes that concentrate certain types of households in conditions of poverty. A right that simply makes surviving poverty marginally more bearable is a troubling notion. That approach to problem solving addresses the symptom and not the cause. Rather, government should focus on enforcing existing individual rights and creating opportunities where possible and feasible so as to aid every American to achieve his or her full productive potential as a human being.     

China’s evolution toward an authoritarian market economy—a?predator–prey evolutionary model with?intelligent design

The following study, integrating public choice theory and evolutionary game theory, develops a predator–prey model with intelligent design to explain the “evolutionary-institutional perspective” that is a well-accepted premise in transitional economics. In the model, growth-oriented central government leaders are intelligent designers of institutional change, provincial and local officials are potential predators, and private firms are potential prey. The model finds that reductions in discriminatory policies are the major institutional contributors to China’s market miracle, whereas improvements in the rule of law and in the protection of private property rights are not needed for short-run economic growth.     

“My forest, my kingdom”—Self-referentiality as a strategy in the case of small forest owners coping with government regulations

Social research that informs the implementation of natural resource policies is frequently driven by the logic of the policy system itself. A prevailing concern with achieving policy outcomes can lead, however, to lack of attention to equally important aspects, for example the challenges the policy instruments present to those they are targeting and the consequences this might have for government–citizen relationships. To help guide research into these issues we have developed a situational–interactional approach to interpretive policy analysis that seeks to examine the processes involved when people collectively make sense of government instruments. The theoretical basis is provided to a large extent by Luhmann’s theory of self-referential social systems. In addition, we operationalise the concepts of interactional framing and resemiotisation to capture the active work of the citizens in sense-making processes. We then apply our situational–interactional analysis to small-scale forest ownership in Flanders. Analysis of data from focus groups with forest owners reveals how interactions build on each other in the co-development of particular strategies to cope with government intervention. Finally, we discuss two future directions for research. First, the forest owners find themselves in an inescapable relationship with the government, and feel their autonomy is threatened. Government intervention, therefore, will almost necessarily lead to resistance. Second, forest groups enhance compatibility between the government system and the forest owners, but rather than narrowing the gap between the two worlds they tend to emphasise it.