The geographical lives of commodities: problems of analysis and critique

In two programmatic essays, Peter Jackson has reviewed new critical research on the geographical lives of commodities. This paper offers a constructive critique of his particular reading of this research. It is argued that three major issues require urgent attention if critical geographers and fellow‐travellers are to take their commodity research forward. First, there is too much imprecision in the use of the related terms ‘commodities’, ‘commodification’ and ‘commoditization’. This threatens to render all three terms meaningless or at the very least confusing. Secondly, this lack of conceptual clarity is linked to the problem of superficial engagements with normative issues. It is argued that the recent geographical research on commodities has thus far glossed over important questions of both academic and lay judgement. Finally, the paper suggests that the ‘modest’ role for critical academics envisaged by Jackson and other commodity researchers is only defensible if questions of voice, message and audience are addressed systematically. Overall, the paper presents a menu of explanatory and normative issues that require attention if critical commodity analysts like Jackson are to maximize the potential of their research agenda.     

The Puzzle of Group Ranch Subdivision in Kenya's Maasailand

This article explores the motivations underlying Maasai pastoralists' support for the subdivision and parcellization of their collectively held group ranches, an outcome that is inconsistent with theoretical expectation. Examining four group ranches that formed part of the wave of subdivisions that occurred in the 1980s, it finds that Maasai herders were inclined to support subdivision in order to capture gains in a new property assignment or to reduce distributional disadvantages within the status quo. Importantly, however, subdivision also emerged as a critical defensive strategy against internal and external threats to Maasai land claims. Incorporating this defensive strategy (aimed at securing individual claims) within the individual's calculus for seeking exclusive rights provides insights into why a theoretically unexpected property rights transformation took place.     

Teaching geographical data analysis: problems and possible solutions

Abstract

Conventional courses in geographical data analysis have major problems of student background, statistical validity, geographical relevance and intellectual inertia. An alternative approach, based upon the methods of data analysis advocated by Tukey, is proposed.     

The geographical distribution of Labour

The small volcanic and limestone islands of the Lesser Antilles, in the eastern Caribbean, have a continuous history of commercial agricultural production which goes back 370 years. During this period, conditions of the environment, both natural (volcanoes, earthquakes, hurricanes, droughts) and human‐induced (deforestation, erosion, land degradation and reduction in the water‐table), have interfered with development in a variety of ways. The paper reviews past and present situations, and considers how growing sectoral imbalances may accentuate the resulting problems.     

Post-electoral politics in Italy: institutional problems and political perspectives

A dysfunctional electoral law and an obsolete bicameral Parliament contributed to the surprising results of the 24–25 February 2013 Italian elections, which have solved none of Italy's institutional and political problems. This article briefly analyses the distribution of votes, stressing especially that the success of the Five Stars Movement derives from the dissatisfaction and the protest of a significant sector of the electorate. Beppe Grillo, like Silvio Berlusconi, is a political entrepreneur, who through patience, hard work and commitment has constructed an organization with a wide geographical following. The presence in Parliament of the Five Stars Movement made the election of the President of the Republic very difficult. President Napolitano was obliged to accept an unprecedented second term and then led the Democratic Party, the People of Freedom and Civic Choice to form an unusual government, almost a sort of Grand Coalition. The government is here briefly assessed. The article ends underlining two critical aspects of the situation. Neither the Italian parties nor the party system have succeeded in reaching a satisfactory level of consolidation and stability. This means that the President of the Republic has been obliged to make good the shortcomings of the political parties. Even malgré soi, the President's behaviour has given rise to a situation in which his own position raises the urgent need for institutional reforms along the lines of the semi-presidential mould of the French Fifth Republic to bring to a close Italy's overlong political transition.     

The first Italian geographical congress

EUROPE.

A Geography of Ireland. By O. J. R. Howarth. The Oxford Geographies Edited by A. J. Herbertson. Oxford: At the Clarendon Press, 1911. Price 2s. 6d.

The Place‐Names of Berkshire. By the Rev. Walter R. Skeat. Oxford: At the Clarendon Press, 1911. Price 2s. net.

Nooks and Corners of Yorkshire. By J. S. Fletcher. With a Map. London: Eveleigh Nash, 1911. Price 2s. 6d. net.

ASIA.

The Story of Korea. By Joseph H. Longford, late His Majesty's Consul at Nagasaki; Professor of Japanese, King's College, London; Barrister‐at‐law, Middle Temple; Author of “The Story of Old Japan.” With Thirty‐three Illustrations and Three Maps. London and Leipsic: T. Fisher Unwin, 1911. Price 10s. 6d. net.

AFRICA.

The Opening‐up of Africa. By Sir H. H. Johnston, G.C.M.G., K.C.B. Home University Library of Modern Knowledge. London: Williams and Norgate. Price 1s. net.

“Yakusu” The Very Heart of Africa. Being some Account of the Protestant Mission at Stanley Falls, Upper Congo. By H. Sutton Smith, Baptist Missionary Society. London and Edinburgh: Marshall Brothers, Limited, 1911. Price 6s.

GENERAL.

British Plants: Their Biology and Geology. By J. F. Bevis, B.A., B.Sc., and H. J. Jeffrey, A.R.C.Sc. London: Alston Rivers, 1911. Price 4s. 6d. net.     

The political geography of macro-level turnout in American political development

Aggregate turnout rates are among the central indicators of democratic performance in the American polity. Despite the considerable implications of macro turnout, however, most studies of turnout focus instead on the micro level. As a consequence, we know little about how local, political, and historical influences have impacted turnout over the course of American political development. The result is a somewhat impoverished conception of turnout that often removes the political from political participation. In this article, I argue for a new, macro-level perspective that highlights the political dimension of turnout by placing turnout in the local political settings in which it has taken place. I contrast two competing explanations of macro turnout variation across local electorates, a political account and Elazar's cultural thesis, and discuss their implications for the political geography of macro turnout in American electoral history. I then examine this political geography by employing a local indicator of spatial association (a LISA statistic) to identify the spatial structuring of macro turnout in the United States from 1828 through 2000. I demonstrate that a political perspective provides greater leverage than Elazar's cultural perspective in explaining the political geography of macro turnout in the United States.