Book reviews

Derek McDougall, Harold D. Lasswell and the Study of International Relations. University Press of America, Lanham, USA, 1984, pp.370. $16.50.

John W. Burton, Global Conflict: The Domestic Sources of International Crisis. Wheatsheaf Books, UK, 1984, pp.194. $54.00.

K.J. Holsti, The Dividing Discipline: Hegemony and Diversity in International Theory. Allen and Unwin, Boston and Sydney, 1985. pp.165. $39.95.

Hedley Bull (ed.), Intervention in World Politics. Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1984, pp. viii + 198. $31.00.

Hedley Bull, Justice in International Relations. 1983–84 Hagey Lectures, University of Waterloo, 1984, pp. iii + 36. No price given. (Available from University Publications Distribution Service, Dana Porter Arts Library, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario N2L3G1, Canada.)

Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. Verso Editions and NLB, London, 1983, pp. 160. £15.00.

Chalmers Johnson, Revolutionary Change. Second edition. Longman, London, 1983, pp.xii + 217. $13.85.

Peter Calvert, Politics, Power and Revolution. An Introduction to Comparative Politics. Wheatsheaf Books, Brighton, 1983, pp.208. £5.95.

John Walton, Reluctant Rebels. Comparative Studies of Revolution and Underdevelopment. Columbia University Press, New York, 1984, pp.xii + 230 $US36.00 (cloth), $US10.00 (paper).

E. A. Tiryakian and R. Rogowski (eds), New Nationalisms of the Developed West. Toward Explanation. Allen and Unwin, Boston, 1985, pp.xii + 394. $69.00.

Peter H. Merkl and Ninian Smart (eds), Religion and Politics in the Modern World. New York University Press, New York, 1985, pp.276. No price given.

Richard Lowenthal, Social Change and Cultural Crisis. Columbia University Press, New York, 1984, pp.viii + 252. $US29.50.

Dietrich Fischer, Preventing War in the Nuclear Age. Rowman and Allanheld, Totowa, N.J./Croom Helm, London, 1984, pp. x + 236. $27.95.

F. Dyson, Weapons and Hope Harper and Row, New York, 1984, pp.340. $24.95.

John Langmore and David Peetz (eds), Wealth, Poverty and Survival. Australia in the World. George Allen and Unwin, Sydney, in association with the Australian Labor Party, 1983, pp. 225.     

Progress in the human geography of the Maghreb

Sutton and Lawless review a selection of the prolific literature on the Maghreb's human geography published from the late 1970s onward. The pedigree of the discipline in Maghreb was established by several notable geographers who lived, researched, and wrote there. Augustin Bernard's writings on rural settlement, his atlas, and study of Algeria are still cited. Jean Despois's regional study with Raynal and his work on Tunisia, together with the detailed rural research of Jean Poncet, provides a particularly rich coverage for that country. Jean Dresch's early work on Morocco exemplified an early critique of the contemporaneous uncritical colonial human geography. The Sahara's fascination also inspired pioneering studies by Robert Capot-Rey. The work of these notables and others provided a solid background of geographical literature on the Maghreb to be supplemented, criticized, and challenged by more recent researchers, sometimes pupils of the above individuals, and increasingly North African by birth. The tradition of general texts on the Maghreb has continued, though increasingly with systematic approaches replacing regional appraisals. The geography of the decolonization of the Maghreb by Isnard has been replaced by a study summarizing recent collaborative work by a team of French geographers. The Saharan extensions of the Maghreb states have often been linked in general works, sometimes being juxtaposed against the Maghreb as in the essays offered to Jean Despois. Lawless and Findlay's collaborative study juxtaposes geographical studies of each country's economic development with political scientists' evaluations of their sociopolitical development. This review limits itself largely to geographers and geographical journals, only occasionally including significant works from other subject areas, and to 1977-1978 publications, with a few notable exceptions. The spatial juxtaposition of contrasting approaches to economic development, liberal market economy approaches by Tunisia and Morocco arguably leading to dependency, and centrally-planned strategies by Algeria and Libya resulting in bureaucratic constraints serves to offer the Maghreb as a pertinent case-study region for the applied geographer of developing countries.     

TRADE CENTER EVOLUTION IN THE GREAT PLAINS*

ABSTRACT Empirical analysis has lagged behind the impressive additions to the theoretical literature on trade center systems during the past 15 years. This study of the trade center system in Saskatchewan is an attempt to begin to redress the imbalance and to test some of the recently formulated theoretical propositions. Communities are identified according to functional classifications for 1961 and 1981 with the aid of a cluster analysis program, and the validity of the groupings are verified using multiple discriminant analysis. Changes in the size, spacing, and function of clusters and individual communities during the 20-year interval are described and an effort is made to prdvide explanations for the changes observed.     

A CONTEXTUAL ANALYSIS OF THE JOURNEY-TO-SHOP WITH PRICE UNCERTAINTY*

ABSTRACT In this paper we extend the contextual theory of demand to consider rational consumer behavior when the household must deal with some random fluctuation in the prices it faces. Prices at stores reflect “advertised specials,” which are potential cost reductions random across goods, and random in-store price changes, which can only be observed by visiting the store. Our theory of rational behavior includes: (1) calculation by the household of an ex ante plan for its planning period; (2) modification to take account of advertised specials; and (3) rational search behavior to take advantage of random fluctuations observable only on a given day. This theory utilizes an active cash balance as a buffer against random variations from planned daily expenditures, and reformulations of trip circuits to account for patterns of cost-minimizing search.