LAND RECLAMATION AFTER SURFACE MINING IN THE USSR: ECONOMIC,POLITICAL, AND LEGAL ISSUES

This paper surveys economic, political, and legal factors involved in decisions to reclaim surface-mined land in the USSR, with particular emphasis on coal and iron ore, two of the most economically significant minerals extracted by surface methods. An initial section presents estimates of areas disturbed by surface mining and subsequently reclaimed. An analysis of selected economic, political, and legal factors follows. These include changing ratios of surface to underground production; a price system which undervalues mineral raw materials relative to finished products; Gorbachev's economic reforms; fragmentation of jurisdiction over reclamation activities; and extant reclamation law and its interpretation.     

The political economy of economic reform in North Korea

For over 10 years, North Korea has undergone a severe economic crisis, including food shortages, which has inflicted great suffering upon the North Korean people. Given such dire realities, it is beyond all doubt that the North Korean government should actively carry out comprehensive economic reforms as quickly as possible which aim to transform North Korea's present inefficient socialist planned economic system into a market economic system. Many argue that such reforms would give rise to successful economic growth in North Korea, which could enhance the legitimacy of the North Korean regime. Yet, the North Korean regime has consistently avoided implementing economic reforms, even though it has had a number of opportunities to do so. The July 1st reforms, which were introduced in 2002, have been half-hearted and inconsistently applied. This then raises an important question: Why has the North Korean government avoided adopting comprehensive economic reforms? In other words, what is the crucial barrier that has hindered North Korea's implementation of economic reforms? This article pinpoints North Korea's unique political system—i.e. its monolithic system of political control and policy making which exhibits the highest level of power concentration in one individual among all political systems—as the biggest barrier to economic reforms. No doubt North Korea desperately needs comprehensive economic reforms, in light of its economic crisis and food shortages. Nonetheless, the current North Korean regime has avoided adopting such reforms since they will undermine North Korea's monolithic system. In conclusion, North Korea's monolithic system has been the biggest obstacle to North Korea's economic reforms.     

City subcenter as a regional development policy: Impact on the property market

The aim of this study is to perform a locally specific investigation of a polycentric development policy through the lens of the property market. The capital city of China, Beijing, adopted a subcenter program for the purpose of developing a new economic growth pole in the suburbs through the redistribution of administrative and economic resources. Herein, we exploit spatial and temporal differencing in microproperty transaction data to address the issue of nonrandom selection of the site for developing the subcenter. The results show that in the first year after announcing the subcenter program, property prices in the subcenter rose by 10.5%, stabilizing at approximately 20% after 2 years of continuous increase. Moreover, property price growth decreases sharply with increased distance from the new administrative center in the subcenter, which will host tens of thousands of civil servants under the subcenter program. In response to the subcenter-induced demand shock, locations with elastically supplied housing have experienced greater population growth and weaker appreciation in property prices. Although strict purchase restrictions have helped stabilize the subcenter's property market to some extent, the fever has spread to adjacent markets. The specific geography of property market dynamics provides an important channel to evaluate the impact of the subcenter program and offers insight regarding the development of tactics to optimize subcenter outcomes.     

基于GWR模型的合肥居住地价影响因素研究

以合肥市主城区为例,基于2010-2014年居住用地的出让数据,运用地统计法、GWR模型等方法,对合肥市居住地价的空间异质性及其影响因素进行研究。研究表明：①合肥市居住地价的空间分布呈现出显著的多中心的空间结构,地价的峰值区分别以老城区、政务区天鹅湖及滨湖新区塘西河公园为中心呈现圈层式分布;②不同的地价影响因素表现出不同的空间分布特征,其中容积率对居住地价的贡献度空间差异最大,其次是宗地面积,主干路次之,交通站点对居住地价的贡献度最小;③厘清各影响因素对地价的作用机制,建立动态的数字地价模型,不仅能促进土地资源的集约利用,重塑城市的空间结构,而且能为城市整体价值的发挥提供重要的理论支撑。     

