Manning the Fields: Remaking Women's Work in the Tobacco South in the Twentieth Century

Today, men make up the vast majority of the workforce in the tobacco fields of the American South. This was not always the case. For more than two centuries, enslaved women worked alongside men in the tobacco fields. In the late nineteenth century, the unpaid labor of female kin made possible the household's replacement of the plantation as the center of production, and it remained critical for farm families well into the twentieth century. Following World War II, agricultural engineers developed new technologies to eliminate tasks traditionally done by women. In the 1980s, the process of defeminization accelerated as growers began to hire male guestworkers from Mexico as more women moved into the non-farm labor market to supplement their families' farm incomes. The transition from family to wage labor in the tobacco South was far from a ‘natural’ process, but one nurtured by state agricultural, labor, and immigration policy.     

Case Survey

This section of the Journal deals with recent case law. The cases are listed in alphabetical order by case name.     

A shrinking state? Politics,economics and private health care in Thailand

This article explores the political and economic forces involved in the development of privatization policies within the health care sector in Thailand. It is suggested that many of the motivating factors behind private sector growth are outside of the health sector; the general macroeconomic environment and tax incentives have stimulated private sector expansion. Within the Ministry of Public Health a preoccupation with improving care in rural areas and an unclear policy line on the private sector has facilitated this expansion. Only recently has private sector growth come to the policy agenda. During this lag period a number of interest groups have developed. It will be difficult to overcome these entrenched interests in order to change policy direction. Meanwhile, problems of rapid cost inflation and inequity face the Thai health care system. Although this case study focuses upon the health care sector in Thailand it would appear relevant both to other sectors and to other countries. The relationship between development models based upon pro-private, pro-market tenets and the establishment of a satisfactory social policy is questioned.     

Suicide: a ten-year retrospective study

Suicide is a complex phenomenon associated with psychological, biological, and social factors, claiming approximately 30,000 lives each year in the United States. We retrospectively reviewed all cases referred to the Medical Examiners' Office/Forensic Pathology Section at the Medical University of South Carolina from January 1988 to December 1997. The cases of suicide totaled 678. All of the cases were analyzed as to age/race/sex, method of suicide, time of year, and toxicological results. Files were also reviewed to determine if the victim left behind a suicide note. The ages ranged from 12 to 94 years; males comprised 79.5% of the victims, and whites 78.3%. The male to female and white to black ratios were both 3.9:1. The most common methods were gunshot wounds, accounting for 64.6% of the cases. No correlation existed with time of year, and the number of cases was not increased around major holidays. The group of victims 65 years and older and the pediatric group under the age of 18 were also examined separately.     

Effects of face-to-face restorative justice on victims of crime in four randomized,controlled trials

The growing use of restorative justice provides a major opportunity for experimental criminology and evidence-based policy. Face-to-face meetings led by police officers between crime victims and their offenders are predicted to reduce the harm to victims caused by the crime. This prediction is derived not only from the social movement for restorative justice, but also from the microsociology of interaction rituals (Collins, 2004). Four randomized, controlled trials of this hypothesis in London and Canberra, with point estimates disaggregated by gender, tested the prediction with measures of both successful interaction ritual (apologies received and their perceived sincerity) and the hypothesized benefits of the ritual (on forgiveness of, and reduced desire for violent revenge against, offenders, and victim self-blame for the crime). The meta-analyses of the eight point estimates suggest success (as victims define it) of restorative justice as an interaction ritual, and as a policy for reducing harm to victims.     

Emotional Variables in Adolescence,and Their Stability and Contribution to the Mental Health of Adult Men: Implications for Early Intervention Strategies

This longitudinal study documented the stability of the emotional of a sample of males from adolescence (age 14) through young adulthood (age 19) and into middle adulthood (age 48). Using the Offer Self-image Questionnaire (OSIQ), the Hess and Henry Identity Test, and the Symptoms Checklist (SCL-90), distinct emotional traits were found in 67 adolescent males that were important in determining their mental health status in adult life (age 48). The results clearly demonstrated that certain adolescent emotional states tend to remain a problem in adulthood as well. Intervention work that could be done in order to change any adverse trajectories set by these variables was discussed.     

Identifying,explaining, and targeting burglary ‘hot spots’

Conclusion The data-gathering and crime analysis part of the Task Force programme (while not yet completed) has generated some useful information about burglary in Cambridge which might inform a crime prevention strategy. The research has shown that residential burglary is not evenly distributed across Cambridge, but tends to be clustered in the northwest of the City. It has also shown that even in these high-burglary areas there are hot spots and cold spots of crime. These hot spots account for a relatively large proportion of all burglary.One factor contributing to the high burglary counts in the hot spot area is the high number of repeat burglaries, with as many as 35 percent of all burglaries recorded in the area being one of a repeat series of burglaries. Another factor which might have contributed to the high burglary counts was the abundance of access and escape routes of the kind identified in the environmental survey. Perhaps the most important factor which explains the high number of burglaries was the closeness of the area to the place of residence of known offenders. The hot spot site thus provides a local source of easy and rewarding opportunities for offenders who live in these areas.In the second stage of its work, the Cambridge Burglary Task Force will collate the information that has been collected in the first stage and devise appropriate intervention strategies. We aim to continue to monitor crime and criminals in the area and to evaluate the effectiveness the programmes implemented.     

