Book reviews

Iran's Foreign policy 1941–1973: A Study of Foreign Policy in Modernizing Nations. By Rouhollah K. Ramazani. Charlottesville, Virginia: University Press of Virginia, 1975. xiv + 507pp. $20.

Israel and Iran: Bilateral Relationships and Effect on the Indian Ocean Basin. By Robert B. Reppa, Sr. New York: Praeger, 1974. 187pp. $16.50.

Iran at the End of the Century: A Hegelian Forecast. By Robert E. Looney. Lexington, Massachusetts: Lexington Books, D. C. Heath, 1977. 155pp.

Mirza Malkum Khan: A Biographical Study in Iranian Modernism. By Hamid Algar. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1973. 327pp.

From Darkness into Light: Women's Emancipation in Iran. By Badr ol‐Moluk Bamdad. Edited and translated by F. R. C. Bagley. Hicksville, New York: Exposition Press, 1977. 140pp. $8.00.

Love and War: Adventures from the Firuz Shah Nama of Sheikh Bighami. Translated from the Persian by William L. Hanaway, Jr. Persian Heritage Series No. 19. Delmar, New York: Scholars’ Facsimiles and Reprints, 1974. 208pp.

Malayer und sein Umland: Entwicklung, Structur und Funk‐tionen einer Kleinstadt in Iran. By Mostafa Momeni. Marburg/Lahn: Marburger Geographische Schriften, Heft 68, 1976. 208pp.

The Qashqa'i Nomads of Fars. By Pierre Oberling. The Hague: Mouton, 1974. 277pp.     

The safe spaces ‘in-between’ – plays,performance and identity among young ‘second generation’ Somalis in London

ABSTRACT

The article elaborates on how young UK-born self-identifying Somalis use performance to create ‘liminal’ spaces that allow them to explore and express the often contradictory registers of self and belonging through play and the carnivalesque. The plays they write, practise and perform transform community places into ‘safe spaces’ that open and invite dialogue on the intergenerational conflicts they experience around identity and expected behaviour. Far from being fictions, in making visible the liminality in the daily lives, these young people communicate ‘the reality behind the role playing mask’ [Turner, Victor. 1982. From Ritual to Theatre – The Human Seriousness of Play. New York: PAJ, 155]. This research is based on 6 months ethnographic research with the Mustaqbal youth group based in London. It contributes to rethinking ‘safe space’ by illuminating how young people use the ‘stage’ to express elements of their lives they are otherwise unable to voice.     

Model Uncertainty in Matrix Exponential Spatial Growth Regression Models

This article considers the most important aspects of model uncertainty for spatial regression models, namely, the appropriate spatial weight matrix to be employed and the appropriate explanatory variables. We focus on the spatial Durbin model (SDM) specification in this study that nests most models used in the regional growth literature, and develop a simple Bayesian model‐averaging approach that provides a unified and formal treatment of these aspects of model uncertainty for SDM growth models. The approach expands on previous work by reducing the computational costs through the use of Bayesian information criterion model weights and a matrix exponential specification of the SDM model. The spatial Durbin matrix exponential model has theoretical and computational advantages over the spatial autoregressive specification due to the ease of inversion, differentiation, and integration of the matrix exponential. In particular, the matrix exponential has a simple matrix determinant that vanishes for the case of a spatial weight matrix with a trace of zero. This allows for a larger domain of spatial growth regression models to be analyzed with this approach, including models based on different classes of spatial weight matrices. The working of the approach is illustrated for the case of 32 potential determinants and three classes of spatial weight matrices (contiguity‐based, k‐nearest neighbor, and distance‐based spatial weight matrices), using a data set of income per capita growth for 273 European regions.     

Alternative Zuliefersysteme im Brauereisektor – Regionalmodelle des Braugerstenbezugs in Bayern

Standort - Seit Jahrzehnten wird Bier größtenteils in standardisierten Wertschöpfungsketten produziert, wobei die Kontexte der Rohstofferzeugung kaum mehr nachvollziehbar erscheinen....     

Human capital accumulation and long‐term income growth projections for European regions

We propose an econometric framework to construct projections for per capita income growth and human capital for European regions. Using Bayesian methods, our approach accounts for model uncertainty in terms of the choice of explanatory variables, the nature of spatial spillovers, as well as the potential endogeneity between output growth and human capital accumulation. This method allows us to assess the potential contribution of future educational attainment to economic growth and income convergence among European regions over the next decades. Our findings suggest that income convergence dynamics and human capital act as important drivers of income growth for the decades to come.