POLICY MODELING TO SUPPORT ADMINISTRATIVE DECISIONMAKING ON THE NEW YORK STATE HIV TESTING LAW

A recent New York law requires medical providers to offer HIV tests as part of routine care. We developed a system dynamics simulation model of the HIV testing and care system to help administrators understand the law's potential epidemic impact, resource needs, strategies to improve implementation, and appropriate outcome indicators for future policy evaluations once postlaw data become available. Policy modeling allowed us to synthesize information from numerous sources including quantitative administrative data sets and practitioners’ content expertise, structure the information to be viewed both numerically and visually, and organize consensus for decisionmaking purposes. This case illustrates how policy modeling can provide an integrated framework for administrators to examine policy problems in complex systems, particularly when data time lags limit pre–post comparisons and key outcomes cannot be measured directly.     

Homeownership affordability series Clashing demographics: Homeownership and affordability dilemmas

Abstract

This paper examines the competing effects of the major demographic factors affecting homeownership affordability in the 1990s. It briefly views the transition in housing eras and then examines long‐term demographic fundamentals, which represent parameters that can be anticipated with reasonable certainty and that define the broad boundaries of future housing demand. The first section, on household segmentation‐diversification, focuses on changes in household configurations and future living‐arrangement choices. Income variations by age and household configuration are evaluated next, after which homeownership variations by age and household configuration are reviewed. Both the uncertainty of future household segmentation and clashing demographic variations in income levels and home‐ownership rates define future housing market complexity and uncertainty.

Following that is a summary of the key demographic parameters and dilemmas emanating from the preceding analyses. A final section then explores the net effect of these factors on various housing market segments for the balance of the decade.     

Subsidized housing and neighborhood racial transition: An empirical investigation

Abstract

Popular wisdom has it that the development of project‐based assisted housing will cause whites to flee or avoid the surrounding neighborhood, leading to rapid racial transition. This article examines the question of whether the development of several types of project‐based, federally assisted housing had an impact on neighborhood racial transition during the 1980s. In general, the development of assisted housing in a neighborhood did not lead to racial transition, nor did it approach levels suggesting “white flight” in the few instances where racial transition did occur.

The results of our analysis suggest that one of the major criticisms of project‐based assisted housing—that it contributes to racial segregation by causing white flight—is not supported by empirical evidence.     

Private market provision of low‐income housing: Historical perspective and future prospects

Abstract

The unaided private market provision of new low‐income housing is substantially a fantasy. There is little on the horizon to alter this situation in the next decade. The income/cost gap is so substantial as to overcome the decline in household formation and positive changes in job patterns that have been advanced as bridge mechanisms.

To set the debate in context, an overview of the demographic and economic future of the United States is provided and mainstream forecasts of economic and demographic trends affecting housing supply and demand are reviewed. Particular attention is given to demographic maturation and shrinkage, household diversification and segmentation, and income and poverty dynamics.     

The United States in a world of rising regional powers: farewell Lilliput,hello Shanghai

Regional powers such as China, India, Russia, and to a lesser degree Brazil and South Africa, now occupy a significant role on the world stage. The United States, while still enjoying superpower status, has taken note. At the same time, the transnational nature of the challenges facing the world will require multilateral and bilateral co-operation perhaps unprecedented in modern history. How will the United States respond to these new requisites within the context of this changed world? While it is too early to assess the Obama administration's foreign policy substantively, it looks to be adopting an approach emphasising the building of consensus and multilateralism in its international engagement. Moreover, there is reason to expect that it will actively seek a more constructive set of relationships with regional powers. United States domestic political constraints may yet hamper Obama in this new approach, as might the type of response the new administration receives from old and new powers to its overtures. Whether the changes are more in tone than substance remains to be seen.     

Literary Reviews

Classic realism. The Time of the Hero. Mario Vargas Llosa. Translated from the Spanish by Lysander Kemp. London: Picador. 1986. 409pp. £4.50pb

The Green House. Mario Vargas Llosa. Translated from the Spanish by Gregory Rabassa. London: Picador. 1986. 405pp. £3.95pb

Colluding with darkness. Of Love and Shadows. Isabel Allende. Translated from the Spanish by Margaret Sayers Peden. London: Cape. 1987. 274pp. £10.95hb

The Lizard's Tail. Luisa Valenzuela. Translated from the Spanish by Gregory Rabassa. London: Serpent's Tail. 1987. 279pp. £7.95pb

