The Santa María pottery of El Bolsón valley (Catamarca,Argentina): Compositional characterization and implications on the elaboration processes,ca. 1000–1600 ce

The results obtained from the multi-analytic compositional characterization of ceramic pastes and paints of the Santa María style, from the El Bolsón valley (Belén Department, Catamarca Province, Argentina), are presented here. This pottery style had a wide regional distribution in Northwestern Argentina between ca. 1000 and1600 ce and is characterized by its complex iconography painted in black, cream and red. The analyses show that the containers correspond to the technical tradition of using grog temper and suggest that its manufacture involved a double firing process. This reveals a new practice for the time.     

Tensions between municipal reform and outdated fiscal levers in rural British Columbia

Debates about the future of small municipalities in Canada are set against a backdrop of economic, political, and social restructuring processes that have displaced former state investment policies in favour of neoliberal public policy approaches. Small municipalities struggle with outdated financial and governance structures and a provincial public policy agenda that asks them to become more creative, innovative, and “entrepreneurial” in their approach and responsibilities. Drawing upon key informant interviews with eight case studies in British Columbia, Canada, this research examines the tensions between municipal reforms mandated by the provincial government over the past 30 years and commensurate fiscal levers and capacities in place to address these broadening responsibilities for small municipalities in volatile staples-dependent regions. Our findings demonstrate how successive provincial governments have mobilized New Public Management objectives through a host of legislative and regulatory changes that have increased the responsibilities and requirements on local governments without commensurate fiscal or jurisdictional capacity.     

Interpreting Spatial Economic Structure and Spatial Multipliers: Three Perspectives

The measurement and interpretation of spatial economic structure have presented many problems for analysts. The notion of a spatial multiplier has received even less formal attention; part of the motivation for this paper is the examination of the degree to which sectoral decomposition analysis might prove useful in illuminating the paths of interaction across space that are associated with changes in exogenous activity levels. In this paper, we present three perspectives that examine spatial structure in the context of an aggregated interregional social accounting matrix for Bangladesh. These perspectives examine structure at the micro-, meso-, and macrolevels and are interpreted with the assistance of several alternative methods, including structural path analysis, the field of influence, the superposition principle, multiregional feedback loop analysis, and the Matrioshka Principle; the results are interpreted analytically and cartographically. Some attention is also devoted to the formulation of a general approach to spatial multipliers. It is shown that the structure of flows and the structure of influence reveal patterns that, taken together, provide important insights into an understanding of structure and may prove to form the basis for the eventual formal presentation of the spatial multiplier.     

Policy Type, Bureaucracy, and Urban Policies: Integrating Models of Urban Service Distribution

This study advances a comprehensive model of urban service distribution based upon types of urban services, to which little concern has been paid in the study of service distribution. By introducing an integrating typology of urban services, it shows how the pattern of service distribution varies depending on service type. By doing so, this study demonstrates that polarized discussions about the primacy of different explanatory models are inadequate and artificial, and that seemingly contradictory models are not necessarily mutually exclusive when the effect of service type on the distribution of services is taken into consideration.     

Predictors of Out-of-Home Placement in a Family Preservation Program: Are Welfare Recipients Particularly Vulnerable?

Participants in a statewide family preservation program were classified on the basis of income level and enrollment in public assistance. These variables, along with other economic, parent, and child risk factors, were used to predict the probability of out-of-home placements at the close of this intervention program. Results revealed that neither low income nor receiving public assistance was predictive of having a child removed from the home. Higher levels of child-centered risk and parent-centered risk were the only consistent predictors of placement outcomes. Additional analyses revealed that family characteristics (e.g., history of psychiatric care, prior child placements, and involvement with the legal system) also were typical of families experiencing out-of-home placements. This study challenges the stereotype of low-income or welfare families being at greater risk of having a child removed from their home. Findings are discussed in the context of recent welfare reform initiatives and implications for future family policy research.