Building blocks of polycentric governance

Success or failure of a polycentric system is a function of complex political and social processes, such as coordination between actors and venues to solve specialized policy problems. Yet there is currently no accepted method for isolating distinct processes of coordination, nor to understand how their variance affects polycentric governance performance. We develop and test a building-blocks approach that uses different patterns or “motifs” for measuring and comparing coordination longitudinally on Australia's Great Barrier Reef. Our approach confirms that polycentric governance comprises an evolving substrate of interdependent venues and actors over time. However, while issue specialization and actor participation can be improved through the mobilization of venues, such a strategy can also fragment overall polycentric capacity to resolve conflict and adapt to new problems. A building-blocks approach advances understanding and practice of polycentric governance by enabling sharper diagnosis of internal dynamics in complex environmental governance systems.     

The Meaning of Local in a Global Economy: The 'Region's Advocacy of Local Interests' as a Necessary Component of Current Global/Local Theories

Today's corporate strategy is resulting in the creation of a network enterprise. As geographic space is integrated in this strategy, it is not only the network enterprise that functions in a polycentric way, but also space. Therefore, a networked territory exists as another reality alongside the existing socio-political entities. In a global/local perspective, recent models of local economic development emphasize the role of the 'local' in local economic development. These theories stress the importance of socio-cultural environment, institutions and networking in local economic development. Without denying the importance of these characteristics, it is clear that even perfect 'local' conditions are not infallible localization forces. Just as globalization is not a kind of mystical force, neither are the forces of localization. To understand why there are winners and losers, localization forces must be regarded from the point of view of existing or absent common local interests and the local capacity to organize them. They are not mystical but they have very much to do with relationships of power not only within, but - resulting from the emergence of a networked territory - also outside the region. From this perspective the existence and the safeguarding of common local interests are not apparent. Local advocacy is therefore a necessity from the region's point of view.     

The economic impact of national competition policy on Australian regions

Over the past 7 years Australia has been undergoing substantial economic reform under a collaborative Federal and State government programme known as national competition policy. These reforms have increased the nation's productivity and international competitiveness, and are generally held responsible for Australia's increased growth rate in gross domestic product (GDP) per capita over the past decade. However, the reforms have been carried out against a background of increased interregional disparities, to which the reform programme may have partly contributed. In this study we examine a number of Australian studies that have used computable general equilibrium modelling to uncover the regional economic consequences of national competition policy.     

EMPIRICAL POLYCENTRICITY: THE COMPLEX RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN EMPLOYMENT CENTERS

Our paper empirically demonstrates that employment subcenters in large urban areas have important economic relationships with each other, and not solely with the central business district (CBD). Using data from Houston, Texas, we estimate polycentric density functions and show that “total” gradients differ from gradients using only own‐center coefficients. We model asymmetry by showing density is very different for centers with overlapping areas of influence. We conclude that subcenters have important yet heterogeneous linkages to each other in addition to the CBD, and that therefore the polycentric city is more complex than simply having additional centers mimicking the CBD.     

Sustaining China's Economic Growth: New Leaders,New Directions?

An American specialist on the economy of China assesses the options and obstacles the country's new leadership will face as it attempts to sustain the current economic growth trajectory in the future. Putting the current situation in historical context, the author first reviews the reforms leading up to the agenda advanced by the previous leadership team (led by Hu Jintao) and then examines the health of China's economy in late 2012 (a situation she argues is characterized by the exhaustion of three key drivers of growth). The paper advances the thesis that further reforms and improvements in technology will be essential to sustained growth, and that additional reforms will be necessary before sustained innovation can take root. As signs of successful further reform going forward, readers are advised to look to increased private-sector legitimacy, a decline in state-sector monopoly power, and strengthening of legal foundations for reform policies.     

From Core-periphery to Polycentric Development: Concepts of Spatial and Aspatial Peripherality

Technical changes in the field of transport, communication and information technology, together with long-term structural shifts will, in the new century, allow a degree of spatial reorganization of European economic activity. The validity of conventional (spatial) models of peripherality is increasingly questionable. They should be supplemented by more appropriate 'aspatial' concepts. Although many elements of these are already well understood, coherent models and operational indicators are required. These could provide a sound theoretical basis on which to further the European Spatial Development Perspective's polycentric development objective. They could also provide new opportunities for peripheral regions, and relief from 'overheating' at the core.     

