Historical Ethnography of Tahiti

Douglas L. Oliver. Ancient Tahitian Society: Volume 1, Ethnography; Volume 2, Social Relations; Volume 3, The Rise of the Pomares. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1975. xv + 1419 pp. Illustrations, figures, maps, bibliography, and indices. $55.00.     

Sites of memory in the Holy Land: the design of the British war cemeteries in Mandate Palestine

British war cemeteries of WW1 form a world embracing system of cemeteries, scattered over a wide range of sites and landscapes wherever Imperial soldiers died during the war. Although recent interest in memory and commemoration has made the British war cemeteries of the Great War a much-studied subject, the spatial dimension of this enormous undertaking remains somewhat out of focus. The geographical context, however, is an important factor in shaping the meanings for each cemetery. In each, the memory of the war intersects and interacts with the historical memory carried by the site. Nowhere is this more evident than in the cemeteries of the Palestine campaign, above all in Jerusalem. The paper follows the history of the design of war cemeteries of the Palestine campaign, and examines the ways the cemeteries and their design relate to their particular geographical context, and the impact this context may have on their interpretation     

Deconstructing clusters: chaotic concept or policy panacea?

Over the past decade, there has been growing interest in localindustrial agglomeration and specialization, not only by economicgeographers but also by economists and by policy-makers. Ofthe many ideas and concepts to have emerged from this new-foundfocus, Michael Porter's work on ‘clusters’ has provedby far the most influential. His ‘cluster theory’has become the standard concept in the field, and policy-makersthe world over have seized upon Porter's cluster model as atool for promoting national, regional, and local competitiveness,innovation and growth. But the mere popularity of a constructis by no means a guarantee of its profundity. Seductive thoughthe cluster concept is, there is much about it that is problematic,and the rush to employ ‘cluster ideas’ has run aheadof many fundamental conceptual, theoretical and empirical questions.Our aim is to deconstruct the cluster concept in order to revealand highlight these issues. Our concerns relate to the definitionof the cluster concept, its theorization, its empirics, theclaims made for its benefits and advantages, and its use inpolicy-making. Whilst we do not wish to debunk the cluster ideaoutright, we do argue for a much more cautious and circumspectuse of the notion, especially within a policy context: the clusterconcept should carry a public policy health warning.