Rethinking Aboriginal ‘Resistance’: The Community Development Employment (CEPD) Program

In this paper I wish to contribute to an understanding of ‘Aboriginal resistance’ by a study of the politics of remote Aborigines' ‘employment’. I begin by highlighting some themes in recent discussions of the Community Development Employment Projects (cdep ) policy, before looking back at some features of the welfare and pastoral economy in the Central Australian hinterland, c. 1950 to c. 1975. My aim is twofold: to show some of the cultural continuities in the relationships between remote Aborigines and government; and to criticise constructively the notion of ‘Aboriginal resistance’, to advocate a structural and processual notion of ‘resistance’ and to move away from one based on the clear identification of actors.     

Beyond the Property Rights Approach: Welfare Policy and the Reform of State‐Owned Enterprises in China

During the pre‐reform era, Chinese state‐owned enterprises (SOEs) operated not only as firms, but also as mini‐welfare states, providing employees with lifetime employment, inexpensive housing, free health care, and pensions. Since China’s market transition began in the late 1970s, however, SOEs have had to bear increasingly heavy burdens for welfare provisions to their employees. The steep increase in welfare spending has not only eroded the base of state revenue, but has also impeded further SOE reforms. To lighten welfare burdens upon SOEs and to remove institutional obstacles to marketization and privatization embedded in the existing welfare system, the Chinese state has imposed many welfare reforms aimed at shifting responsibilities for welfare provision from SOEs to a combination of government, enterprises, communities, and individuals. This article examines the belated welfare reforms in China’s state sector and their impact upon the reform of SOEs. It finds that reform implementation has been sluggish. To achieve the policy goal of welfare reforms, high degrees of state autonomy and capacity are needed.     

Governing Warlpiri Subjects: Indigenous Employment and Training Programs in the Central Australian Mining Industry

In remote Australia there is an expanding emphasis on the employment and training of Indigenous people in the mining industry. Employment and training programs are presented as an effective strategy for breaking welfare dependence and empowering individuals and communities to take responsibility for their future. Using the case of programs targeting Warlpiri people's participation in the gold mining industry in the Tanami Region of the Northern Territory of Australia, this paper explores some of the different ways in which Warlpiri people are being governed. It investigates the endeavours, through various practices and discourses, to constitute Warlpiri people as particular kinds of neoliberal and ‘job ready’ subjects. Whilst the employment and training programs claim to respect the culture and liberties of Warlpiri people, there are clearly outlined attempts to construct self‐reliant, autonomous and active individuals. Finally, the paper explores the potential links between rationalisations justifying the programs and the current concern, at the level of state and national governments, to direct various populations into work.     

Monitoring to Learn,Learning to Monitor: A Critical Analysis of Opportunities for Indigenous Community‐Based Monitoring of Environmental Change in Australian Rangelands

Indigenous community‐based monitoring has been a central feature in many international attempts to improve monitoring of and local adaptation to environmental change. Despite offering much promise, Indigenous community‐based monitoring has been underutilised in natural resource management in Australia, particularly within the remote, semi‐arid rangelands. This paper discusses contextual social and environmental factors that may help to explain this apparent deficiency, before critically analysing key stakeholder perceptions of the roles for, and challenges of monitoring in the Alinytjara Wilur ara Natural Resources Management region in the north‐west of South Australia. The analysis guides a discussion of responses to better integrate monitoring in general, and Indigenous community‐based monitoring in particular, into regional environmental management approaches. We argue that community‐based monitoring offers a range of benefits, including: better coordination between stakeholders; a heightened ability to detect and respond to climatic trends and impacts; the effective utilisation of Indigenous knowledge; employment opportunities for managing and monitoring natural resources; and improved learning and understanding of rangeland socio‐ecological systems. Identified opportunities for spatial and temporal community monitoring designed for the Alinytjara Wilur ara region could be of value to other remote rangeland and Indigenous institutions charged with the difficult task of monitoring, learning from, and responding to environmental change.     

