‘Social Exclusion’ Discourse and Chronic Poverty: A South African Case Study

This article questions the export of ‘social exclusion’ discourse to the field of development and poverty studies. It considers the findings of ongoing research into chronic poverty in the Western Cape district of Ceres, one of the centres of the South African deciduous fruit export industry. It explores the links between the livelihood options of poor people and processes of global integration, agro‐food restructuring and the modernization of paternalist farming styles. In this context the concept of ‘social exclusion’ is of only limited utility, and has significant disadvantages. Although it has the potential to focus attention on the disabling effects of poverty, its most common usage often fails to capture how poverty can flow not only from exclusion but also from processes of integration into broader economic and social networks. The author argues that these are better captured by the notion of ‘adverse incorporation’, and calls for a more cautious approach to the modernizing myths and moralizing narratives that shape policy debates.     

Anglican Evangelical Theology,c. 1820–1850: The Case of Edward Bickersteth

The period between the 1780s and the 1830s is widely acknowledged to be a formative one for Anglican Evangelical identity. It was the age of Simeon, Wilberforce, and the Clapham Sect, a time when polite culture became imbued with moral seriousness, and when pious causes came to the centre of the political stage. Yet while it is equally well known that the late 1820s witnessed a significant change in mood and direction, prompted by the passing of an earlier generation of leaders, missionary failure and theological fragmentation, the Anglican Evangelical movement in the second quarter of the nineteenth century has received comparatively little attention. Evangelicals appear frequently in work on the Oxford Movement and Broad Church, but often only as two‐dimensional reactionaries ripe for the protagonists to trample. Edward Bickersteth (1786–1850) is therefore a particularly interesting figure, having risen to prominence in the 1810s and 1820s but in the 1830s and 1840s becoming one of the movement's acknowledged leaders. By showing how the coming man of the earlier period negotiated rockier territory later on, this article seeks to explore not just the changes but also the striking continuities in Evangelical thought. For even if, as Grayson Carter has argued in an excellent recent study, the ecclesiastical changes of the 1820s and 1830s forced Anglican Evangelicals, like others, to reconsider their place in the Church of England, Bickersteth was among the most prominent of the majority who, while unhappy with developments in politics and theology, remained loyal to their Church.     

Gender,Pay Equity and Human Service Work: A New South Wales Case Study

The 1998 New South Wales Pay Equity Inquiry demonstrates some limitations of dominant theoretical approaches to the undervaluation of work in female-dominated occupations and industries. Campaigns for equal pay could be enriched with a firmer understanding of the complexity of caring and emotional labour in women's paid human service occupations such as nursing, hairdressing and childcare. Such understandings can help redefine skill and worth so as more thoroughly to recognise and reward interpersonal work performed in female-dominated service occupations. Rejecting common moral and economic objections to placing monetary values on these traditionally feminine and ostensibly ‘non-economic’s activities is another ingredient for the historic achievement of gender pay equity.     

The Candidates of the Liberal Unionist Party, 1886–1912*

Historians have hitherto based discussion of the electoral performance of the Liberal Unionist Party on incomplete data regarding the candidates of the party, as published sources, including F.W.S. Craig's British Parliamentary Election Results, 1885–1918, the standard reference work, include a number of cases where the party label of a Unionist candidate (either Liberal Unionist or Conservative) is uncertain or incorrect. Utilising a wide range of primary and secondary sources, this article resolves a number of these cases, and thus creates the most accurate list of Liberal Unionist candidates available. The creation of this list allows for accurate analysis of the party's history, and the article makes some preliminary observations based on the data presented. Among these observations are that the Liberal Unionists comprised a consistent percentage of the overall Unionist Party in the house of commons, that the number of seats contested by Liberal Unionists remained steady through the January 1910 election, and that existing interpretations of the electoral pact between the Liberal Unionists and Conservatives may be flawed.     

Indigenous management of teak woodland in Zimbabwe, 1850–1900

African forests provide the focus for a growing body of historical research. This study draws on economic and environmental history approaches in exploring the exploitation and conservation of woodland, respectively. The main focus of the investigation is the consumption–conservation relationship between pre-colonial African people and the forest zone, an interaction viewed by colonial foresters in Zimbabwe as wasteful and based on religious superstition. In spite of the open criticism of rapacious timber cutting by mining companies and poor farming techniques by settlers, colonial perceptions over time stressed the notion of ‘improvident Africans’ as the prime cause of environmental destruction, in particular, deforestation and erosion. Within the African context, historical forest literature is bound to reject colonial misconceptions regarding the scope of indigenous woodland management. Customary forest practice in the Zambezi teak or Baikiea woodland points towards a better understanding on the subject, informed by a wide range of sources; oral tradition, missionary records, travel accounts and colonial documents. In reconstructing pre-colonial resource use from interviews and archival data, this study adopts a multi-source approach, while guarding against an overly romanticised view of indigenous practice.     

Ceremony and Citizenship: African American Weddings, 1945–60

Following the Second World War, many Americans embraced the white wedding – an event marked by conspicuous consumption, gendered roles and responsibilities, and welcoming of ‘traditions’ such as formal dress, proper vows and post‐ceremony reception. For aspiring, middle‐class and elite African Americans, the wedding served a dual purpose. Through the ceremony, they demonstrated adherence to the ideals of post‐war American citizenship while preserving distinct cultural practices and values. Focusing primarily on the upwardly mobile black community of Indianapolis between 1945 and 1960, this article emphasises the wedding as a site of both personal and public significance. Adoption and enactment of the white wedding reinforced the strength of the black family and declared African Americans’ rightful belonging to the American middle‐class community.