Rural China in ruins: The rush to urbanize China's countryside is opening a moral battleground (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

China has officially become a predominantly urban country, with over 50% of the population now registered as urban residents. Its urbanization process has been described as the most managed in human history. The Chinese government manages the building of new cities, regulates the housing of displaced people and controls squatters. As an historically poorer area, the west of China has been the target of ongoing efforts at infrastructural development. Describing urbanization as managed however masks the conflicts and contradictions involved in a process which is far from smooth. Although villagers are usually seen to be largely the powerless victims of these initiatives, it is clear that many try to take advantage of the situation, while others are unable to do so. Based on recent fieldwork and eight years of visits to one village undergoing urbanization, this article looks at the complex dynamics involved and at the moral battleground which they lay bare.     

THE SOCIAL BENEFITS OF URBAN CULTURAL AMENITIES*

ABSTRACT. This paper uses a two-stage hedonic wage approach to derive the benefits from improvement of five cultural amenities. It is argued that the hedonic approach permits valuation of both private and local public aspects of cultural goods since access to the amenity is an essential input in the production of the final service flow. Empirical estimates of willingness to pay suggest price and income elasticities are approximately unity. Lower-bound estimates of marginal benefits for a representative city range from $0.85 million for an additional theater to $57.9 million for an additional zoo facility.     

Evaluating Tobler's Migration Vector Fields

In the past decade Tobler has provided an innovative cartographic presentation of migration flows. The central theme of this research has been to utilize detailed migration data to reveal the underlying structures of migration flows. Even though the analyses are not explanatory models of migration exchanges, the application of these techniques to migration flows over time and across different spatial scales provides a visual generalization of often extremely complex flows. The application of his techniques at two spatial scales for the Netherlands illustrates both the strengths and weaknesses of migration force fields for the analysis of migration.     

Madness and colonisation: The embodiment of power in Pangia

The article considers two examples of ‘madness’ which occurred during the colonial era in Pangia district, Southern Highlands Province, PNG. The first, immediately prior to pacification, concerned outbreaks of madness among young Wiru men which were similar to the ‘wildman’ behaviour described in the Highlands ethnography. The second style of madness was associated with the so-called ‘hysteria’ accompanying revival activity by Christian missions. The two styles are compared using a Foucauldian perspective, primarily for the ways in which colonial technologies of power were inscribed on the bodies of Pangia people. The article presents an anatomy of colonial power, and suggests an ethnohistory of the body is possible. It examines the ways in which this power was created through discourses and practices involving concepts of the ‘primitive’ and ‘heathen,’ resulting in a transformation of the Wiru subject.