Brazilian journeys. The Land. Antônio Torres. Translated from the Portuguese by Margaret Neves. London: Readers International. 1987. 136pp. £3.95pb

Sergeant Getulio. Joao Ubaldo Ribeiro. Translated from the Portuguese by the author. London: Faber and Faber. 1986. 146pp. £3.95pb

Macunaíma. Mário de Andrade. Translated from the Portuguese by E A Goodland. London: Quartet. 1984. 168pp. £8.95hb

Philosophy and intuition. Family Ties. Clarice Lispector. Translated from the Portuguese with an Afterword by Giovanni Pontiero. Manchester: Carcanet Press. 1985. 140pp. £8.95hb/£3.50pb

The Foreign Legion. Clarice Lispector. Translated from the Portuguese with an Afterword by Giovanni Pontiero. Manchester: Carcanet Press. 1986. 219pp. £8.95hb

The Hour of the Star. Clarice Lispector. Translated from the Portuguese with an Afterword by Giovanni Pontiero. Manchester: Carcanet Press. 1986. 96pp. £8.95hb

Western filters. Genesis. Eduardo Galeano. Translated from the Spanish by Cedric Belfrage. London: Methuen. 1987. 293pp. £3.95pb

Cultures of resistance. The Last Song of Manuel Sendero. Ariel Dorfman. Translated from the Spanish by George R Shivers with the author. New York: Viking. 1987. 450pp. S18.95hb

Power and polemics. End Papers. Breyten Breytenbach. London: Faber and Faber. 1986. 270pp. £12.50hb

Mating Birds. Lewis Nkosi. London: Constable. 1986. 184pp. £8.95hb

The Scaffold. Edward Lurie. London: Zed Books. 1986. 237pp. £4.95pb

A mind of winter. Memory of Departure. Abdulrazak Gurnah. London: Cape. 1987. 159pp. £9.95hb

Yoruba destinies. Pauper, Brawler and Slanderer. Amos Tutuola. London: Faber and Faber. 1987. 156pp. £9.95hb/£3.95pb

Shared history: novels from the francophone Caribbean. The Ripening. Edouard Glissant. Translated from the French by Michael Dash. London: Heinemann Educational Books. 1985. 195pp. n/p

Cathedral of the August Heat: A Novel of Haiti. Pierre Clitandre. Translated from the French by Bridget Jones. London: Readers International. 1987. 159pp. £8.95hb/£4.95pb

A Caribbean poet questing. Mother Poem. 1977. 122pp. £3.95pb Sun Poem. 1982. 104pp. £4.95pb X/Self. 1987. 131pp. £6.95pb Edward Kamau Brathwaite Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Fatal passivity: women in Arabic fiction. From Sleep Unbound. Andree Chedid. Translated from the French by Sharon Spencer. London: Serpent's Tail. 1987. 160pp. £4.95pb

The Story of Zahra. Hanan al‐Shaykh. Translated from the Arabic by Peter Ford with the author. London: Pavanne. 1986. 184pp. £2.95pb

Death of an Ex‐Minister. Nawal El Saadawi. Translated from the Arabic by Shirley Eber. London: Methuen. 1987. 110pp. £9.50hb/£2.95pb

Rival unrealities. Sorraya in a Coma. Esmail Fassih. Translated from the Persian. London: Zed. 1985. 287pp. £9.95hb/£4.95pb

Indian truths. Truth Tales. Edited by Kali for Women. London: Women's Press. 1987. 201pp. £8.95hb/£3.95pb

Stories. Satyajit Ray. Translated from the Bengali by the author. London: Secker and Warburg. 1987. 190pp. £10.95hb     

Terrorism and computerized databases: An examination of multidisciplinary coverage

The potential for research in the field of terrorism expanded considerably with the increase in the size, availability, and types of computerized databases, from on‐line systems to the CD‐ROM. This study reviews these relatively new avenues of search in the field and observes its growing interdisciplinarity.     

Question,ethos, event: Foucault on Kant and Enlightenment

The use of labour values as a basis for economic calculation in a socialist economy is defended. A resource allocation mechanism is outlined that uses a combination of labour value calculation with market clearing prices for consumer goods. Conditions for full employment are specified. A type theoretic analysis of economic calculation is presented. Information theory is used to estimate the information content of real price vectors. It is demonstrated that both price calculations and value calculations are type theory equivalent and that both involve information loss. It is shown that modern computer technology is capable of computing up to date labour values with comparative ease.