A QUARTERLY ECONOMETRIC MODEL OF FACTOR DEMANDS IN REGIONAL MANUFACTURING

This paper presents a model of demand for factor inputs in regional manufacturing industry. Demands for labor and capital are distinguished from demands for factor services using a generalization of the disequilibrium adjustment framework of Nadiri and Rosen. The generalization allows for a richer variety of responses to external shocks and involves the distinction between systematic and error dynamics.
The model is estimated for the period 1963:I-1980:I using data from the Cincinnati SMSA and appropriate econometric techniques. Substantial attention is paid to the dynamic response of the estimated equations.     

Reviews and book notes

Niels Erik Rosenfeldt, Knowledge and Power. The Role of Stalin's Secret Chancellery in the Soviet System of Government, Copenhagen, Rosenkilde and Bagger, 1978, pp. 219.

Garry Wills, Inventing America, Doubleday, $14.

Bruce Stinebrickner (ed). Readings in American Government 78/79, Duskin, 1978.

Allan Patience & Brian Head, From Whitlam to Fraser: Reform and Reaction in Australian Politics (Oxford University Press, Melbourne, 1979). 320 pp. $7.95.

Geoffrey Hawker, R.F.I. Smith, Patrick Weller: Politics and Policy in Australia. Univ. of Queensland Press 1979, pp. 313.

Martin Painter, Bernard Carey: Politics Between Departments. Univ. of Queensland Press 1979. Cloth $17.95. Paperback $8.95.

W.J.M. Mackenzie, Biological Ideas in Politics: An Essay on Political Adaptivity. Penguin, 1978. $2.50.

Benn, Stanley, et al., Political Participation: A discussion of political rationality, pp xv + 88, Canberra: Australian National University Press, 1978, $4.95 paperback.

Ross Fitzgerald (ed.), Human Needs and Politics (Sydney: Pergamon Press, 1977)

Ross Fitzgerald (ed.), What it Means to be Human (Sydney: Pergamon Press, 1978)

Jean Martin, The Migrant Presence, George Allen & Unwin Australia, Sydney, 1978, pp. 261.

Rachel Unikoski, Communal Endeavours: Migrant Organisations in Melbourne. ANU Press, Canberra, 1978, pp. 333 + xiii. $14.50.

M.J. Salter, Studies in the Immigration of the Highly Skilled, ANU Press, Canberra, 1978, pp. 208 + xiv. $9.95.

John Nightingale, Migrant Household Economic Behaviour, ANU Press, Canberra, 1978, pp. 339 + xix + Index. $7.50.

Peter Hay, Ian Ward and John Warhurst (eds.), Anatomy of an Election, Melbourne, Hall of Content, 1979, pp. vii + 268. Paper.

John Higley, Desley Deacon, Don Smart, Elites in Australia, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1979, pp. xiii + 317.

P.J. Taylor and R.J. Johnston, Geography of Elections, Penquin Education, 1979, pp. 528. $9.50 (recommended).

Stuart A. Bremer, Simulated Worlds: A Computer Model of National Decision‐Making, Princeton University Press 1977, pp. 249.

Michael Clarke, Simulations in the Study of International Relations, G.W. & A. Hesketh 1978, pp. 225.

Colin Campbell and George J. Szablowski, The Super‐bureaucrats: Structure and Behaviour in Central Agencies, Macmillan of Canada, Toronto. x + 286.

Roger Scott (ed.), Interest Groups and Public Policy: Case Studies from the Australian States. Macmillan, Melbourne, 1980.

Michael L. Mezey. Comparative Legislatures. Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press, 1979, pp. 317. $17.95.     

Slum Wars of the 21st Century: Gangs,Mano Dura and the New Urban Geography of Conflict in Central America

The political economy of violence in Central America is widely perceived as having undergone a critical shift during the past two decades, often pithily summarized as a movement from ‘political’ to ‘social’ violence. Although such an analysis is plausible, it also offers a depoliticized vision of the contemporary Central American panorama of violence. Basing itself principally on the example of Nicaragua, the country in the region that is historically perhaps most paradigmatically associated with violence, this article offers an alternative interpretation of the changes that the regional landscape of violence has undergone. It suggests that these are better understood as a movement from ‘peasant wars of the twentieth century’ ( Wolf, 1969 ) to ‘urban wars of the twenty‐first century’ ( Beall, 2006 ), thereby highlighting how present‐day urban violence can in many ways be seen as representing a structural continuation of past political conflicts, albeit in new spatial contexts. At the same time, however, there are certain key differences between past and present violence, as a result of which contemporary conflict has intensified. This is most visible in relation to the changing forms of urban spatial organization in Central American cities, the heavy‐handed mano dura response to gangs by governments, and the dystopian evolutionary trajectory of gangs. Taken together, these processes point to a critical shift in the balance of power between rich and poor in the region, as the new ‘urban wars of the twenty‐first century’ are increasingly giving way to more circumscribed ‘slum wars’ that effectively signal the defeat of the poor.     

Investigating foetal and perinatal mortality in prehistoric skeletal samples: a case study from a 3000-year-old Pacific Island cemetery site

The Teouma skeletal sample from Vanuatu represents one of the few truly colonising populations in the Pacific Islands. Therefore, investigating the factors that may have affected foetal/infant mortality in this population is potentially important for understanding the success of settlement in this region of the world. We investigate whether stable isotope analyses of carbon and nitrogen in conjunction with skeletal ageing techniques, can aid in identifying whether the subadults from Teouma died before or after birth in an attempt to understand the potential threats to foetal and infant survival. Multiple skeletal ageing methods using diaphyseal lengths were used to age the young subadults (n = 7). Using regression-based skeletal ageing methods, four of the individuals were aged at around full-term gestation (37–42 weeks gestation), while the remaining three individuals died preterm. The isotope analyses did not assist in identifying the individuals that survived post-birth because none of the subadults displayed the 2–3‰ trophic increase in δ¹⁵N values expected for a breastfed infant, probably as a result of their young age. However, all of the foetal/perinatal individuals exhibited higher δ¹⁵N values in their bone collagen compared with the adult females of the sample, with two of the individuals demonstrating unusually high δ¹⁵N values. The δ¹³C values of the foetuses/perinates did not exhibit the same variation. We explore a number of possible explanations for this elevation of perinatal/foetal δ¹⁵N values and tentatively suggest that this is a result of in utero stress as a consequence of chronic maternal ill-health. The osteological and palaeodemographic evidence supports the assertion that females, foetuses and perinates were susceptible to environmental stress within this colonising population, resulting in early death of the perinatal individuals in addition to early terminations of pregnancy or premature birth possibly caused by infectious and/or metabolic diseases.