The legacy of the home owners’ loan corporation

Abstract

The appraisal practices of the Home Owners’ Loan Corporation (HOLC) and its Residential Security Maps are often cited as major contributors to later redlining and the perpetuation of segregation through unequal access to mortgage credit. This article focuses on whether there was a relationship between the HOLC's neighborhood assessments and mortgage outcomes.

Our results indicate that the agency was clearly instrumental in restructuring the home finance system and permitting far greater access to homeowner‐ship, but it is important to consider other factors in examining the HOLC's legacy in the reshaping of the mortgage market and the operation of the financial sector after the Great Depression. Specifically, the issue of increasing segregation in older cities in the late 20th century remains inextricably linked to both the shifting nature of real estate finance after the HOLC era and the demographic, economic, and residential changes affecting U.S. cities.     

Learning from the Americanists (Again): Theory and Method in the Study of Delegation

European(ist) scholars have largely followed their American(ist) colleagues in the formulation of theories about delegation of powers to non-majoritarian institutions, most notably through the application of principal-agent models of relations between legislative principals and their executive and judicial agents. This article suggests that Europeanists can once again learn from recent developments in both theory and method in the study of delegation in American politics. The first section discusses the methodological challenges of testing hypotheses about the conditions under which agents might enjoy some degree of autonomy from their legislative principals, and draws lessons from the recent Americanist literature. The section examines the development in American politics of a second wave of principal-agent analysis which aims to formulate and test hypotheses about the conditions under which legislative principals might delegate authority and discretion to bureaucratic agents. The third and final section of the article examines some preliminary applications of the principal-agent approach to the European Union and to the comparative study of European parliamentary democracies, and proposes a research agenda for the comparative study of national-level delegation in the parliamentary systems of Western Europe.     

Club apples: a biology of markets built on the social life of variety

Abstract

Club apples are patented apple varieties, often grown by members of a co-operative who plan the production and marketing of the apples. Drawing on ethnographic work, this paper will use club apples as a case to demonstrate that varieties have shaped the development of the apple industry in ways that resist institutional pressures to commodify the biological features of the apple. Club apples extend social boundaries around varieties in ways that grant growers more control over the market life of the apple and more economic power. The productive opportunities availed in the aliveness of biological materials can be seen to shape competition and the contours of economic markets.     

Comments on Hasenfeld and Gidron: “Understanding multi-purpose hybrid voluntary organizations”

The article develops a theoretical framework to analyse the social construction of citizenship at the local level in Bolivia through the Ley de Participación Popular (LPP). It explains how decentralization at the municipal level and the introduction of participatory mechanisms affect the development of civil society in Bolivia. I argue that decentralization at the city level can provide new formal spaces for the development of civil society in relation with the state, which can in turn foster the social construction of a more inclusive citizenship regime. Many factors, however, determine if such potential is exploited. Drawing from the Bolivian experience, the article elaborates on the socio-political conditions necessary for local governance to have a positive impact on citizenship. It shows that the institutional shortcomings of the LPP, an elite-driven reform adopted in a country with a legacy of weak institutions and civil society, posed fundamental limits for social participation at the municipal level to lead to the social construction of an inclusive citizenship regime.     

Nothing Succeeds Like Access? NGO Strategies Towards Multilateral Institutions

Despite a large literature on international nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), we still know relatively little about their nature as strategic actors. This article addresses this gap, arguing that a key determinant of NGOs' strategies towards multilateral institutions in particular is their level of formalization. NGOs' choices over both organizational structure and strategy towards multilateral institutions reflect their level of commitment to being a social movement organization. Some NGOs bureaucratize their organizations and seek insider access to (and influence in) multilateral institutions, while others reject formalization as betraying the social movement network ethos and inviting co-option. Drawing on an original database, this article demonstrates that NGOs adopting formal bureaucratic structures are more likely to engage in insider strategies—i.e. lobby and seek accreditation at multilateral institutions—than those maintaining informal coalitional structures, regardless of these NGOs' budgets, age, or ideology. This finding gives us new insight into the divisions within global civil society and the limited prospects for cooperation between two sets of actors central to emerging forms of global governance.     

Photovoice as a Pedagogical Tool in the Community Psychology Classroom

Constructivist perspectives contend that individuals actively extract and make meaning from the world around them. In the classroom this means that students are not passive recipients or repositories for our theories and empirical findings; instead, they actively redefine and relate to (or not) the concepts presented. To simultaneously stimulate and build on this process, I adopted Photovoice as a pedagogical tool to situate students as observers of their own community and create space for them to engage in participatory, community-focused meaning making activities. By employing strategically crafted framing questions, students generated Photovoice data that served as a powerful jumping off point for discussing key community psychology concepts. In addition, the Photovoice process provided students the opportunity to directly experience a participatory research process as well as engage in basic qualitative data analysis. This article presents the general process my class undertook as well as qualitative feedback from students.     

中国P2P小额信贷中介服务行业法律监管研究

基于对域外P2P行业监管的梳理和分析,结合我国P2P小额信贷中介服务机构所兼具的创新性金融服务机构、投资咨询类中介服务机构和电子商务金融创新服务平台的三重性质,我国应当尽快完善并不断发展P2P小额信贷中介服务行业的法律制度体系建设,践行多方推动、统筹兼顾、虚实结合、着力创新、注重实效、规范发展、保障安全的新型监管理念并将政府主导型监管制度和市场需求引致型监管制度演变相结合,从而建立起由中国人民银行主导监管、银监会在相应业务领域紧密配合、地方政府严格实施、工商行政管理机关和工信部门积极参与的P2P行业监管框架.     

高校管理权力配置的失衡与规避

随着高等教育的发展,国家包揽办学的局面已经改变,办学主体多元化成为趋势,政府从对学校的直接行政管理转变为运用立法、拨款、规划、政策等手段进行宏观管理,国家控制变为国家监督,高校自主管理权在加大。但高校内部管理仍处在历史的惯性作用下,行政化了的管理行为仍在继续, 学术权力与行政权力失衡。如何解决失衡并建立现代大学制度,本文试作初步的探讨。     

高校思想政治工作新途径探索——浅谈社会实践的德育功能

社会实践是新时期高校思想政治工作的新途径.它有助于青年学生了解国情民情,培养正确的世界观;有助于加强理论联系实际;有助于大学生敬业精神的培养;有助于促进德育教学改革.     

大学生体育锻炼态度现状及影响体育锻炼因素的调查研究

体育态度会影响人的锻炼行为。本文通过文献资料、问卷调查、数量统计等方法对天津市4所大学252名大学生的体育锻炼态度及影响因素进行了调查。研究结果表明,大学生体育锻炼态度总体上较积极,不同性别、不同年级的大学生在体育锻炼态度上存在差异;促进大学生身体锻炼的因素有身体因素、心理因素、学习方面因素、交流方面因素、习惯因素,阻碍身体锻炼的因素有客观和主观因素。