Now and Then1

Abstract: Antipode was launched into the firmament of the 1970s. We might reflect upon how well the journal and its contributors fully appreciated the historical gravity and weight of what was surrounding the project to create “a radical journal of geography”. What sort of radicalism was on offer? The language was “social relevance” from “a radical (Left) political viewpoint”. In writing to celebrate Antipode's birthday, this time in another, and similar, firmament there is still the need to confront the challenge of radicalism and its meanings. Whether we agree with Perry Anderson that the last vestiges of the 1960s have been finally swept away, that the “fluent vision” of the Right has no equivalent on the Left and that embedded liberalism is now as remote as “Arian bishops”, where do radical alternatives stand in relation to the fractured hegemony of neoliberalism? At the very least the need for alternatives is more pressing than ever. David Harvey has proposed rethinking the idea of “the right to the city”. But what other rights might we rethink? I reflect upon this question by returning to the 1960s and 1970s and Marxist debates over the law, and by thinking about the possibilities offered by this Polanyian moment.     

Inter- and intraregional inequality in a spatial economy

In this paper, we develop a three-region economic geography model with workers of heterogeneous skills and mobility rates to consider how first-nature, regional differences impact both inter- and intraregional inequality. In our model, the skill premium within a region summarizes both the degree of intraregional inequality between mobile, skilled workers and immobile, unskilled workers and the interregional inequality through differences in the welfare of unskilled workers across regions. Regions with the highest skill premium have the greatest degree of intraregional inequality and provide the lowest level of welfare to unskilled workers, relative to other regions. We find that the skill premium will be higher in regions with a greater supply of unskilled labor, lower supply of housing, or are more remote. An increase in a region's housing supply or centrality will lower intraregional inequality and raise the welfare of the local, unskilled workforce. However, the magnitude of these changes are declining in the initial number of skilled workers in the region. The model is extended to consider imperfectly elastic housing supply. The larger the price elasticity of housing, the larger the range of values, such that more populated regions will host a disproportionate share of skilled workers, have lower levels of intraregional inequality, and provide higher levels of welfare for unskilled workers.     

Of Market Vendors and Waste Collectors: Labour,Informality, and Aesthetics in the Era of World-Class City Making

A growing literature demonstrates the significance of aesthetics within processes of world-class city making, as decisions about who gets to live and work in the city are increasingly made on the basis of codes of appearance. However, less attention has been paid to how such codes are (re)produced and (re)directed by informal workers and their organisations in everyday practice. Drawing upon a multisided ethnography in Kampala and Delhi, this paper explores the ways in which market vendors and waste collectors have responded to the proliferation of three aesthetic technologies: the identity card, the uniform, and the code of conduct. We show that workers have appropriated these technologies in creative ways in order to defend their livelihoods against the threat of displacement. However, this act of appropriation has come at the cost of the exclusion of the more vulnerable workers, who now find their activities policed not only by the state but also by a range of non-state organisations. These findings contribute to debates on labour organisation and world-class city making by demonstrating the ways in which aesthetic rationalities emerge through an encounter with the tactics of everyday life.     

Discourse on the Docks: Containerization and Inter-Union Work Disputes in US Ports, 1955–85

Research on labour markets has often focused on the economics of work location. Far less attention has been paid to how labour markets are constructed discursively. In this paper, I analyse how the creation of rival discourses concerning traditions of work were central elements in the efforts of two unions to structure local labour markets, in order to retain work for their members in the face of technological innovation. The struggle between the two unions centred on their abilities to construct rival discourses concerning the historical geography of work in the industry. These formed the basis for judicial interpretations concerning whether the actions of the dockers' union represented a legal work preservation action or an illegal work acquisition measure. Such interpretations shaped the subsequent evolution of work and labour markets in the industry. The ability of economic actors to shape discourse in their favour can be a powerful force in the regulation of local labour markets, and thus in the production of economic landscapes.     

In Search of Competitive Efficiency: Labour Process Flexibility in Canadian Newsprint Mills

This paper focuses on the strategies for production and work reorganization pursued in the Canadian newsprint industry during the 1990s. Many newsprint mill managers view new pulping technologies and increased labour process flexibility as the important keys to success in their never-ending quest to remain competitive in the U.S. market. These strategies are discussed in the context of two underlying themes: the nature of the particular competitive pressures faced by Canadian newsprint producers in the early 1990s and the specific nature of the labour process in newsprint mills. Evidence points to the central importance of achieving functional labour flexibility in newsprint mills and to the fact that numerical labour flexibility is not a viable strategy, given the continuous-process nature of the industry.
The Economics of Production, Technological Change, and Cost Competitiveness in the Newsprint Industry
Work Practices and Labour Conventions in the Newsprint Industry
Flexibility and the Quest for Competitive Efficiency in Canadian Newsprint Mills     

Much Lost,Little Gained? Contemporary Trade Agreements in the Pacific Islands

At the close of the 20th century, it was increasingly clear that Pacific Island countries would struggle to remain competitive in international commodity and merchandise trade. As governments worldwide embraced free trade, many Island exporters looked set to be displaced by more efficient producers elsewhere. Island policymakers also faced pressure from more powerful states to renegotiate trading arrangements to bring them into alignment with the rules of the World Trade Organization. This article explains how Pacific Island countries responded to the overlapping challenges of globalization. It considers strategies pursued by Island states in negotiations with the European Union (EU), and with Australia and New Zealand. In both cases, Pacific Islands pressed for agreements that would take account of their unique trading circumstances, and arrangements that would allow more Pacific Islanders to work abroad. After nearly two decades of talks, however, final results proved disappointing. A proposed regional Economic Partnership Agreement with the EU was essentially abandoned, and a regional trade agreement with Australia and New Zealand was concluded without the signature of Fiji or Papua New Guinea – the two largest Pacific Island economies. Ultimately, contemporary trade agreements in the Pacific achieved little to ameliorate the competitive disadvantages Pacific Island states face participating in international trade.     

Copra World: Coconuts,Plantations and Cooperatives in German Samoa

ABSTRACT

Since the mid-19th century, the copra trade has created challenges and opportunities for Pacific Islanders, including Samoans. In the wake of formal annexation in 1900, German colonial officials tried repeatedly to force Samoans to work on foreign plantations for wages. In this article, I argue that Samoans resisted these demands in two major ways. On the one hand, the overwhelming majority of Samoans continued subsistence agriculture that offered greater control over their lives. On the other hand, Samoans selectively adapted to new economic circumstances. Occasionally, Samoans engaged in wage labour on Euro-American plantations to earn the cash needed for imported goods, government taxes and church donations. To circumvent the monopolistic practices of Euro-American traders, Samoans also founded copra cooperatives. These ultimately folded under coercion, but not without creating a crucial legacy for future anti-colonial resistance. In Samoa’s world of copra, sweetness and colonial power were tightly bound together.     

Cogs in the Machine: The Experiences of Female Munitions Workers and Members of the Australian Women’s Land Army in South Australia, 1940–45

Mobilisation on the Australian ‘home front’ during the Second World War enabled some women to move temporarily into employment usually reserved for men, and to earn significantly higher wages than they were accustomed to, but the benefits of this have been often overstated. Focusing on South Australian women in the city and rural areas who took up the new working opportunities — in munitions factories and the Australian Women’s Land Army in particular — this article demonstrates that relatively few women were entitled to higher wages, such wages were lower and paid later in South Australia than in other states, and that working conditions were unattractive and often dangerous. At the war’s end, the social imperative to marry and raise children, coupled with demands that they give up their place for male workers, then saw many women return to domesticity or less-rewarded and lower status ‘female occupations’.