Capital Assistance for Small Firms: Some Implications for Regional Economic Welfare

This paper analyzes the role of finance capital in regional economic development. A cost‐benefit approach is invoked in order to estimate the welfare impacts of a regional loan and guarantee program for small firms in Israel. Program‐created employment is treated as a benefit and an employment account that separates net from gross employment, is presented. An estimate of net wage benefits is then derived. This involves adjusting wages across different earnings classes in order to account for the variation in opportunity costs of labor at different levels. The estimation of costs includes the opportunity costs of capital, administration, default, and tax‐raising costs. Results point to substantial regional welfare effects. We stress the need to account for changing regional economic structure in this kind of evaluation framework.     

“You Cannot Trade What Is Not Yours”: Indigenous Governance and the NAFTA Negotiations

ABSTRACT

Contemporary International Relations scholars and practitioners generally recognize that substate governments affect the state’s international affairs; however, there is less acceptance of Indigenous governments as global actors that meaningfully impact the state. After all, the expectation would be that central governments, with considerably more resources and power, would be unlikely to face a challenge from an Indigenous government. However, Indigenous governments are negotiating new relationships with foreign and domestic governments, forming economic development corporations, hiring private firms to raise capital, funding trade missions, and even opening offices in key international locales such as Beijing to engage in trade promotion and push investment opportunities in projects such as resource extraction. Applying paradiplomacy theory, which argues that International Relations cannot be properly explained absent the global affairs of substate governments, this article analyzes the effect of Indigenous peoples and governance in the Canada–US trade relationship. It specifically considers how Indigenous engagement in the global economy affects the bilateral trade regime, foreign direct investment, and cross-border trade. The driver for these analysis centers on demands for the inclusion of a so-called “Indigenous chapter” in the North American Free Trade Agreement renegotiations in 2017 and 2018.     

Competitive Pressures and the Emergence of Mothers' Aid Programs in the United States

Do states compete in providing (or not providing) welfare services? Do competitive pressures shape state welfare program adoption? Even though interstate competition is viewed by some to be a ubiquitous feature of the American federal system and welfare state, there is mixed evidence as to whether such pressures have influenced cash assistance policy in the United States. Although evidence exists of competitive pressures in contemporary welfare program decisions, such pressures have not been found in examinations of early state welfare programs. To reconcile this seeming contradiction, I examine the impact of neighboring state behavior on the emergence of state Mothers’ Aid cash assistance programs during the early part of the twentieth century. Linking theory of intergovernmental competition to program diffusion, I argue that competitive pressures may play a greater role as programs evolve past the circumstances of initial adoption to decisions about program maintenance. Contrary to previous research, I find that state decisions regarding Mothers’ Aid were responsive to similar decisions in neighboring states. Further, there is evidence that women's political organizations were important to Mothers’ Aid adoption but not to how states subsequently structured those programs.     

Welfare Reform and Economic and Housing Capacity for Low-Income Households, 1997–1999

The 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) marked the continued devolution of social policy to state and local government in addition to restructuring an ailing welfare system. Despite concerns that welfare recipients would find greater obstacles to economic stability as a result, declining welfare rolls have been accompanied by declining poverty rates over the past seven years. An important question is whether low‐income families have gained greater employment and housing capacity following welfare reform. Moreover, does capacity vary across states with different welfare policies? In addition, do families face greater economic vulnerability with respect to food scarcity and health care? This article uses the data from the 1997 and 1999 waves of the National Survey of America's Families to systematically assess differences in capacity and vulnerability among lower income families across different policy regimes. Using two measures of capacity for housing and employment, and quality of life, findings suggest that more stringent welfare rules are related to greater job and housing attainment but a reduced quality of life.     