A. Reviews: general

THE CIVILIZATIONS OF ASIA AND THE MIDDLE EAST BEFORE THE EUROPEAN CHALLENGE. By JAROSLAV KREJCI. Basingstoke, Macmillan, 1990. 348 pp. .£37.50 (hb).

THE ORIGINS OF ARAB NATIONALISM. Edited by RASHID KHALIDI, LISA ANDERSON, MUHAMMAD MUSLIH, and REEVA S. SIMON. 288 pp. + glossary, bibliography, index. New York, Columbia University Press, 1991.

THE ARAB STATE. Edited by GIACOMO LUCIANI. London, Routledge, 1990. 454 pp., bibliography, index, tables.

STATE, POWER, AND POLITICS IN THE MAKING OF THE MODERN MIDDLE EAST. By ROGER OWEN. London, Routledge, 1992. xiv, 302 pp. £40.00 (hb), £12.99 (pb).

L'ÉCHEC DE L'ISLAM POLITIQUE. By OLIVIER ROY. Paris, Editions du Seuil, 1992. 247pp.

MOSCOW AND THE MIDDLE EAST. By ROBERT O. FREEDMAN. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1991. xii, 426 pp. $59.50 (hb), $16.95 (pb).

EURO‐ARAB RELATIONS: A STUDY IN COLLECTIVE DIPLOMACY. By HAIFAA A. JAWAD. Reading, Garnet Publishing, 1992. viii, 302 pp. £25.00

OIL ON TROUBLED WATERS: GULF WARS 1980–91. By JOHN CREIGHTON. London, Echoes, 1992. viii, 156 pp. £35.00.

ALL THAT REMAINS: THE PALESTINIAN VILLAGES OCCUPIED AND DEPOPULATED BY ISRAEL IN 1948. Edited by WALID KHALIDI. Washington, D.C., The Institute for Palestine Studies, 1992. li, 636 pp. Illustrations, maps, bibliography, index. $59.00 (hb).

PALESTINE REBORN. By WALID KHALIDI. London, I.B. Tauris, 1992. xxi, 234pp. £35.00(hb), £14.95 (pb).

WILDFIRE: GRASSROOTS REVOLT IN ISRAEL IN THE POST‐SOCIALIST ERA. By SAM N. LEHMAN‐WILZIG. New York, State University of New York Press, 1992. x, 198 pp. $12.95 (pb).

MODERN ALGERIA. By CHARLES‐ROBERT AGERON. London, Hurst, 1991. x, 166 pp. £16.50 (hb).

L'ALGERIE PAR SES ISLAMISTES. By M. AL‐AHNAF, BERNARD BOTIVEAU and FRANCK FREGOSI. Paris, Karthala, 1991. 328 pp.

TUNISIA: RURAL LABOUR AND STRUCTURAL TRANSFORMATION. By SAMIR RADWAN, JAMAL VALI and AJIT GHOSE. London, Routledge, 1991. xii, 122 pp, £30.00 (hb).

SUDAN AFTER NIMEIRI. Edited by PETER WOODWARD. (Routledge/ SOAS Contemporary Politics and Culture in the Middle East series.) London, Routledge, 1991, xii, 223pp. £35(hb).

TRADE AND EMPIRE IN MUSCAT AND ZANZIBAR: ROOTS OF BRITISH DOMINATION. By M[OHMED] REDA BHACKER. (Exeter Arabic & Islamic series.) London & New York, Routledge, 1992. 278pp. £40.00

THE KURDS: A CONTEMPORARY OVERVIEW. Edited by PHILIP K. KREYENBROEK AND STEFAN SPERL. London, Routledge, 1991. xii, 250 pp. £35.00 (hb).

ARABIC ADENI TEXTBOOK. By HABAKA J. FEGHALI. Edited by ALAN S. KAYE. (Arabic dialect series (Yemen).) Wheaton, MD, Dunwoody, 1991. xx, 233 pp.

MOROCCAN ARABIC READER. By HABAKA J. FEGHALI. Notes by Alan S. Kaye. Wheaton, MD, Dunwoody, 1989. xi, 143 pp.     

Government capacity to contract: health sector experience and lessons

Using case-study material of contracting for clinical and ancillary services in the health care sector of developing countries, this article examines the capacities required for successful contracting and the main constraints which developing country governments face in developing and implementing contractual arrangements. Required capacities differ according to the type of service being contracted and the nature of the contractor. Contracting for clinical as opposed to ancillary services poses considerably greater challenges in terms of the information required for monitoring and contract design. Yet, in some of the case-studies examined, problems arose owing to government's limited capacity to perform even very basic functions such as paying contractors in a timely manner and keeping records of contracts negotiated. The external environment within which contracting takes place is also critical; in particular, the case-studies indicate that contracts embedded in slow-moving, rule-ridden bureaucracies will face substantial constraints to successful implementation. The article suggests that governments need to assess required capacities on a service-by-service basis. For any successful contracting, basic administrative systems must be functioning. In addition, there should be development of guidelines for contracting, clear lines of communication between all agents involved in the contracting process, and regular evaluations of contractual arrangements. Finally, in cases where government has weak capacity, direct service provision may be a lower-risk delivery strategy. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.