Conflicts between east European states and minorities in an age of democracy

Conflict between dominant and subordinate ethnic groups in eastern Europe has greatly complicated efforts to build stable and just democratic systems in the region. Leaders of new states as well as rulers whose authority extends from the communist era have attempted to create political systems where competition is clearly along ethnic lines. Polarisation and violence have resulted from the manipulation of ethnic feeling, but there are also a range of factors which have encouraged majority and minority representatives to show mutual restraint at crucial moments.

The internationalisation of East European nationality disputes and the gradual acceptance by a number of states of group rights to stand alongside individual ones, have cooled down a number of disputes and possibly forestalled new ones. But the national question will be a troubling one for many still‐fragile democracies unless strong external incentives are offered which encourage states to conciliate internal minorities and estranged neighbours.     

Adolescent Emotional Distress: The Role of Family Obligations and School Connectedness

The current study draws upon ecodevelopmental theory to identify protective and risk factors that may influence emotional distress during adolescence. Hierarchical regression analyses were used to examine the relationship among family obligations, school connectedness and emotional distress of 4,198 (51% female) middle and high school students who were primarily (59%) European American. The overall model explained 21.1% of the variance in student emotional distress. A significant interaction effect was found indicating that school connectedness moderated the relationship between family obligations and emotional distress. Specifically, for students with low to moderate levels of family obligations, a stronger sense of school connectedness was associated with lower emotional distress. The buffering effect of school connectedness was weakened as the level of family obligations increased and completely disappeared for students who experienced high levels of family obligations. The creation of a program that takes a holistic approach, in order to curtail the levels of highly emotionally distressed adolescents, must continue to address the ever changing demands that adolescents encounter and prepare youth to deal with functioning within multiple contexts and do so while maintaining emotional well-being.     

Peasant essentialism and the Agrarian question in the Colombian Andes

Our Daily Bread: The Peasant Question and Family Farming in the Colombian Andes, by Nola Reinhardt. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1988. Pp.xv + 308. US$35.

This review article considers a number of problems which arise from an incorrect theorisation of the agrarian question. Instead of a transformation in which some peasants become small capitalists and others de facto workers, rural change is said to involve an absolute opposition: in economic terms the whole peasantry either dissolves or persists. Since the former is clearly not the case, the continued existence of peasants in Colombia is attributed by the book under review to their economic efficiency. Its essentialist framework therefore conceptualises all peasants as a uniform body of commodity producers, rather than as internally differentiated strata incorporating disparate class elements. In contrast to this neo‐populist approach, it is suggested here that capitalist peasants and de facto proletarians are indeed present — but not recognised as such ‐ in the context studied.     

Patterns of agrarian transformation in Ethiopia: State-mediated commercialisation and the ‘land grab’

Much of the literature on the ‘land grab’ has thus far focused on the international drivers of foreign agricultural investment, with far less attention paid to the roles of developing country states and domestic political economy in changing forms of agrarian production. This paper analyses how global and domestic processes combine to produce patterns of agrarian transformation in Ethiopia, one of the main targets of foreign agricultural investment. The paper presents a typology of changes in land use and examines in detail three case studies of investments in Ethiopia drawn from this typology. The paper concludes that the most dramatic changes are taking place in lowland, peripheral regions where large-scale, capital-intensive farms employing wage labour pose a serious risk to pastoralists whose ‘use’ of land is contested by the state. Although the government has been careful to avoid mass displacement of settled smallholders, there are also important changes taking place in highland areas, with the government encouraging investments that combine the resources of investors with the labour and land of smallholders. These investments have resulted in exposure to new forms of market risk.     

Justice and Effective Cooperation

Justice is important because it facilitates effective cooperation and thereby enables superior forms of social coordination. On the bilateral level people are better able to resolve conflicts if they can refer to shared justice rules. When third parties are needed to facilitate cooperation they can function more effectively when the parties agree that they are exercising their authority through fair procedures;? finally, people are more willing to engage with collectivities when they evaluate them as acting through a shared conception of justice.? Overall justice is central to facilitating cooperation and the key to its success is that there is a consensus about what is just among those involved. This is equally true of the relationship between people who are negotiating about the price of a product or service and people who are members of large-scale communities, organizations, or societies.     

Pakistan's elusive quest for identity: Is it too late?

Pakistan Under Bhutto. Shahid Javed Burki, London: Macmillan. 1980. 245pp. £15.00

Politics in Pakistan: the nature and direction of change. Khalid B Sayeed New York: Praeger. 1980. 194pp. £14.25

Bhutto: trial and execution. Victoria Schofield, London: Cassell. 1980. 250pp. £7.95

Bhutto: a political biography. Salmaan Taseer, London: Ithaca. 1979. 208pp. £9.50. £3.50 pb

Pakistan in Search of Democracy, 1947–77. Hamid Yusuf Lahore: Afrasia. 1980. 189pp. $15.00 (Rs 100)

Pakistan: the enigma of political development. Lawrence Ziring Boulder, Colorado: Dawson Westview. 1980. 294pp. £12.00