Moscow in the 1990s: Market Reform and the Central City

The built environmental reflects in tangible ways the values of the societies of which it is a part. Soviet cities developed in accordance with the precepts of socialism for more than half a century, and nowhere were the consequences more palpable than in the central city. The present paper examines changes in urban development and management now under way in Moscow as a consequence of the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the advent of fundamental economic and political restructuring. More specifically it explores the impact of the new political economy on central Moscow's employment structure, housing stock, and land use, and assesses the attitudes of business representatives and residents to these changes. 5 figures, 2 tables, 25 references.     

The Receiving End of Reform: Everyday Responses to Neoliberalisation in Southeastern Mexico

Abstract: This article builds upon the literature on neoliberalism and environment as well as studies on community forestry by examining the creative accommodations that rural producers have made in navigating Mexico's neoliberal turn. In contrast to previous work that emphasizes macro‐level processes (eg privatization of public natural resources) and local resistance, I employ Bourdieu's theory of practice to examine the symbolic and material dimensions of local responses to neoliberal policy reform. Drawing on research from nine communities in the state of Quintana Roo, I argue that local producers have accommodated neoliberal policies and programs by adopting hybrid logics, property regimes, forms of organization, and modes of exchange. Moreover, I contend that these creative responses constitute elements of a longstanding “culture of accommodation” to institutional change that predates Mexico's neoliberal reforms.     

The compactness of federal electoral districts in Canada in the 1980s and 1990s: an exploratory analysis

Considerations of the compactness and aesthetics of electoral districts have loomed large in the litigation surrounding the last round of US redistricting. For a variety of reasons, we expect that there will be increasing pressure on Canadian electoral cartographers to provide opportunities for protected minorities to be represented in the country's federal legislature. As a result, we expect that future electoral maps may well embody a tradeoff between compactness and other representational and cartographic desiderata. We look for evidence of this in an exploratory analysis of the last two federal electoral maps (adopted in 1987 and 1996) and in so doing we offer the first country-wide assessment of the compactness of Canadian federal electoral districts (FEDs). The results demonstrate the importance of natural boundaries in the achievement of district compactness. Strong evidence of a decline in the compactness of FEDs between the two maps is not forthcoming, however. Thus there is relatively little sign that Canadian electoral districts will be open to the kind of aesthetically-based legal challenges that American Congressional Districts faced in the 1990s. However, the analyses we report establish an important baseline against which the next electoral map, to be produced following the 2001 census, can be compared.     

“冷战”的起源与终结——世界历史的视角

20世纪的世界体系经历了从"解构"到"局部重构"、再到"全面重构"的历史过程。冷战处于世界体系的"局部重构"阶段。这种特殊的国际关系形态既反映了世界体系结构的内在矛盾,也反映了世界体系与国际体系的张力与互动。冷战史表达的结构性矛盾不仅是一般意义上的国家利益竞争和国际关系中的霸权之争,更具实质性的是两种对抗性社会制度及其指导性意识形态的斗争。冷战后的历史运动表明,冷战终结并非人类社会在发展道路选择上的最后结果。后冷战时代世界体系结构性矛盾的升级和深化使国际社会面临诸多现实的挑战和风险。由于世界体系层面全球治理机制的滞后,缺乏公共产品支撑的国际体系面临失范的风险,后冷战时代的世界正呈现出难以把握的"不确定性"。     

The United States and the Middle East at the End of the Cold War

Books reviewed in this article:
Burton I. Kaufman, The Arab Middle East and the United States: Inter-Arab Rivalry and Super-Power Diplomacy
Michael W. Suleiman (ed.), U.S. Policy on Palestine from Wilson to Clinton     

The Pluralist Paradox: The Decline of Economic Interest Groups in Zambia in the 1990s

New democracies attempting to implement political and economic reform simultaneously are considered to face a dilemma, as democratization may undermine economic reform by encouraging political participation and empowering interest groups that are unlikely to benefit from reform. This article compares relations between interest groups and the government under one‐party and multiparty rule in Zambia. Contrary to the assumptions of pluralist theory, the article argues that the influence of interest groups declined as a result of political and economic liberalization. Political liberalization in Zambia has so far resulted in a proliferation of civic associations and a weakening of corporatist links between the state and economic interest groups that had been granted some real influence in the previous authoritarian regime. This ‘pluralist paradox’ has meant, at least in the initial phases of multiparty rule, that interest group resistance has not constituted a significant threat to the sustainability of the reform programme, or to the electoral prospects of the Movement for Multiparty Democracy (MMD).     

The Great Russian Depression of the 1990s: Observations on Causes and Implications

A senior Japanese economist briefly examines the causes of Russia's great economic depression of the 1990s, highlighting the important role of the ruble exchange rate. The author argues that “liberalization” of exchange markets contributed substantially to the depression, because of the “dual” nature of the Russian economy (strong energy sector and weak manufacturing sector). Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: E50, E58, F31. 7 tables, 22 references.     

Neoliberalism and Suburban Employment: Western Sydney in the 1990s

During the past 15 years metropolitan planning strategies of the NSW state government have done little to address the spatial distribution of either employment or labour market equity within the metropolis. In the fast‐growing outer western suburbs, the government has focused on attracting business investment to increase the stock of local jobs and to improve employment ‘self‐sufficiency’— a dominantly neoliberal policy framework. This paper explores a widening gulf between the reality of outer urban change and this policy framework by considering changes in the location of jobs and in the employment experiences of residents in Greater Western Sydney (GWS). Evidence is drawn from census journey‐to‐work data (1991–2001). While holding a majority of manufacturing jobs in Sydney, GWS also experienced continued growth of jobs in service industries during the 1990s. Yet the relative importance of employment in the city's fast‐growth finance and business services sector still lags well behind that of inner and northern parts of the city. The focus on growing the regional stock of jobs has not addressed problems of labour market access faced by residents of particular localities and the goal of employment self‐sufficiency has not delivered greater equity to outer suburban labour markets. A focus on sufficiency of access to employment for residents of GWS draws attention not only to regional stocks of jobs but also to the provision of social infrastructure and state‐provided services to outer suburban populations as they continue to expand.     

The French Republic and Women's Access to Professional Work: Issues and Controversies in France from the 1870s to the 1930s

While the French feminist movements campaigning to obtain the right to vote between the 1870s and the 1930s are well known, the struggles for women's access to higher education and professional work have not yet been studied in depth. Although the French Third Republic (1871–1940) claimed to adhere to the principles of equality, meritocracy and the ‘free competition of talents’, which translated concretely into the creation of a system of scholarships, competitions and professional degrees which provided access to many of the professional careers, these doors remained largely closed to the first women attempting to enter them. The controversies that this situation provoked are the subject of this article, which draws from professional, parliamentary, press and activist sources. More broadly, through examining this particular series of controversies, the article aims to give an account of the mechanisms and arguments that are generally used to make such discriminations publicly acceptable within institutional spaces that are formally governed by the principle of equal access.