Spaces of nostalgia: the hollowing out of a London market

In this paper we look at the place of memory and nostalgia in peoples' narratives of an old, traditionally white, working-class market in London, which over the last decade has experienced social and economic decline. We argue that in this hollowed out space, abandoned by many of those who can move, has emerged a nostalgia for the halcyon days of the market when people came from far and wide to shop, and when there was a strong sense of community. What these nostalgic discourses mask are the social divisions (particularly racialized divisions) of the time, while in this romanticized vision of the past, the new population of asylum seekers have become an easy trope for the dissatisfactions of the present. Regeneration strategies in an area such as this need to confront the force of these nostalgic discourses in order to tackle the deep social and racial divisions and reverse the socio-economic decline.     

A LINEAR PROGRAMMING APPROACH TO SOLVING INFEASIBLE RAS PROBLEMS

ABSTRACT The RAS procedure is widely used to update national and regional input-output tables and international trade tables and to construct regional tables from national ones. Special problems, however, have been encountered when the procedure is used to adjust interregional trade tables. In this paper, the special properties of interregional trade tables that increase the likelihood of nonconvergence of the RAS procedure are discussed, and two linear programming methods of solving infeasible RAS problems are provided. First, a closed linear programming approach, which enables exogenous information to override the purely mechanical solution of infeasible RAS problems, is presented. Finally, the open linear programming approach is applied successfully to adjust U.S. interregional trade data that had previously failed to converge using the RAS procedure.     

Policy options for full employment: Which way forward for Australia

This paper seeks to review the long‐term policy choices Australia faces if full employment is to be restored. Using cross‐national data for the period 1972–88, it identifies the variety of routes taken to mass unemployment and full employment It then discusses the diverse policy strategies underlying routes to full employment and examines the possibility and desirability of their adoption in Australia.     

MUNICIPAL WASTE RECYCLING IN BRANDON, MANITOBA: DETERMINANTS OF PARTICIPATORY BEHAVIOUR

The municipal waste disposal crisis has received considerable public attention in recent years, particularly as it has become increasingly difficult, both financially and politically, to dispose of the steadily growing volume of waste. With municipalities under pressure to find acceptable alternatives to the traditional forms of refuse disposal - landfilling and incineration - the recycling of household waste has been advocated by policy makers and some environmentalists as a possible solution. The purpose of this study is to examine the factors influencing the collection and disposal of household recyclables, as well as the effectiveness of institutional strategies to induce residents' participation in such a program. The study area is the city of Brandon, Manitoba, a settlement of some 40 000 people, 210 kilometres west of Winnipeg. To obtain a representative overview of the recycling behaviour of the population, three groups totalling a sample of 490 respondents, were investigated. Two of these groups were made up of people who actively recycle, and the third constituted a control group made up of those who do not engage in recycling activities. An overview of the municipal initiatives in Brandon, and an analysis of the data collected in the study, as well as statistics available on recycling programs from other sources, indicate that the recently introduced services and facilities have contributed to make significant qualitative changes but with limited success in dealing with the real magnitude of the solid waste problem. It is suggested that the goals of the various strategies have been established, but there is currently little incentive -apart from personal satisfaction - for residents to participate. This would seem to explain the limited success, in quantitative terms, of the programs to date     

Reviews of books

Historia, utopía y ficción de la Ciudad de los Césares. Metamorfosis de un mito. Por FERNANDO AINSA. Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 1992. Pp. 120.

Cultural Diffusion of Spanish Humanism in New Spain: Francisco Cervantes de Salazar's ‘Diálogo de la dignidad del hombre.’ By DIANNE M. BONO. New York: Peter Lang, 1991. Pp. 161.

Soldiers of the Virgin: The Moral Economy of a Colonial Maya Rebellion. By KEVIN GOSNER. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1992. Pp. xiv, 227.

La crisis del orden colonial. Estructura agraria y rebeliones populares de la Nueva España, 1750–1821. By ERIC VAN YOUNG. México: Alianza Editorial, 1992. Pp. 515.

Esthetic Recognition of Ancient Amerindian Art. By GEORGE KUBLER. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1991. Pp. xvii, 276.

Books of the Brave: Being an Account of Books and of Men in the Spanish Conquest and Settlement of the Sixteenth‐Century New World. By IRVING A. LEONARD. Introduced by ROLENA ADORNO. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992. Pp. xlvii, 453.

Family and Frontier in Colonial Brazil: Santana de Parnaíba, 1580–1822. By ALIDA C. METCALF. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992. Pp. xvi, 280.

Los naufragios. By ALVAR NUÑEZ CABEZA DE VACA. Edición crítica de ENRIQUE PUPO‐WALKER. Madrid: Castalia, 1992. Pp. 334.

Estudios de literatura hispanoamericana. Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz y otros poetas barrocos de la colonia. By GEORGINA SABAT‐RIVERS. Barcelona: PPU, 1992. Pp. 355.

Vida i sucesos de la monja alférez. Autobiografía atribuida a Doña Catalina de Erauso. Edición, introducción y notas de RIMA DE VALLBONA. Tempe: Center for Latin American Studies, Arizona State University, 1992. Pp. 236.     

New light on old pumice: the origins of Mediterranean volcanic material from ancient Egypt

This paper presents and discusses the Neutron Activation Analysis (NAA) results newly obtained from pumice pieces found decades ago at the Egyptian sites of Maiyana, Sedment, Kahun, and Amarna – now in the collections of the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, and the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, London – which could be successfully related to several volcanic eruptions in the Mediterranean. The work contributes to the constant accumulation of knowledge concerning the first appearance of pumice from the so-called Minoan eruption of the Santorini volcano. In addition, it unexpectedly sheds more light on the long-distance trade of Mediterranean volcanic material in the Bronze Age world by disclosing another connection between Lipari and the Eastern Mediterranean.     

Nationalism,international factors and the ‘Irish question’ in the era of the First World War

Abstract. The ‘Irish question’ encompassed negotiations leading to the partition of Ireland in 1921. The paper considers factors that contributed to the growing tendency for the major players involved in the struggle – Irish nationalists, unionists and British officials – to adopt postures that were mutually irreconcilable. Conceptualising the problem in terms of Rogers Brubaker's ‘triadic nexus’ model of nationalisms reveals that the rigidity was encouraged by the dynamic interaction of nationalist representations employed by the three parties in response to the postures adopted by their rivals. Further, international factors – specifically, the prevailing international definition of nation and the position taken by the authority in place to adjudicate claims of nationhood – combined with regional pressures to consolidate Irish, Ulster and British nationalisms in such forms that militated against a compromise solution. By amending Brubaker's model to include international as well as regional forces, the analysis shows how understanding of the Irish contest can be enhanced if conceived as issuing from the continuous and reflexive interaction of three distinct nationalisms with and within an international context that itself was structured with respect to questions of nation.