Risk and Agricultural Land Use: A Reformulation of the Portfolio-Theoretic Approach to the Analysis of a von Thünen Economy

This paper extends the portfolio-theoretic approach to a von Thünen economy. It presents the farmer's decision problem as a mean-variance mathematical program, then examines the effect of increasing risk or risk aversion on land use. Risk seeking and the effect of competition on risk taking are also considered.     

The Price Theory of Thünen's Theory of Rent: Assumptions and Implications of a Familiar Model

Economic forces in the Thünen rent diagram and the equivalence of certain Thünian and Ricardian land rent concepts are shown diagrammatically. The usual, linear rent line requires fixed production coefficients in agriculture and constant costs in transportation. The ability to substitute among land and other inputs in agriculture makes the rent line convex to the origin, as do decreasing costs in transportation. Increasing cost transportation makes the rent line concave. Traditional, subsistence agriculture is likely to produce a more strongly convex rent line than modern, large-scale agriculture.
Les forces économiques dans le diagramme de rente de Thünen et l'equivalence de certains concepts de rente foncier Thünien et Ricardien sont exposés graphiquement. La courbe de rente linéaire exige des coëfficients de production fixes en agriculture et des coûts de transport fixes. La capacitéà substituer entre la terre et d'autres facteurs de production en agriculture, ainsi que des coûts de transport décroissants, donnent une courbe de rente convexe par rapport à 1'origine. Des coûts de transport accroissants donnent une courbe de rente concave. Une agriculture à petite échelle, traditionnelle, donnera probablement une courbe de rente plus convexe qu'une agriculture moderne, à grande échelle.     

民国时期成都平原的押租与押扣——兼与刘克祥先生商榷

成都平原是租佃制度发达的地区,押租制度在此地十分流行,不仅对该区域的农村经济产生了重要的影响,而且其自身的一些特点,也值得深入研究和探讨。通过对一些县级档案资料和土改档案资料的分析研究,可以看到近代成都平原的押租与押扣,并非如有关学者所说的仅仅是加强剥削的手段,它们有着更广泛的内涵,是该地区自然生态和社会生态环境的产物。缴纳押租,佃农不仅获得了土地的佃种权,而且通过押扣的方式使自己交出去的押租金获得了一定的利息。从制度上看,租佃双方的经济关系比清代以前更趋平等。     

The Redevelopmental State: Governing Surplus Life and Land in the ‘Urban Age’

This article theorizes changing configurations of development governance emerging as states attempt to reconcile two contradictory pressures of global urbanization: dispossessing capitalist accumulation and demands for inclusive welfare. It introduces the ‘redevelopmental state’ as a dynamic spatio‐political framework for understanding how hegemonic rule is tenuously forged amid potentially volatile urban land struggles. Whereas Northern urban redevelopment theories are less attentive to post‐colonial urbanization processes and most developmental state scholarship has not focused on cities, the redevelopmental state offers an alternative conceptualization. It centres on how emerging regimes of territorial rule, development and political participation contour access to land and social benefits in Southern cities. Forged at key conjunctures of social pressure, these redevelopmental state spaces work through and beyond formal policies and institutions, and articulate with nationalist cultural politics of belonging and aspiration that foster consent for redevelopment while also legitimating exclusions, violence and dispossession. A case study of Mumbai illustrates redevelopmental state spaces that suture ethno‐religious nationalism, urbanized accumulation and populist welfare to unevenly distribute life capacities, garnering both cooperation and contestation. The article concludes by suggesting ways this spatially attuned framing can provide insights into the recent rise of ethno‐nationalism and authoritarian populism around the world.     

Thinking Past Henri Lefebvre: Introducing “The Theory of Ground Rent and Rural Sociology”

This introduction to the translation of Henri Lefebvre's 1956 essay “The theory of ground rent and rural Sociology” moves through three stages. First, it suggests that Anglophone appropriations of Lefebvre have tended to focus too much on his urban writings, at the expense of understanding his early work on rural sociology, and failing to recognise how his urban focus emerged as a result of his interest in rural–urban transformation. Second, it provides a summary of his wider work on rural questions, including his unfinished work on a major treatise of rural sociology; and outlines the key themes of the present essay in relation to these other projects. Third, it connects Lefebvre's issues to wider debates in political economy and geography about aspects of the rural, land and ground rent, not least including the work of Antonio Gramsci and José Carlos Mariátegui.     

Rent,Real Estate,and Flood Mitigation in New Orleans East

This paper presents results from a study of environmental harm created in the collision of real estate speculation and the political process that governed extension of the urban frontier of New Orleans into its eastern wetlands. Near term concerns of rent‐seeking real estate capital and the contested politics of urban infrastructure expansion challenged a fragmented state charged with regulatory oversight and protection of investments in land and citizens. The paper engages theoretically the relative inattention of urban political ecology theory to rent as a way to theorize how capital flows through land, and argues for increased attention to the problem of land rent and the multiple scales of political engagement that manage ecological crisis immanent in the metabolism of nature and society under capitalism.     