Diplomatic relations through wartime alliance: the Republic of China's relations with Canada

Relations between China and Canada began 150 years ago with the arrival of Chinese immigrants in British Columbia. However, formal diplomatic relations were not established until 1942, when Canada and the Republic of China (ROC) became wartime allies in their common fight against the Axis powers. The Canadian government soon passed a China aid program and earmarked 52 million Canadian dollars in war materials for China. This aid program was not favored by either the United States or Great Britain, but was unilaterally adopted by the wartime Canadian government. However, shipments of war materials destined for unoccupied China were blocked by geographic barriers and could not reach their destination. Canada's China aid program continued during the immediate post‐war years. The main motivation was economic: to get rid of Canada's surplus war materials and to develop bilateral trade relations. The aid program came to a halt in late 1948 only when China's political development made the Canadian government change its China policy. Afterward, Canada's diplomatic relations with ROC were stringently maintained until the Canadian government granted diplomatic recognition to the People's Republic of China in 1970. This article is a brief survey of the Canada–ROC relations during those years.     

城镇劳动就业与中国改革的发轫

劳动就业不仅是现代社会必须解决的基本问题之一,也是社会改革的推动力。20世纪70年代末的中国城镇劳动就业就是如此。中国政府通过改革的方式顺利解决了当时严峻的就业问题,为社会的发展和进一步改革创造了稳定的环境。这一实践增进了人们对社会经济发展规律的认识,加深了人们对生产关系与生产力相互关系的理解,为中国经济体制的改革奠定了一方面的基础。     

“Why would they care?”: Youth,resource extraction,and climate change in northern British Columbia,Canada

Discussion about local decision making tends to overlook rural and remote youth engagement. Resource extractive industries are, however, fixtures in many rural, remote, northern, and Indigenous communities in settler colonial British Columbia, Canada. These industries shape youths' perceived options for social and economic ventures when they are looking towards their futures. By engaging literature on climate change, settler colonialism, and critical Indigenous studies, and drawing on empirics from workshops conducted with youth from northern British Columbia, this paper explores how rural and remote northern and Indigenous youth engagement and perspectives can transform discussions on climate change and resource extraction. The paper documents how rural and northern youth have been engaged in environmental decision making, particularly in light of resource extraction. The paper also suggests that environmental decision making has at times been extractive itself. The paper concludes that when engaged meaningfully, youth desire to work collectively against social and environmental injustices.     

Actors,Decisions and Policy Changes in Local Urbanization

Land-use policies have long been recognized as important driving forces of urbanization, but little research has been conducted on the interrelationship of actors, policy decision processes and changes in the built environment. In this paper, we use the advocacy coalition framework to analyse policy decisions that affected the development of the built environment in three Swiss municipalities between 1970 and 2007. We found that all three municipalities experienced the same major policy changes, namely a new definition of the role of urban management (1970s); the adoption of an environment- and problem-oriented approach in land-use planning (1980s) as well as an increased emphasis on public participation and intra-municipal coordination (1990s). Although national laws and actors have shaped the crucial driving forces of urban change, local actors, their coalitions and the local distribution of resources crucially determined these decisions in the study period. Our findings suggest that a stronger focus on local actors, their coalitions and resources could greatly improve our understanding of spatial development processes in Switzerland. For instance, as land ownership turned out to be a crucial resource, Swiss municipalities could benefit from engaging more actively in the land market.     

‘Brothel of the Pacific’: Syphilis and the Urban Regulation of Laikini Wahine in Honolulu, 1855–75

ABSTRACT

By 1860, Hawai‘i’s Indigenous population had declined by 75 per cent when compared to its estimated pre-contact level. Legislators and physicians attributed this crisis to the seasonal migration of Hawaiian prostitutes. After contracting syphilis from sailors in Honolulu, these women returned to their Native villages where they unwittingly spread the disease. Drawing on legislation, health reports, and newspapers, this article underscores the urban-rural nature of Hawai‘i’s syphilis epidemic by analyzing the 1860 Act to Mitigate the Evils and Diseases Arising from Prostitution (ATM). The law compelled prostitutes to enlist on a government registry, undergo medical inspections, and submit to treatment if infected. Arresting depopulation, adherents argued, hinged on the government’s ability to police Indigenous women within a conspicuous urban environment. In designing and enacting the ATM, legislators and physicians characterized Honolulu as a syphilitic breeding ground that catalyzed Indigenous depopulation by sheltering transient carriers of this highly gendered disease.     

