Housing Management and the Comprehensive Housing Model in Hong Kong: A case study of colonial influence

This article contains an examination of the way in which the largely British model of professional comprehensive housing management became important in Hong Kong. It shows how a comparatively small number of pioneers, mainly women who were followers of the principles of Octavia Hill, a philanthropic social reformer who developed her ideas in 19th century London, had a considerable influence in the very different environment of Hong Kong. An examination of the comparatively small amount of literature on the housing management profession is followed by a detailed analysis of the way in which the housing management profession has developed in Hong Kong. A review of the origin of public housing programmes in Hong Kong highlights the influence which housing professionals had when the housing administration was radically restructured at the time of the formation of the Hong Kong Housing Authority in the early 1970s.     

Overprovision and the licensing (Scotland) act 1976

This paper examines Scottish licensing law, in particular the granting of licenses to supply alcoholic liquor. Any application for a license must be granted unless one or more of four conditions are fulfilled. One of these, that the award would lead to overprovision, is the central concern of this study. The paper does not investigate why the consumption and distribution of alcohol are regulated nor why regulatory control takes the form it does. ¹ The starting point is rather that regulation exists and takes a particular form. Attention is focused on the operation of this regulatory control and with how it might be improved.In the next section, some of the key features of the licensing law and its appeals are reviewed, establishing the importance of evidence of the presence or otherwise of overprovision. Section II discusses the use of density of licensed premises as a measure of provision, indicates the problems, and argues that a measure might be refined and validated by entering it in an equation explaining the retail price of alcoholic beverages. Section III examines empirically the relationship between price and licensing density.     

Under development and modes of production: A reply to Nicos Mouzelis

What follows is a reply to a number of points raised by Nicos Mouzelis in his review of my book, From Modernisation to Modes of Production: A Critique of the Sociologies of Development and Underdevelopment (Macmillan 1979, £4.95 paper) in The Journal of Peasant Studies, Volume 7, No. 3, April 1980. I focus on Mouzelis’ arguments that my framework for analysing Third World societies is ideological and reductionist. I try to show how the analysis put forward in my book can be used to analyse what for me is the central problem of ‘development ‘ ‐ namely the relations between the restricted and uneven capitalist development characteristic of Third World societies, their class structures, forms of state and development strategy. I also examine the relevance of Mouzelis's alternative ‐ of inter‐relating structuralist and action perspectives ‐ and suggest that the framework put forward in my work can deal more adequately with the issues raised by Mouzelis in his review. I agree with Mouzelis that the most fruitful debates in the Sociology of Development currently centre on the relevance of the Marxist approach, and view my comments here as part of this wide‐ranging, continuing debate, of which my work forms a part.     

A Poisson model of incidents of international terrorism in the United States

Abstract

Various haphazard, and often uncoordinated, efforts have been devoted to discouraging and combatting terrorism. Unfortunately, there has been a noticeable lack of quantitative studies of the problem of terrorism. Nevertheless, it can be expected that the problem of international terrorism will eventually be a focus for operations researchers. A factor fundamental to any OR study is an understanding of the underlying generating process for incidents of terrorism. Based on incidents of terrorism from 1968 to 1974, this paper notes that the Poisson is a good model for the occurrence of incidents of international terrorism in the United States. Results of both chi‐square and Kolmogorov‐Smirnov tests are presented. Finally, an unusual result, inconsistent with popular beliefs, is noted.     

Is the internet an instrument of global democratization?

This article explores the hypothesis that people in less democratic nations will use the Internet newsgroups devoted to those countries as a relatively ‘safe’ form of political discussion and even protest. Also, it is expected that nationals of those countries living overseas will use these newsgroups to more openly discuss politics in those nations than they could otherwise do so. Before turning to a content analysis of the messages posted in non‐United States Usenet groups, the number of these groups and the levels of political discussion in them are quantified. The article quantifies the international usage of the Usenet as a first attempt to find some patterns in this usage that may be politically motivated. After all, many pundits imagine that the Internet will become the vaunted ‘global village’ and source of ‘grass‐roots democracy’, and not merely in the United States. An examination of the content of about 2500 messages in 41 Usenet groups then follows, with a view to establishing the following: how many messages are explicitly political; how many are in opposition to the current government; how many are pro‐government; whether they primarily serve as alternative sources of news; whether they are attempts to recruit people in the subject country and around the world into some sort of political action; and whether richer nations are more likely to have higher levels of discussion in their newsgroups than poorer ones. The findings conclude that newsgroups devoted to countries with lower levels of democratization have a much higher percentage of anti‐government messages than the newsgroups about nations that are more democratic.     

Of miracles and models: The rise and decline of the developmental state in South Korea

This article argues that the South Korean economic 'miracle' was based on the ability of the state to implement a strongly developmental policy. The state was able to do so because, for a time, it was highly insulated from demands from social classes which might have diverted it from the objective of industrialisation. This insulation, or 'relative state autonomy', derived from an historical trajectory which left the state in an unusually dominant position in relation to these classes. Domestic dominance was one factor enabling the state to insert the South Korean economy into world markets in a more advantageous position than would otherwise have been possible. However, its very success in industrialising the country strengthened various class forces, whose demands and intrusion into politics undermined the autonomy of the state. With industrialisation, the state's freedom of manoeuvre was lessened. International influence only reinforced those class pressures inside South Korea. The overall effect was to force a retreat of the state and an end to a developmental policy.