THE CONCEPTUAL LINKS BETWEEN RECREATION SITE DEVELOPMENT AND REGIONAL ECONOMIC IMPACTS*

ABSTRACT. Assessing regional economic impacts of recreation trips is important to public agencies' decisions about using recreation as a rural development tool. Minimizing the total cost of recreation trip production implies that households will spatially distribute their purchases of inputs to trip production, including both trip-specific inputs and durable recreation equipment. A recreation site contributes to a region's economic growth through household purchases of trip inputs. The site's cost effects, price information effects, and recreation and retail agglomeration effects cause changes in household recreation purchases and ultimately generate regional economic impacts.     

Reflections on Ukraine's Current Economic Dilemma

A prominent specialist on economic transition in the former Soviet Union presents an overview of Ukraine's economic dilemma in the aftermath of the most recent elections in that country. The author, a former economic advisor to Ukraine's government and co-chair of the UN's Blue Ribbon Commission for Ukraine, relates his insights into the causes of three acute problems (inflation, corruption, and the lack of structural reforms). Focusing on the state of economic affairs in 2008, the paper, which includes data on economic growth and exchange rates, discusses inter alia the hryvnia's peg to the dollar and the potential consequences of rising food and commodity prices. Included in the analysis is a comparison with Russia. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: E58, E60, O52, P26. 34 references.     

空间联系视角的沈阳市多中心城市结构研究

以沈阳市为研究案例,借鉴国际著名团队POLYNET的研究经验并加以改良,进行了空间联系视角的多中心城市结构的实证分析。分别从人口密度分布、就业-居住空间联系网络与企业空间组织网络三个维度来识别沈阳市的人口中心、就业中心与产业中心,综合分析这些"中心"得出四点结论:①城市核心区就业与居住中心构成十字交叉的内循环结构;②浑南新区次中心特征颇具雏形;③外围人口中心、就业中心与产业中心错位发展;④沈阳市呈现不均衡的多中心结构特征。     

World Bank Influence and Institutional Reform in Argentina

During the 1990s, reforms concerned with ‘good governance’ became popular with multilateral and bilateral lenders. This trend was led by the World Bank, which claimed that in order to achieve economic development, institutions mattered. This article looks at governance reforms in Argentina, specifically in the judicial sector, and contends that World Bank involvement affected the nature, reach and depth of these initiatives. The influence of the Bank can be traced through three dimensions that have characterized its approach to institutional reform: donor‐driven designs for project reform; reliance on technical approaches; and restricted forms of decision making in project initiatives. Such an approach to institutional change conditioned domestic reform in Argentina and contributed to piecemeal and inadequate initiatives. The author also argues that the Bank's approach in Argentina can be traced to wider strategies that derive from embedded institutional practices and ideological foundations within the institution that throw into question the Bank's capacities to promote such reforms.     

Polycentric Transformation in Kenyan Water Governance: A Dynamic Analysis of Institutional and Social‐Ecological Change

Beginning in 2002, Kenyan water governance transitioned from a monocentric, top‐down system to one exhibiting traits of polycentricity. In this paper, we investigate the changes made to water policy following the 2002 reform, outcomes produced in a collection of community‐ and catchment‐level user groups in the Mount Kenya region, and the conformance of these changes and outcomes with principles of polycentricity. A new framework is used to capture the complex institutional arrangements and interactions existing before and after the polycentric transformation. Unlike many previous polycentricity studies, the present research focuses primarily on the outcomes of the polycentric shift and determines if these correspond to predictions from polycentricity theory. We utilize survey data collected in 2013 from water managers, as well as archival research to interrogate congruence with principles of polycentricity. This study contributes to the broader discussion on polycentricity in two fundamental ways: (i) It documents the functioning of a water management system following a top‐down imposed polycentric reform, and (ii) It empirically inspects whether these polycentric reforms have produced benefits predicted by polycentricity theorists, such as experimentation by local water users, increased collective action, and improved coordination between levels of management.     