Wildlife Management in Tanzania: State Control,Rent Seeking and Community Resistance

Despite a decade of rhetoric on community conservation, current trends in Tanzania reflect a disturbing process of reconsolidation of state control over wildlife resources and increased rent‐seeking behaviour, combined with dispossession of communities. Whereas the 1998 Wildlife Policy promoted community participation and local benefits, the subsequent policy of 2007 and the Wildlife Conservation Act of 2009 returned control over wildlife and over income from sport hunting and safari tourism to central government. These trends, which sometimes include the use of state violence and often take place in the name of ‘community‐based’ conservation, are not, however, occurring without resistance from communities. This article draws on in‐depth studies of wildlife management practices at three locations in northern Tanzania to illustrate these trends. The authors argue that this outcome is more than just the result of the neoliberalization of conservation. It reflects old patterns of state patrimony and rent seeking, combined with colonial narratives of conservation, all enhanced through neoliberal reforms of the past two decades. At the same time, much of the rhetoric of neoliberal reforms is being pushed back by the state in order to capture rent and interact with villagers in new and oppressive ways.     

Lifetimes of Disposability and Surplus Entrepreneurs in Bagong Barrio,Manila

Working in collaboration with Migrante International and drawing on testimony of residents in the remittance‐dependent, migrant‐sending community of Bagong Barrio in Caloocan City in Metro Manila, Philippines, we examine the systematic production of lifetimes of disposability that drives labour migration across the generations. The closure of factories and contractualisation of work in the 1980s created the conditions in which labour migration is not a choice but a necessity. Diligent use of remittances to pay for the education of their children in many cases has produced a new generation of overseas Filipino workers (OFWs), and investment in housing often is another route to OFW status. Alongside this narrative of ongoing precarity, we listen closely to the testimony of residents for ways of living that are both subsumed within and somewhat excessive to accounts that might render their lives as merely waste or wasted.     

Exploring a Relationship Between Aggregate and Individual Levels Spatial Data Through Semivariogram Models

Analysis of social data is frequently done using aggregate-level data. There may not be a direct interest in spatial relationships in the data, but the presence of spatial interdependence may still need to be taken into account. This article explores the aggregation effect from a spatial perspective by assuming nonzero covariance for individual data from two different groups. We investigate the bias associated with aggregate-level data for semivariogram analysis. We show that the bias mainly arises from the average of the semivariogram within the groups. It is also shown how aggregated-level data may be used to estimate parameters of an individual-level semivariogram model. A nonlinear regression method is proposed to carry out this estimation procedure and a simulation is done to clarify the results.     

Generating Confusion,Concern, and Precarity through the Right to Rent Scheme in Scotland

The Immigration Act 2016 has heralded an era of amplified Government intervention into day‐to‐day life, placing increased responsibility for border protection on UK citizens. Using interviews with representatives from the field of housing in Scotland, this paper examines one specific aspect of the Immigration Act 2016, the Right to Rent scheme. We investigate how the Right to Rent creates a precarious environment for all those who may appear to be non‐UK citizens. We argue that it may endorse senses of fantasy citizenship to inculcate people into acting on behalf of the state and is a driver for further division in society. Scotland provides a particularly interesting case study, as housing is a devolved power, but immigration is not. This creates an additional layer of tension in our interview data, as housing organisations are faced with a set of conditions imposed from Westminster, infringing on a field that Scotland has self‐determined for some time. Our interviews illustrate the level of confusion around the scheme, the fact that it is increasing criminalisation in the housing sector, and stresses that the scheme is offloading state responsibility for border protection.     

Artificial Scarcity in Housebuilding and the Impact on Affordability: The Return of Absolute Rent

The slow response of volume housebuilders to changes in demand has been cited as a contributing cause of a global crisis of housing affordability and allegations of land banking have persistently dogged the industry. This article reviews the supply responsiveness of speculative housebuilders in the United Kingdom and Australia through the neglected Marxian analytic category of absolute rent. Absolute rent directs attention to the relationship between the value of land and the cost of housing and models a market in which landowners may withdraw land from supply to inflate prices. Through the lens of absolute rent, the real estate practices of the housebuilding industry can be understood as a strategy of artificial scarcity straddling land and housing markets. The findings of this investigation demonstrate the insights to be gained by a return to absolute rent that valuably expand the current debate on the supply and cost of housing.     

文化旅游资源分类赋权价值评估模型与实测

文化旅游资源的科学分类与价值评估是资源科学的重要基础理论问题.本文引入分类赋权思想,运用模糊评价与层次分析方法,综合主客观赋权,构建了遗址遗迹类文化旅游资源、建筑空间类文化旅游资源、商品类文化旅游资源、活动类文化旅游资源的价值评估模型.对大湘西地区文化旅游资源进行分类与价值评估实测表明,文化旅游资源价值分类赋权评估模型具有合理性与可推广性,可为文化旅游资源的分类与评价、文化旅游的规划与开发提供科学依据.     

Surplus Production and Marine Resource Use in the North Norwegian Iron Age

The coast of northern Norway was an important dried‐cod production area during the Medieval period. During the Iron Age, marine resources had also played a vital role in the economy of the inhabitants in the region. The increase in marine harvesting post c.AD 600, as substantiated by archaeological finds, suggests that mass maritime goods, in addition to those goods of a prestigious character, were a significant part of the chiefly provisioning system of the Iron Age.