The changing geography of metropolitan opportunity: The segregation of the poor in U.S. metropolitan areas, 1970 to 1990

Abstract

This analysis uses census tract data to measure the segregation of the poor in U.S. metropolitan areas in 1970, 1980, and 1990. Two measures of segregation are used: the indices of dissimilarity and isolation.

In 1990 the mean dissimilarity of the poor in the 100 largest U.S. metropolitan areas was 36.1, which is substantial but below the 60.6 dissimilarity of blacks. The 1990 isolation of the poor was 21.0. From 1970 to 1990, the dissimilarity of the poor increased by 11 percent, and the isolation of the poor rose by 9 percent; in contrast, racial segregation declined. Exploratory regression analyses reveal that income segregation in metropolitan areas was significantly greater in 1990 and increased more from 1970 to 1990 in the Northeast than in the South and West. Midwest areas generally were not significantly different from Northeast areas in 1990 segregation levels or in changes from 1970 to 1990.     

Economic shifts and the changing homeownership trajectory

Abstract

From 1980 to 1988, homeownership rates declined substantially for the first time in the postwar era. They stabilized and began to creep upward during the 1988–94 period. After presenting a long‐term perspective, this article describes and examines two of the underlying forces of this upswing—demographic aging and improved levels of affordability—as well as the impact of immigration and minority lags. Fundamental economic factors are then surveyed: national and regional housing price shifts, housing production cycles, measures of housing affordability, and employment. Several key economic parameters of the post‐recession housing market are presented as a guide to the short‐term future.

Post‐1988 homeownership rates initially rose because of an aging demography. But gradually, the new affordability became part of the dynamic. The new affordability was driven by the decade‐long slowdown and weakening of housing prices, lower post‐recession interest rates, and accelerated job creation following the period of “jobless” economic growth.     

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.     

N Generations of Reform in UK Local Government: Compliance and Resistance to Institutional Pressures

ABSTRACT

The UK government under the Thatcher administration was one of the first to launch NPM-type reforms. Since then, several generations of reform initiatives can be identified in the UK—including the “quality” initiative under Major, the Blair administration's early emphasis on “Best Value,” followed by its emphasis on targets and inspection, and its recent reconversion to public governance concerns. The UK, then, represents an interesting test case for studying how several generations of reforms co-exist and inter-relate. This article examines the imprint of past reforms in the current drive towards contestability and choice in local government modernization. It argues that coercive isomorphism has been evident in local government but that resistance has been successfully mounted against each generation of reforms, that these resistance efforts have themselves displayed isomorphic tendencies but that, nevertheless, a gradual move towards a mixed economy of provision has emerged in many local authorities.     

A Networked Space of Meaning? Spatial Politics as Geostrategies of European Integration

The European Union is an example of regionalisation characterised not only by economic integration, but also by a 'spatial politics' aimed at instilling a sense of European identity and citizenship. Spatial politics are discussed here in terms of governance, regional policies and the production of geographical knowledge that reinforce the notion of a diverse but interdependent European space and, hence, political community. The paper examines recent planning concepts and regional development initiatives and their socio-political qualities and, in particular, their contested nature. Critical questions are raised, for example, regarding European spatial planning, its openness to different spatial development options and its apparent domination by 'core' Europe. The author suggests that European spatial politics can potentially contribute to a more cohesive political community, but that this is contingent upon the translation of symbolism into concrete incentives and opportunity structures that promote wider Europeanisation. This also requires forceful institutions, integrating symbolism and clear and effective forms of governance that allow regional diversity to find appropriate political expression.     

Two ways of realizing justice and democracy: linking Amartya Sen and Elinor Ostrom

In The Idea of Justice (2009), Amartya Sen advocates democracy defined as ‘public reasoning’ and ‘government by discussion’. Sen’s discursive approach facilitates the exercise of political freedom and development of one’s public capacities, and enables victims of injustice to give public voice and discussion to specific injustice. It also responds to the contested nature of ‘universal human rights’ and the need to clarify and defend them via public reasoning. However, Sen’s approach leaves intact the hegemony of a liberal form of democracy that prioritizes political and civil rights over social and economic rights and thus precludes alternative democratic forms, most notably a form of cooperative democracy that politicizes social and economic activities in the pursuit of local and global justice. Sen’s ‘government by discussion’ must combine with cooperative democracy and a global ethos emphasizing cooperation (and action) over privatization in order to address our most serious global injustices, including exploitation, inequality and poverty in the Global South, accelerating destruction of the environment and biodiversity, and global warming and climate change.     

Statement of General James E. Cartwright,USMC Commander United States Strategic Command Before The Strategic Forces Subcommittee On Space Policy March 16, 2005

ABSTRACT

The following is the prepared testimony of General James E. Cartwright, U.S. Marine Corps, Command of United States Strategic Command, presented to the Strategic Forces Subcommittee of the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee on 16 March 2005. The prepared testimony can also be found at http://armed-services.senate.gov/statement/2005/March/Cartwright%2003-16-05.pdf     

The Feminisation of Agriculture with Chinese Characteristics

The objectives of this article are to assess whether or not the feminisation of agriculture is occurring in China, and if so, to measure its impact on productivity. To meet these objectives, we rely on three data sets that allow us to explore who works on China's farms and the effects of the labour allocation decisions of rural households on productivity. We find that since the late 1990s, the role of women has increased in both the supply of farm labour and in the duties that they take on in the management of farms. While this expansion is important, we further demonstrate that when women do a majority of farm work or manage the farm, their farms are equally efficient as farms managed by men.     

Online Opposition in Singapore: Communications Outreach Without Electoral Gain

While “new media” have substantially altered the landscape for information dissemination and social mobilisation, these media are neither all alike in their ideological leanings or intentions, nor independently capable of identity transformation and mobilisation. The paper explores these new media in the context of Malaysia since the late 1990s. It differentiates among news sites and organisational websites, which transmit (often previously proscribed) information to domestic and foreign audiences, with potentially significant effects on “civicness” and mobilisation; blogs, which tend to be primarily personalised, monological and often unfiltered; and social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter, which have eroded the anonymity of online interaction but represent the apex of self-selected communities. “Old media” still populate this landscape as well, from newspapers and other media sources, to public lectures, to leaflets and other ad hoc publications. Even apart from common caveats as to who has access, criteria for evaluation of these new and old media as tools for political change must vary, including differing degrees of information-provision and edification, interest articulation and aggregation, and transformation of collective identities so as to enable new patterns of mobilisation for collective action.