Balancing London? A Preliminary Investigation of the “Core Cities” and “Northern Way” Spatial Policy Initiatives Using Multi-City Corporate and Commercial Law Firms

This paper reports a preliminary investigation into the economic efficacy of two spatial frameworks—English Core Cities and the Northern Way—recently promoted by national policy makers. We ask whether they are consistent with contemporary economic process in the UK space economy through analyses of commercial multi-city law firms. The latter are treated as an “indicator sector” to define the contemporary UK space economy as practised by law firms. Within this new space of flows, the location strategies of the law firms do confirm the salience of the Northern Way (as trans-Pennine corridor) and Core Cities as part of a larger UK metropolitan space of flows. Conflating the two spatial frameworks leads us to identify hints of a rebalancing of London within a metropolitan UK space. A Manchester polycentric mega-city region is found to be the likely candidate for this role. This finding in no way impinges on London's dominant global role, and we conclude that perhaps mutuality between London and provincial cities is beginning to replace past negative dependency relations.     

The Political Economy of Environmental Policy Reform in Latin America

Many parts of the world are threatened with environmental damage and degradation, affecting both the natural resources and the economy of the area. This article analyses the factors affecting the likelihood of different environmental policy reforms in Latin America, with particular emphasis on: the strengths and weaknesses of different groups which promote such reforms; the degree to which the reforms are compatible with the region's current economic policies; and how the type of political regime affects these issues. It reaches the conclusion that, although there has been progress in recent years, the possibility of carrying out far-reaching reforms which could substantially reduce pollution and resource depletion has been limited by: 1) the difficulties involved in linking environmental issues with concerns for social justice; 2) economic policies which promote the exploitation of natural resources and labour and weaken the public sector; and 3) the great influence over regional governments of groups with vested interests in continuing environmentally destructive activities.     

Russia's Economic Transformation under Putin

A prominent specialist on the Russian economy presents a systematic account and analysis of Russia's economic transformation under President Vladimir Putin. The study covers the period from the financial crash of August 1998 through the years of spectacular growth leading to August 2004. The discussion encompasses the financial stabilization in the aftermath of the crash, the work of Putin's first economic team, the tax reform, tightened budgetary control, deregulation, land and judicial reforms, trade policies, the economic agenda for Putin's second term, and prospects for further economic reform. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: E60, E63, F13, H20, H60, P21. 1 figure, 2 tables, 57 references.     

Cost,price, and revenue differentials in electricity supply: Queensland and Australia

Queenslanders consume relatively less but pay more for electricity than most Australians, a penalty surprising in a State with the nation's largest sources of energy. An explanation lies in the industry's relative youth and dynamic performance, strong post-war capitalisation, inherent monopoly organisation and the issue of product differentiation expressed in peak/off-peak pricing. Such matters pose particular problems in the Queensland market which is numerically small and areally dispersed. Examination of production and distribution economics reveals that Queensland fuel is presently not cheap and that some of the penalty derives from the strong capitalisation which the system is undergoing. Further pressures lie in the lack of scale economies and in financial policies of supply authorities such as spatial price equalisation. Many factors bear on future prices and predictions are difficult. Nevertheless Queensland's energy advantages should ensure that unless major change transforms the economic environment the price of electricity relative to that in other States falls during the next two decades.     

Vietnam: Two Decades of Urban Development

Doi moi, adopted as a policy of economic reform in Vietnam in 1986, has ushered in fundamental and sweeping economic and social changes spearheaded by its cities. The paper, by a senior Hong Kong-based geographer, reviews the country's progress over a twodecade period ending in 2006. Discussion of the first decade focuses on deterioration of urban infrastructure and its causes (as well as the onset of reconstruction) based largely on field interviews, reconnaissance, and review of official documents and reports. Coverage of the second decade's more rapid change highlights legal reforms, privatization, foreign direct investment, as well as regional development. The favorable prognosis for urban Vietnam is examined in the context of the country's accession to the WTO and its hosting of the APEC Summit in late 2006. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: O10, O18, O30, P20. 4 figures, 1 table, 26 references.