Understanding rural resistance: contemporary mobilization in the Brazilian countryside

Contradictions between impressive levels of economic growth and the persistence of poverty and inequality are perhaps nowhere more evident than in rural Brazil. While Brazil might appear to be an example of the potential harmony between large-scale, export-oriented agribusiness and small-scale family farming, high levels of rural resistance contradict this vision. In this introductory paper, we synthesize the literature on agrarian resistance in Brazil and situate recent struggles in Brazil within the Latin American context more broadly. We highlight seven key characteristics of contemporary Latin American resistance, which include: the growth of international networks, the changing structure of state–society collaboration, the deepening of territorial claims, the importance of autonomy, the development of alternative economies, continued opposition to dispossession, and struggles over the meaning of nature. We argue that by analyzing rural mobilization in Brazil, this collection offers a range of insights relevant to rural contention globally. Each contribution in this collection increases our understanding of alternative agricultural production, large-scale development projects, education, race and political parties in the contemporary agrarian context.     

农村社会管理体制创新的困境及对策

农村社会管理主体权威日渐弱化、"乡政村治"造成权力运行中的体制摩擦、农民组织化程度偏低、社会协同管理意识薄弱等是当前农村社会管理体制中存在的突出问题。因此,在新时期创新农村社会管理体制,应建立并完善农村社会管理多元主体的协调运转机制,建立健全统筹城乡发展的社会流动机制,建立健全农村社会矛盾纠纷预警调处机制,不断完善具有中国特色的农村社会保障机制。     

Political Parties and Grassroots Clientelist Strategies in Urban Turkey: One Neighbourhood at a Time

Both principal Turkish political parties make extensive use of patron–client networks, but in very different ways. The CHP relies on competing local brokers and synchronous vote buying. The AKP is at the centre of a network of public and private funding turning social policy to clientelist ends. Socially anchored AKP activists link the party to voters, allowing it to target social assistance for political advantage and take credit for improvement in local conditions. The case presented in this paper provides a natural experiment suggesting that this distinction is an important explanation for the AKP’s electoral success in low-income urban areas.     

Thailand’s urbanized villagers and political polarization

Thailand currently suffers from high levels of political polarization; parties associated with former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra have won every election since 2001, based partly on strong support from voters registered in the populous North and Northeast regions. Many of these voters are migrant workers who spend much of their time working in Greater Bangkok, yet remain legal residents of their home provinces. This article argues that Thailand’s political polarization could be reduced if many of these “urbanized villagers” either took up formal residence in the capital city, or were encouraged to share in the creation of new small-scale urban communities in their places of birth.     

From rural rebellions to urban riots: political competition and changing patterns of violent political revolt in Uganda

Violent political revolt has been common in independent Uganda. For a long time, such revolts were exclusively expressed as rural-based rebel groups fighting the government. Since the mid-2000s, however, this seems to have come to an end. Instead, urban riots, very rare in the past, have become much more common. This article analyses these changing patterns of types and location of violent political revolt in Uganda under the National Resistance Movement government. It argues that the earlier prevalence of rural rebellions can be explained by the combination of a coercive and militarised state, and weak and ethnically factionalised political forces who took their violent resistance to rural regional bases. Over time, however, government counter-insurgency became more effective and the conditions for insurgency were undermined by withdrawal of external support. Furthermore, the reintroduction of multi-party politics in 2005 opened up new avenues for political expression. The changes to the political system were, however, more nominal than real in many respects. While the rebel option had become less attractive and feasible, a series of social, economic and political grievances remained which were only partly channelled through party politics. They also found expression through sporadic urban violent revolt.     

农村人力资本投资的影响因素分析

农村人力资本投资不但受到经济发展水平与风险因素的影响,还会受到政府投资政策与投资体制的影响。总得来看,由于政府财力有限以及在投资过程中的城市化倾向、农民收入增长缓慢和人力资本流动造成的风险使得农村人力资本投资水平比较低。     

新农村建设中的乡村关系协调

乡村关系冲突是我国新农村建设中的一个突出问题。乡村关系冲突从根本上主要是由乡镇政府在我国权力体制中的特殊地位、村委会在利益角色上的双重性和乡镇政府在利益上的自利性、乡村关系在法律规范上的制度供给短缺造成的。建设新农村,必须通过转变理念、创新体制和完善法治对其加以改进与完善。     

关于边疆民族地区建设社会主义新农村的哲学思考

我们党提出和实施建设社会主义新农村,既是战略性的考虑也是客观需要。反映了党和政府与时俱进的思维和谋略,它尊重和体现了马克思主义的哲学原理。边疆民族地区建设社会主义新农村有它的特殊性,从哲学的角度,可以从六个方面进行思考。     

信用证欺诈例外原则的问题分析

信用证是国际贸易中重要的信用结算工具,由于信用证独立抽象的原则,银行只审单而不管实际的货物,导致国际贸易中利用信用证进行欺诈的案件屡屡发生。因此,各国纷纷采取信用证欺诈例外原则来进行补救,但信用证欺诈例外原则的滥用则会损害合法受益人及善意第三方在信用证项下的利益,因此,对欺诈原则应适当地适用,以发挥其最佳效用。     

When does the Gender Difference in Rumination Begin? Gender and Age Differences in the Use of Rumination by Adolescents

A cross-sectional non-clinical sample of 1,218 adolescents, aged 10–17 years, completed measures of stress, rumination, and depression to allow tests of the response style theory of S. Nolen-Hoeksema [J Res Adolesc 4:519–534, 1994] in adolescents, in particular whether increasing levels of stress and rumination in early adolescence are predictive of the onset of the gender difference in depression. Overall, females reported higher levels of stress, rumination, and depression than males. The onset of the gender differences in stress and depression occurred at age 13 years, and for rumination one year earlier at 12 years. Significantly, also from 13 years, rumination explained the gender difference in depression by showing that it significantly mediated the effect of gender on depression. Gender moderated the rumination to depression relationship; specifically the association was stronger for females than males. Developmental differences were noted in that rumination significantly mediated between stress and depression earlier in the age range for females than males. Results supported many of the predictions of Nolen-Hoeksema’s model of the emergence of a gender difference in adolescent depression.