‘They'd Rather Go Play Footy’: an Exploratory Study of the Enjoyment and Benefits of the Arts in Western Australia's Remote Murchison Region

The role of the arts in the revitalisation and strengthening of Australia's rural, remote, and Indigenous communities has been of particular interest to Australian State and Federal Governments, as reflected through various policy and positioning documents. In order to understand the relationship between the arts and communities, it is important to explore why people engage in the arts and what might be some of the barriers to that engagement. For the rural, remote and Indigenous communities of the Murchison Region, the arts has been a useful way of reaching and engaging with residents to build a stronger sense of community, provide light relief and entertainment, and facilitate communication among community members, government, and industry. However, there are several barriers that impact on the viability of arts projects. These barriers are amplified in rural and remote areas, and particularly for the three case study communities of the Murchison Region for a number of reasons. These include the transient nature of the population, a lack of resources, isolation and remoteness, and local politics, culture and history. The arts can provide a context in which other non‐arts related outcomes, such as health, capacity building, income generation, and so on, are facilitated and achieved. It is important for policy makers to recognise and address the barriers which hinder activity and serve to lessen the impact of the arts on communities.     

Common Counsel,Common Policy: Healthcare,Missions and the Rise of the ‘Voluntary Sector’ in Colonial Tanzania

Analysis of the voluntary sector in sub‐Saharan Africa has tended to focus on the role of the NGO, and the types of relationships this institution establishes and maintains with donors, national governments and the communities with which they work. The voluntary sector in Africa is therefore usually defined through, and often treated as synonymous with, the institution of the NGO. As a result, the boundaries of understandings of the ‘third sector’ space occupied by the vast number of NGOs — its origins, the nature of the relationship of voluntary sector actors to the state, the types of organizations that characterize the sector — have tended to reflect a narrow concern with the NGO type and its experiences. This article suggests that this view is too narrow in its gaze. The voluntary sector was not a creation of a post‐colonial (and especially post‐1970s) development crisis. It emerged from an evolving relationship between colonial‐era non‐state (voluntary) actors and governments determined to demonstrate that they were meeting their commitments to the welfare of Africans under their charge. Missions and mission welfare services, expanding across much of rural sub‐Saharan Africa by the beginnings of the twentieth century, and increasingly coordinated from the late 1920s and early 1930s, created the foundations for the emergence of sub‐Saharan Africa's formal voluntary sector as it exists today. This matters for more than just historical accuracy. To understand the constraints, challenges and opportunities faced by NGOs, we need to move beyond a narrow focus on the institution of the NGO itself, and look in addition to the environment in which it operates: its history, its evolution and the shifts that created those conditions.     

A Potential Case of Social Bankruptcy: States' AFDC Payments and Their Teen Birth Rates

Based on a pooled time series analysis that covers a 30-year period at five different time points—1960, 1970, 1980, 1985, and 1990—this research examines the relationship between states' Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) payments and teen birth rates. Drawing on rational choice theories, we expected the effects of states' AFDC payments on their teen birth rates to be positive, taking into account states' divorce rates, population change rates, unemployment rates, racial composition, and poverty rates. The effects of states'AFDC payments were significant in a negative direction in Model 1, a random effects model; they also were significant in a negative direction in Model 2 when we controlled for the effects of year; however, when we controlled for the effects of year and state in Model 3, they were not significant. The findings do not support assumptions regarding the incentive effects of welfare that underlie rational choice theories in states where teen birth rates are higher. If anything, teen birth rates are higher in states where AFDC payments are lower. Implications for policy and further research are discussed in relation to the positive effects of states' poverty and population change rates on the state teen birth rate problem.     

