Neoliberalisation from the Ground Up: Insurgent Capital,Regional Struggle,and the Assetisation of Land

In this paper we argue that “assetisation” has been a central axis through which both neoliberalisation and financialisation have encroached in the post‐Fordist era. We focus on the mobilisation of land as a financial asset in northwest England's former industrial heartlands, offering an account of how property developer the Peel Group came to dominate the land and port infrastructure of the region through aggressive debt‐led expansion and, in particular, a hostile takeover of the Manchester Ship Canal for its land‐bank. In doing so, we illustrate how the capture of resources, especially land, by private corporations has shaped both substance and process of neoliberalisation from the ground up. By focusing on transformative struggles over land we contribute to research agendas attempting to understand the systemically dispossessive nature of assetisation, its relationship to fictitious capital formation, and the way such neoliberalising transformations are produced through grounded and situated socio‐spatial struggles.     

Tea Party imitators? The campaign against the carbon tax,the media and a new uncivil politics

The Gillard government's decision to reverse an election promise to not introduce a carbon tax prompted protest rallies around Australia during 2011–12. Beneath the hyperbole of critics who dismissed these protests as imitating US Tea Party extremism lies an intriguing possibility: that these are each examples of a new form of right-wing political expression enabled by structural changes in the media. This article considers the nature of the anti-carbon tax ‘people's revolt’ and its resemblance to the Tea Party. Both are a hybrid mix of top-down control and bottom-up grassroots populism whose emergence ‘outrage media’ facilitated. In a manner that echoes the support Fox News gave Tea Partiers, talkback radio in Sydney appears to have played a particular role shaping the identity, agenda and uncivil tone of the campaign against the carbon tax.

吉拉德政府决定背弃不征碳税的竞选承诺,在2011-12年引发了全澳大利亚的抗议示威。批评者将示威斥为对美国茶党极端主义的模仿。批评者夸张言辞的背后却是一种有趣的可能：此乃媒体结构变化所造成的、右翼政治表达的新形式。本文思考了反碳税“人民反叛”的性质,以及它与茶党的相似性。二者都是自上而下控制与自下而上草根民粹的混合,“愤怒的媒体”有利于它们的出现。就像狐狸新闻声援茶党那样,悉尼的对讲电台似乎在塑造反碳税运动的身份、议题以及粗暴的口吻方面发挥了特殊的作用。     

Eyes on the alley: children’s appropriation of alley space in Riverdale,Toronto

ABSTRACT

Recent research suggests that numerous positive physical, cognitive, and social benefits can be derived from independent mobility and play agency amongst children, necessitating an understanding of how physical and social environments facilitate this development. This study involved parents, and children aged 9–13 from twelve households in the neighbourhood of Riverdale in Toronto. Using a mapping exercise to instigate discussion, participants were asked to describe where, how, and with whom play occurs in their neighbourhood. A reoccurring theme emerged amongst households that border a back alley where parents perceived this space as safer allowing them to grant greater independent mobility to their children and use this space as an intermediary tool to prepare their children for greater independence. For children, this space serves as one of creative appropriation, granting them access to more space and friends to play with. Situated within the context of age-friendly cities, this research identifies several socio-spatial qualities found in alleys that have the potential to contribute to the discussion of more inclusive city-building practice.     

Not About Land,Not Quite a Grab: Dispersed Dispossession in Rural Russia

In most literature in geography and agrarian studies, rural dispossession is neatly related to land rights or access, a trend that increased with debates about the recent wave of farmland investments worldwide. Drawing on long‐term fieldwork in rural Russia, this paper critiques that focus and the assumed nexus between rural dispossession and farmland, as is prevents an understanding of more dispersed stakes, modes and temporalities of dispossession. I introduce the concept of dispersed dispossession which advances our understanding of social and relational objects of dispossession beyond natural resources (such as sustaining institutions and infrastructures), and the tangled, complex, often slow and silent modes and temporalities of dispossession beyond spectacular events. I show how the concept sheds new light on current agrarian change in Russia, and how it contributes to debates on (rural) dispossession and “land grabs” more generally.     

Effective hydration temperature of obsidian: a diffusion theory analysis of time-dependent hydration rates

An estimate of effective hydration temperature (EHT) is needed for chronological use of obsidian hydration data. This paper describes a method for calculating EHT by the practicing archaeologist, replacing three techniques that are in general use today: estimates based on mean temperature, numerical integration of models of diurnal and annual temperature variations, and use of temperature cells. The hydration (or diffusion) coefficient of obsidian is a function of temperature and thus is time varying, while the classic quadratic law of hydration is not valid for time-varying diffusion coefficients. This paper presents a mathematical solution to the case of a time-varying hydration coefficient, based on diffusion theory, with a concise definition of EHT. It is shown that the results are not affected by concentration dependence in the diffusion coefficient. A computer program to compute the rigorous solution is described, and data are presented to explore the resulting range of variation. That use of the Lee equation to compute EHT is not appropriate for obsidian hydration studies is evident from the data presented. The effects of paleoclimatic variation are estimated, and an algebraic best fit equation and worksheet are provided as practical aids to the archaeologist.     

A contribution to the study of post-depositional alterations of pottery using TL dating analysis

In luminescence dating, the potassium concentration significantly contributes to the dose rate value in the age estimation. Within this study, fine-grain thermoluminescence dating has been applied on sherds of calcareous pottery of known age, excavated at a Roman site in Mallorca, Spain. For those of the samples that showed signs of severe potassium leaching, according to chemical and mineralogical examination, the thermoluminescence analysis provided overestimated dates. By using the known archaeological age of the samples, a corrected dose rate value can be estimated which provides the potassium concentration averaged for the burial period. Finally, a step-like model can then be used to estimate the fraction of the burial period after which most of the alteration effects took place.