From Preamble to Post‐project Frustrations: The Shaping of a Slum Upgrading Project in Recife,Brazil

Abstract: This article presents an ethnography of the evolution of Prometrópole, a slum upgrading project in the Brazilian city of Recife. The project aims to improve the urban infrastructure, eradicate slums and resettle the population. We focus on the project's first area of intervention, Jacarezinho. We analyze how, from lead‐up through implementation, the project gained shape and gradually became real. Participatory procedures were very important in shaping the project that for a long time did not materialize. We argue that the project manifested itself as a vehicle of modernity that evoked a dream of progress. The population, which never asked for the project, was attracted to this dream, but remained critical. We contend that, although the project partly delivered on its promises, for many slum dwellers it failed to entail a better life. We portray the project's genealogy, the compromise between different aims, and an echelon of post‐project frustrations.     

The Antarctic problem

Pioneering in New Guinea. By James Chalmers. London : The Eeligious Tract Society, 1887. Price 16s.

Australian Defences and New Guinea. Compiled from the Papers of the late Sir Peter Scratchley, R.E., K.O.M.G. By C. Kinloch Gooke, B.A., L.L.M., Barrister‐at‐Law. London : Macmillan, 1887. Price 14s.

Shores and Alps of Alaska. By H. W. Seton Kaee, F.R.G.S. Pp. xiv. + 248. London : Sampson Low and Co., 1887. Price 16s.

The Ancient Cities of the Neiv World, being Travels and Explorations in Mexico and Central America, from 1857–1882. By Désiré Charnay. With numerous Illustrations. Translated from the French by J. Gonino and Helen S. Conant. London : Chapman and Hall, 1887. Pp. xxxii. and 514.

Report on the Administration of the Punjab and its Dependencies for 1885–86. Lahore, 1887.

Précis de Géographic Élémentaire. Par Paul Chaix. Onzième. Édition, revue et modifiée. Geneva : Cherbuliez. 1887.

Lonqmani New Geographical Readers: The Seventh Reader.—The Ocean, Currents, Tides, the Planetary System, and Phases of the Moon. London : Longmans, Green, and Co., 1887. Price 18. 9d.     

Constructions of rural childhood: challenging dominant perspectives

This article reviews research on the lives and experiences of children and young people living in rural Minority world environments. The literature reviewed has focused on constructions of rurality in relation to children's experiences, most notably the rural idyll. Alternative constructions of rural childhood, characterised by dullness, horror and deprivation, are also apparent, and associated with insufficient rural activities, resources and transport, marginalisation and social exclusion. The more recent inclusion of children's perspectives on rural living provides a deeper understanding of rural childhood and challenges the dominant perspectives.     

Balancing London? A Preliminary Investigation of the “Core Cities” and “Northern Way” Spatial Policy Initiatives Using Multi-City Corporate and Commercial Law Firms

This paper reports a preliminary investigation into the economic efficacy of two spatial frameworks—English Core Cities and the Northern Way—recently promoted by national policy makers. We ask whether they are consistent with contemporary economic process in the UK space economy through analyses of commercial multi-city law firms. The latter are treated as an “indicator sector” to define the contemporary UK space economy as practised by law firms. Within this new space of flows, the location strategies of the law firms do confirm the salience of the Northern Way (as trans-Pennine corridor) and Core Cities as part of a larger UK metropolitan space of flows. Conflating the two spatial frameworks leads us to identify hints of a rebalancing of London within a metropolitan UK space. A Manchester polycentric mega-city region is found to be the likely candidate for this role. This finding in no way impinges on London's dominant global role, and we conclude that perhaps mutuality between London and provincial cities is beginning to replace past negative dependency relations.