ELECTRON SPIN RESONANCE THERMOMETRY APPLIED TO QUARTZITE COBBLES FROM VERGELEGEN SLAVE LODGE,SOMERSET WEST,SOUTH AFRICA

This paper describes the use of electron spin resonance spectroscopy to estimate the degree of heating of quartzite cobbles from hearths on the floor of the archaeological remains of an eighteenth-century Dutch colonial slave lodge. A novel technique based on the comparison of line intensities for the E’and O^-₂ centres in quartz distinguished successfully between cobbles which had been heated to estimated temperatures ranging from 300 °C to 450° C and controls from an adjacent stream bed. This inexpensive and simple technique could be applied to a wide range of archaeological problems involving the thermal history of objects consisting of or containing quartz.     

COINTEGRATION BETWEEN U.S. WHEAT MARKETS

ABSTRACT. Average monthly price data from twelve hinterland markets and the Houston port price for wheat are studied in a cointegration framework using the Engle-Granger "two-step" procedure and Johansen's maximum likelihood procedure. Out-of-sample forecasts from an error correction model are compared to those from a vector autoregression fit to levels and a univariate autoregression fit to first differences. This comparison suggests that modeling these (cointegrated) data as a levels vector autoregression, rather than as an error-correction process, results in significantly higher error bias, but lower error variance, at long horizons.     

A MIXED-FREQUENCY MODEL OF REGIONAL OUTPUT*

ABSTRACT. This paper proposes a new method for estimating a monthly regional production model. The technique involves treating the region's monthly industrial output as a latent variable, which is in turn a function of capital (prosed by energy usage) and labor inputs. Annual observations on regional value added correspond to the summation of the unobservable monthly series over the 12 months, while changes in the national Industrial Production index help infer the series' month-to-month fluctuations. The model is estimated using the Kalman filter and the method of maximum likelihood. The estimates are used to compute monthly indices of regional value added for 15 individual 2-digit industries, and for the aggregate manufacturing sector in the Seventh Federal Reserve District. In a comparison of out-of-sample forecasting accuracy, the mixed-frequency model outperforms both the traditional parametric Cobb-Douglas and nonparametric Atlanta methods over the 1988–89 forecasting horizon.     

GUTENBERG'S INKS AND PAPERS: NON-DESTRUCTIVE COMPOSITIONAL ANALYSES BY PROTON MILLIPROBE

Particle induced X-ray emission (PIXE) has been used in analysis of ink and paper of the 42-line Bible and other early printed works. Results are reported and their significance discussed.     

EXIT AND VOICE: STRATEGIES FOR CHANGE IN BUREAUCRATIC-LEGISLATIVE POLICYMAKING

This paper uses the case of telecommunications deregulation to construct a model of interest group behavior in bureaucratic-legislative policymaking. The model posits three common policymaking arenas: closed, open, and the transformational period between the two. Three features of these policymaking arenas are explored: (1) changes in the numbers of interested actors, leading to (2) changes in the policy-making environment and to (3) the shifting strategic interests of actors. Borrowing the concepts of “voice” and “exit” from Hirschman (1970), alternative interest group strategies are found to occur in different policymaking environments, or arenas, which in turn depend in significant part on the numbers of interested actors involved. Voice works when interests are or appear to be relatively complementary. Exit is used when voice fails, that is, in permeable arenas of many actors with conflicting interests.