Increasing livelihood vulnerabilities to coastal erosion and wastewater intrusion: The political ecology of Thai aquaculture in peri-urban Bangkok

Most livelihood research focuses on micro-level decisions affecting occupations but fails to examine wider scale processes that shape markets, institutions, and thus livelihood choices. A political ecology framework can help address this gap by providing ways to analyse how multi-scalar and extra-local practices, policies, and discourses affect local-level socio-environmental outcomes. In the qualitative research reported here, that framework is applied to Tha Kam, a peri-urban coastal sub-district of Bangkok, where most residents are small-scale aquaculture farmers. These farmers have experienced precipitous drops in incomes because of two major environmental changes: coastal erosion and wastewater intrusion. The causes are multiple and complex, and many originate not from practices within Tha Kham but from challenges present at a larger scale or that start upstream. The political and economic drivers of these problems stem from Thailand’s fragmented vertical and horizontal governance structure, unequal class relations in which smallholder farmers and peri-urban residents are marginalised, and lack of accountability and representation. This combination of multi-scalar factors and power imbalances has contributed to evolving injustices of peri-urbanisation, all of which are profoundly geographical in their significance.     

The fragmentation of the nation state? Regional development,distinctiveness, and the growth of nationalism in Cornish politics

Stateless nations across the European Union have become increasingly vocal and confident in asserting a desire for autonomy, devolved governance and independence. Meanwhile, identity politics has become a key factor of contemporary European regional development, with utility as a social, economic and governance tool. Culture has become a resource for regional branding to attract inward investment and differentiate in terms of competitiveness. The paper considers whether the utility of identity to regional development might provide an explanation for the growing confidence of European Union stateless nations. We use the case study of Cornwall to explore the correlation, arguing that economic regionalism has provided a space for the articulation of national identities.     

Book reviews

Mohammed Ayoob, The Middle East in World Politics. Croom Helm Ltd., London, 1981, pp. 217. $10.95

Charlotte S.M. Girard, Canada in World Affairs, Volume XIII, 1963–1965. Canadian Institute of International Affairs, Toronto, 1980, pp. 372. $Can27.00 (cloth), $Can10.00 (paper).

Morton A. Kaplan, Towards Professionalism in International Theory: Macrosystem Analysis. The Free Press, New York, 1979, pp ix + 182. $US17.95.

Holly Sklar (ed.), Trilateralism The Trilateral Commission and Elite Planning for World Management. Black Rose Books, Montreal, 1980, pp. 604. No price given.

Michael Mandelbaum, The Nuclear Question: The United States and Nuclear Weapons 1946–1976. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1979, pp. 276. £ 12.50.

Graham Kearns, Arms for the Poor. Strategic and Defence Studies Centre, Australian National University, Canberra, 1980, pp. 131. $7.00.

John G. Keliher, The Negotiations on Mutual and Balanced Force Reductions: The Search for Arms Control in.Central Europe. Pergamon Press, New York, 1980, pp. 204. No price given.

Michael Sexton, War for the Asking: Australia's Vietnam Secrets. Penguin Books Australia, Ringwood, 1981, pp.212. $5.95.

Ian McGibbon, Blue‐Water Rationale: The Naval Defence of New Zealand 1914–1942. Government Printing Office, Wellington, 1981, pp xxi + 446. $NZ45.00.

Erhard Fordran and Paul J. Friedrich (eds.), Rüstungskontrolle und Sicherheit in Europa. Europa Union Verlag GMBH, Bonn, 1979, pp. 374. No price given.

Alan Rix, Japan's Economic Aid. Croom Helm, London, 1980, pp. 286. £14.95.

K.H. Digby, Lawyer in the. Wilderness, Data Paper No. 114, Southeast Asia Program, Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y., 1980, pp. xi + 102. $US5.75.

R.B. Smith and W. Watson (eds.), Early South East Asia: Essays in Archaeology, History and Historical Geography. Oxford University Press, Melbourne, 1979, pp. xv + 561. $56.00.

Allan Bollard, Agricultural Project Design and Evaluation in an Island Community, Australian National University Development Studies Centre Monograph No. 15, 1979, pp. xiii + 228. $8.00.

Philip J. Eldridge, Indonesia and Australia: The Politics of Aid and Development since 1966. Australian National University, Development Studies Centre Monograph No. 18, 1979, pp. xviii + 233. $8.00.

Paul Harrison, The Third World Tomorrow: a report from the battlefront in the war against poverty. Penguin Books, Harmondsworth, 1980, pp. 380. $7.95.

R. T. Shand and H. V. Richter (eds.), International Aid: Some Political, Administrative and Technical Realities. Development Studies Centre Monograph No. 16, The Australian National University Press, Canberra, 1979, pp. 278. $9.00.

Seweryn Bialer, Stalin's Successors. Leadership, Stability and Change in the Soviet Union. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1980, pp. 312. £12.50.     

High precision isotopic analyses of lead ores from New Mexico by MC-ICP-MS: implications for tracing the production and exchange of Pueblo IV glaze-decorated pottery

Between ca. 1275 and 1700 CE, Pueblo groups in the northern Southwest United States produced and exchanged ceramic bowls decorated with lead-based glaze paints. Previous studies of these glaze-decorated bowls have used lead isotopic analysis by ICP-MS to identify the sources of lead used by Pueblo potters, and investigate how social or economic factors may have influenced resource use among different Pueblo communities (e.g. 13 and 14; Huntley et al., 2007; Huntley, 2008). However, interpretations of much of this isotopic data have remained provisional because of overlap among the isotopic ratios of potential sources and because the isotopic composition of many glaze paints do not clearly match any known source. Here, we use multi-collector ICP-MS to re-measure the lead isotopic composition of 48 samples of lead sulfide (galena) and lead carbonate (cerussite) from sources in New Mexico that were potentially utilized by Pueblo potters, including mines within the Cerrillos Hills, Magdalena, Hansonburg, and Joyita Hills mining districts. These results define the isotopic composition of lead ores from these districts with greater precision and accuracy than achieved in previous studies and better distinguish among these mining districts in lead isotope space. Most significantly, we find that galena mineralization within the Cerrillos Hills only has a modest degree of isotopic variation, with ²⁰⁶Pb/²⁰⁴Pb ratios from 18.508 to 18.753, ²⁰⁷Pb/²⁰⁴Pb ratios from 15.580 to 15.607, and ²⁰⁸Pb/²⁰⁴Pb ratios from 38.388 to 38.560. These ranges are far narrower than previously reported, and should supersede previously published values for this district. In total, we conclude that isotopic measurements of both ores and glaze paints made by MC-ICP-MS will provide new information about the provenance of lead in glaze paints and allow for more detailed interpretations about resource procurement and exchange in the Pueblo world.     

Class in a Glass: Capital,Neoliberalism and Social Space in the Global Wine Industry

Abstract: This paper explores the evolving relationship between class and capital in the neoliberalised global wine industry. Wine is a unique sector that is possessed of intricate and underexplored aspects of class formation. Having investigated the recent restructuring of the industry under neoliberalism the paper goes on to analyse class formations in the production and consumption spheres. In this discussion we note not only the concrete economic and social dynamics of change, in terms of the differing fortunes of consumers, investors, landowners and workers, but also the physical and symbolic expressions of class in and through the countryside, as manifested in changing landscapes, discourses and idylls. In conclusion we analyse relationship between capital, class formation and accumulation across and within different scales in the context of a rapidly globalising sector that is so rooted in place.