The political economy of Southeast Asia's techno-glocalism

Asian economies' prospects for upward mobility within the global division of labour hinge significantly on the degree to which transnational corporations' (TNCs) global production networks (GPNs) accommodate or hinder their efforts to shift from simple production into more remunerative roles. A growing literature notes the rise in various countries of a ‘neo-techno-nationalism’ that aims to bolster local innovation and challenge TNCs' technologically derived leverage over the distribution of roles and rewards within GPNs. Industrial and technological policies in Southeast Asia, however, reflect a quite different ‘techno-glocalist’ strategy. Such strategies are based on a ‘governance bargain’ in which host governments, in exchange for technological upgrading, facilitate TNCs' exercise of governance authority transnationally as well as in coordinating local investments in innovation and other cluster-building activities. They highlight a conceptual distinction between the degree of internalization and hierarchy within networks that is typically elided in theories of GPN governance.     

The Circulation of Secularism

Inquiring into the causes behind the spread of secularism in the modern world, this paper proposes that the concept has proliferated owing to its peculiar property as culture: It is simultaneously a piece of culture and also a reflection upon culture. In its latter capacity, it imagines a world in which alternative religious belief systems divide people. It spreads as a piece of culture because it enables sharing and, hence, community, across the cultural boundaries erected by religious belief. For this reason, some governments have embraced the concept and incorporated it into official state discourse. Other governments, in turn, have copied the language of secularism not for its intended meaning but for pragmatic purposes—namely, to proclaim a position within the community of modern nations. State discourse, however, irrespective of the reasons for which it was adopted, affects how ordinary people reason about religion. Reasoning from the possibility of alternative religions opens a space for unbelief. Through an analysis of constitutional language, census data, and interviews, the paper concludes that secularism has more to do with the circulation of discourse and the reasons behind it, than with an immanent versus transcendent solution to the puzzle of existence—the transcendent solution being the foundation for the circulation of religious belief itself.     

Fatal postpartum spontaneous liver rupture: case report and literature review

Maternal hepatic rupture is a rare complication of pregnancy that can be fatal to both mother and child. This phenomenon is most often associated with preeclampsia/eclampsia and/or HELLP syndrome, which is defined by a collection of clinical features including hemolysis (H), elevated liver enzymes (EL), and a low platelet count (LP). These disease processes are typically identified and treated during pregnancy, often in the last trimester. The described case is unusual in that the decedent had no known history of preeclampsia/eclampsia or HELLP syndrome during this pregnancy, and she died suddenly several days postpartum of liver rupture with massive intraperitoneal hemorrhage following a routine cesarean section delivery and an uneventful hospital course. Similar cases are infrequent in the literature, which is reviewed in this report.     

Incumbent Vulnerability and Challenger Emergence in Senate Elections

We examine challenger emergence in Senate elections by looking at the 1992 campaign in depth. We develop unproved measures of incumbent: vulnerability using data from the 1988 and 1990 NES Senate Election Studies. These measures are used to test the hypothesis that higher-quality challengers are more likely to challenge vulnerable incumbents. We find generally weak relationships between our incumbent vulnerability measures and challenger quality. Instead, challenger quality scores increase with the size of the pool of potential high-quality challengers.     

The Big End of Town Meets the Local Council: The Investment Habitus of Four Sets of Australian Councils during the GFC

The Global Financial Crisis of 2008 led to a substantial write‐down in the value of investments such as collateralised debt obligations (CDOs) with one class of investors being NSW Local councils.  This article analyses interviews with four different investor types (or sets) of local councils, each of which took a substantially different approach to CDO investment. This categorisation into sets was based on interviews of 28 individuals working within 14 local councils as well as commentaries on legal cases involving a class action of local councils suing Lehman Brothers Australia as well as Grange Securities over losses in their investments. This article adopts Bourdieu's Theory of Practice to describe and explain behaviour regarding decisions to invest (or not) in CDOs. Interesting themes arise regarding differing views on the appropriate role of local councils, and on the degree and form of ‘capital’ (which includes knowledge, competencies, skills, and economic resources) that a council should have before investing in sophisticated financial products. This article explores the role that field, habitus, and capital played in moderating and influencing council investment making decisions. The analysis shows that these Bourdieuian concepts can be utilised to help explain individual behaviour. This case study shows that excessive capital left in the hands of individuals may result in suboptimal decision making. Local councils may need to consider ways of implementing policies and procedures that can be used to moderate individual action.     

Highway Robbery: Testing the Impact of Interstate Highways on Robbery

Research has shown that the occurrence of crime is based on multiple factors including a variety of geographical characteristics. Previous researchers have suggested that the environmental feature of the interstate system has an influence on crime. For this study, we test for a relationship between interstate presence and robbery at the county-level in Georgia. Additionally, we test whether or not urban/rural differences affect this relationship. Findings are consistent with previous research showing that the number of interstate exits in a county significantly increases crime; in this case the robbery rate.