Intellectuals,Economic Reform and Social Change: Constraints and Opportunities in the Formation of a Nigerian Technocracy

Crisis and economic reforms have changed the status of intellectuals and their relations with dominant élites and policy makers. Because of the technical and ideological nature of these reforms, policy makers have tended to rely on intellectuals as opposed to bureaucrats to shape the agenda of change. This has converted a large number of intellectuals into technocrats and undermined the fabric of academic life in universities. Nowhere is this more pronounced than in developing countries with a large middle class and an economic or financial base that ensures some degree of independence from the multilateral financial institutions. Understanding the success or failure of economic reforms in developing countries requires some analysis of the complex relations between technocrats and political leaders and the societal constraints both sets of actors face. This article explores these issues in the context of Nigeria, whose academic community, bureaucrats and professionals grew in leaps and bounds in the 1970s, following an oil-induced boom. The crisis of the 1980s led to attempts at economic reform and a highly programmed strategy of political change in which academics played a leading role. The article examines the effectiveness of intellectuals in government, and compares the Nigeria case with technocratic experiments in Ghana, Botswana and Côte d?Ivoire.     

Commentary : Partication and representation in the 2002 ATSIC elections

This commentary updates earlier work on participation and representation in ATSIC elections. It adds analysis of the fifth round of ATSIC elections held in 2002 to those held in 1990, 1993, 1996 and 1999. It confirms and refines earlier findings relating to a number of different measures of participation and representation. It argues that overall voter turnout is reasonable given the voluntary nature of ATSIC elections. It discerns a distinctive geography of both voter turnout and candidate interest. It argues that women's participation in ATSIC elections as voters, candidates and in being elected as regional councillors is quite high, but that there is some falling away in women's election to the offices of commissioner and regional council chairperson. It notes some weakness in the representation of women as regional councillors in remote areas and an under-representation of councillors under the age of 35. It also discerns a distinctive geography in the election of Torres Strait Islanders to ATSIC regional councils. In all these instances, the commentary attempts to explain and understand the patterns of participation and representation, while also raising them as possible issues of concern for ATSIC. Explanations relate to ATSIC's program and service provision roles, different social meanings and types of Indigenous identity, the relative influence of European settlement norms on traditional patterns of Indigenous political behaviour, and the nature of public career life courses. The commentary suggests that the distinctive geographies and other patterns of participation and representation are both understandable and well entrenched, and are unlikely to change greatly in the future.     

Australian local government in the 1970s

Australian local government was the subject of a great deal of debate in the 1970s as attention focused on geographical boundaries, legal and constitutional jurisdiction, and financial imbalance. Little came of moves to reform boundaries or to alter the scope of activities. More success was achieved in applying the principle of fiscal equalisation to local government's parlous financial situation. Stability and resistance to change are however the overwhelming characteristics of Australian local government. The paper surveys the scope and function of local government in the 1970s. The recently developed radical critique of the local state is found to have little relevance to Australian local government because of the small and fragmented scale of local government social policy.     

Tailors-Made: Heritage Governance Customization in Late Modern Canada

Canada is not just a patchwork of varying heritage governance delineated by provincial and territorial boundaries but a maelstrom of contesting and overlapping practices and processes originating from state and non-state actors. Since the 1990s, this patchwork of governance has increasingly diffused into Indigenous and local spheres through the negotiation of formal (treaties, legislation) and semi-formal (memoranda of understanding) agreements. Ideological tensions persist between the design aspirations of resurgent Indigenisms and Canadian late modern state processes. The resurgence of Indigenous capacities and institutions with a heritage management mandate has also created Indigenous jurisdictions not premised in any nation-to-nation agreement.