The changing geography of metropolitan opportunity: The segregation of the poor in U.S. metropolitan areas, 1970 to 1990

Abstract

This analysis uses census tract data to measure the segregation of the poor in U.S. metropolitan areas in 1970, 1980, and 1990. Two measures of segregation are used: the indices of dissimilarity and isolation.

In 1990 the mean dissimilarity of the poor in the 100 largest U.S. metropolitan areas was 36.1, which is substantial but below the 60.6 dissimilarity of blacks. The 1990 isolation of the poor was 21.0. From 1970 to 1990, the dissimilarity of the poor increased by 11 percent, and the isolation of the poor rose by 9 percent; in contrast, racial segregation declined. Exploratory regression analyses reveal that income segregation in metropolitan areas was significantly greater in 1990 and increased more from 1970 to 1990 in the Northeast than in the South and West. Midwest areas generally were not significantly different from Northeast areas in 1990 segregation levels or in changes from 1970 to 1990.     

The Sacred,Social Creativity and the State

Abstract

This paper explores the specific contribution of a strand of contemporary French social theory founded by Cornelius Castoriadis and Claude Lefort to the under standing of human power. It formulates a conception of power that transcends its definitions in terms of physical coercion or institutionalised violence to reveal the way power is creative and institutes the social. Its reflection on the cultural nature of political power and it role in society is shown to extend the pioneering reflection of Durkheim's sociology, especially as regards the homology that exists between religion and politics. The social role performed by the state explored by Durkheim prefigures Gauchet's theory of the state, which builds on Lefort's work. Gauchet's theory can be said to elaborate a critical synthesis of the two stands of Durkheim's work: the sociology of religion and the sociology of the modern state. This synthesis raises questions on the role played by the European state in the development of individualism, in both its political and economic manifestations.     

道路自信、理论自信、制度自信的基本内涵浅析

党的十八大报告提出,全党面对党和人民90多年奋斗、创造、积累的根本成就时,要坚定“道路自信”、“理论自信”、“制度自信”。只有在坚定“三个自信”的同时,脚踏实地、扎扎实实地干好自己的事业,我们的道路自信才不是固步自封,我们的理论自信才不是夜郎自大,我们的制度自信才不是骄傲自满。有了这样的底气和精神状态,我们就一定能完成党确定的宏伟目标。     

Framing hostage negotiations: analysing the discourse of the US government and the Islamic State

Since August 2014, there has been a marked increase in the violence perpetrated by the Islamic State against Western hostages. Videos released by the Islamic State depicting the brutal executions of hostages have been circulated widely on social media. This has prompted a dialogue about governments’ policies regarding negotiation with terrorist organisations to secure the release of their citizens held overseas. The United States and Britain, two non-negotiating countries, have faced significant criticism for this policy, which has led to the beheadings of several American and British citizens. This article analyses the discourse of two spokesmen – White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest, and British hostage John Cantlie – in framing the issue of hostage negotiations on behalf of their organisations. A grounded theory approach informed by framing analysis is utilised in order to identify dominant discourses employed in White House press briefings and John Cantlie’s videos and articles. This article concludes that, through the deliberate use of discourse, the US government and the Islamic State shape public perception of hostage negotiations in pursuit of distinct policy goals.     

Barbárie: literatura e filosofia moral

The view of the barbarity is a theme that has been inexhaustible due to the constant human ability of reinventing the horror’s dimensions. However, if analyzed through the political philosophy, this is a theme that requires continuous rereadings in order to prevent the risk of reactualization of the horror in the contemporary world’s roll of concerns. The horror’s reactualization in this context would be assisted by the weakness that is currently happening at the democratic institutions as a result of virulent denouncing criticisms that expose its infirmity, often deservedly. We believe that the barbarity is unembraceable and unapproachable in its integrality if seen through one single angle. Therefore, our purpose in this text is supporting the continuous process of reflecting about this theme through the possible conjunctive approximation of literature (Jünger and the survival’s literature) and political philosophy (Schmitt and his critics).     

The Social Market After the Crash

Markets are powerful tools for reform in both the public and private realms. But those markets need careful design and stewardship if they are to work to create value rather than simply becoming a mechanism for distributing rents to private investors. SMF Director Ian Mulheirn examines how the social market framework offers the most cogent analysis of recent events and how it can be a vital guide for future policy.     

Transnationalism,neo-liberalism,and the rise of the shadow state

This paper examines the processes through which a neo-liberal agenda is broadened and entrenched through time. The case study focuses on a federal immigration policy in Canada in the 1980s, which encouraged the rapid entry of wealthy entrepreneurs and investors from Hong Kong. One of the many impacts of the arrival of this Chinese business élite in British Columbia was the rapid growth of a key volunteer organization in Vancouver dedicated to social service provisioning for immigrants. With the donations and volunteerism of the new Chinese arrivals, this organization grew from a small, narrowly focused social service institution, to one of the largest and most extensive providers in the lower Mainland, supplying numerous goods and services formerly controlled primarily by the province and the federal government. As a result of the actions of this voluntary organization, a type of interstitial organization that some scholars have termed under the rubric, 'the shadow state', conservative politicians in the 1980s were able to roll back many welfare state programmes in British Columbia without a corresponding loss of legitimacy occurring from the immediate truncation of services. The Business Immigration Programme thus aided in the entrenchment of a neo-liberal agenda both through the increased circulation of capital and articulation with Asian networks, and also through the devolution of direct welfare-state governance. I argue that this immigration programme thus represents one good example of the multiple ways that seemingly simple policy shifts can have much broader effects, and can entrench neo-liberal policy socially,culturally and institutionally as well as economically.     

Participatory planning as a deliberative democratic process: a response to Hodgson's critique

This paper is a response to Hodgson's recent critique of our model of participatory planning through negotiated co-ordination. His critique focused on four issues: the coherence of our distinction between market exchange and market forces; our understanding of tacit knowledge; the scope for innovation in our model; and the alleged problems of information overload and cognitive limitations. In this response we argue that Hodgson misinterprets our model as being based on the aggregation of individual preferences, whereas it is in fact a model of participatory planning through a process of deliberative democracy.     

Skin deep: Barthes,Lavater and the legible body

Much of the Indian debate about secularism is built around what seem to be commonsense assumptions about India and the West. But a close look at the impact of Protestant Puritanism on the relationship between religion and politics in the United States suggests that these assumptions are mistaken. Far from having fundamentally different experiences, there are some striking similarities between India and the United States: similarities that draw attention to potential long-term dangers for India.     

Los poderes fácticos mediáticos y el surgimiento del Estado híbrido en México

The process of institutional overlapping that developed in Mexico between formal traditional constitutional powers and mass electronic technologies, which gradually attained factual positions in the second half of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st, changed the nature and basic governing functions of the national State. Thus, mass media power gave rise to a novel mixing phenomenon that generated a new type of “hybrid State”. The corresponding new historical Republic with a highly political and media oriented nature modified the structure and scenario of the conventional contemporary nation state. The evolution of this historical reality has not yet come to an end, but instead continues to develop with an enormous amount of dynamism and force towards new stages of transformation of the State, public space, and society as a whole, without knowing its final outcome due to the strengthening of factual media power while the major branches of government are gradually weakening. Consequently, society needs to critically engage in an objective analysis of this strategic phenomenon, its phases of transformation and the viable alternatives for recovering the national development path.