bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Racism, Marxism, Psychology
Authors: Foster Don
Published: March 2007

Locating a revised, multiple and shifting conceptualization of racism, the paper outlines ways in which Marxist theorizing may challenge the individualism and reductionism which are characteristic of mainstream psychology. Approaches to racism from emerging alternatives to main-stream social psychology in the form of two contrasting streams, inter-group theorizing and social constructionism, are sketched, along with a few remarks on psychoanalysis. A revised Marxism drawing on Cornel West's notion of genealogical materialism offers a broader vision which could potentially merge progressive elements from the psychological realm with a thoroughgoing materialism, and point towards an appropriately critical stance against racism.
Elucidation vs Pseudo-Explanation in Psychology: A Response to Professor Wetherick
Authors: Sharrock Wes , Coulter Jeff
Published: March 2007

Our response to Professor Wetherick (1999) encompasses some issues beyond the purview of his contribution, but which we believe are relevant to a serious appraisal of his comments on our original paper on J.J. Gibson (Sharrock & Coulter, 1998). In our view, Wetherick perists in the conflation of conceptual and empirical questions, presenting a more complex `solution' to the Gibsonian problem which we had attempted not to solve but to dissolve. Therefore, we are led to treat his constructive proposals in the same way as we did those of Gibson, namely as misplaced attempts to theorize about the nature of human visual capacities. We contest his appeal to the concept of an `object' in his theorizing about vision. Moreover, we note that Wetherick assumes as fact a point which we seriously contested in our original paper: the causal role of the retinal image in human vision.
Union Revitalization Strategies in Comparative Perspective
Authors: Frege Carola M. , Kelly John
Published: March 2007

This introductory article provides a preliminary explanation of the cross-national similarities and differences of union revitalization strategies discussed in this special issue. Differences in the institutional context of industrial relations as well as state policies and employer strategies explain some major differences in how national unions are responding to the current socio-economic challenges. However, our findings reveal that union responses are also influenced by their own internal structures. In particular, we use insights of the social movement literature to highlight the importance of the cognitive or `framing' processes through which unions as actors translate and act upon changes in the environment.
Workplace Resistance in Western Europe: A Preliminary Overview and a Research Agenda
Authors: Edwards Paul , Collinson David , Della Rocca Giuseppe
Published: March 2007

There has long been a lack of attention to the informal and subtle ways in which employees can resist or shape the rules of work, often within the act of work itself. Yet they are increasingly important in understanding how systems of industrial relations are actually experienced. The paper provides a conceptual framework for analysing workplace resistance. It illustrates the approach through a historical introduction and analysis of the periods of `Fordism' and `post-Fordism'. The main empirical examples are drawn from France and Italy. A central hypothesis is that forms of resistance may have been similar across Europe in early industrialization, diverging under distinct state and employer policies. It is possible that contemporary developments point to a reconvergence. This and related hypotheses are used to propose a future research agenda.
Systems of Work and Socio-Economic Structures: A Comparison of Germany, Spain, France and Japan
Authors: Kohler Christoph , Woodard James
Published: March 2007

This article compares systems of work and production in the German, Spanish, French and Japanese machine-building industries and draws some methodological and conceptual conclusions. The analysis shows a common basic structure of work but with nation-specific variations. France displays a more rigid division of labour than Germany, while Japan shows more functional differentiation. In Spain there is a marked difference between formal and informal organization: a paradoxical mix of `Taylorist' bureaucratic structures and craft elements. In the late 1980s, tight economic constraints initiated a phase of change and experimentation in national models of production and work, and new types of national and regional variation are emerging. The findings of this article support `neo-contingency' theories at the micro (plant and company) level, but `societal effects' seem to be more important at the meso and macro levels (structure of industry and economy).
National Industrial Relations Systems and Transnational Challenges: An Essay in Review
Authors: Hyman Richard
Published: March 2007

This essay in review examines a series of recent texts which address the tension between economic internationalization and national industrial relations systems. The notion of `globalization' identifies real and substantial developments which challenge established forms of employment regulation, but these developments are contradictory and create new possibilities for strategic intervention.
Changing Times
Authors: Steward Barbara
Published: March 2007

This article explores the effect of telework on the experience, calculation and use of time. Telework is said to offer professional and clerical workers flexible time to synchronize work, domestic and leisure activities. Telework is predicted to produce greater productivity and work satisfaction through autonomous time management. This report of a small-scale research project suggests that teleworkers rarely work flexibly during conventional work times, and work increasingly in the evenings and at weekends. More important is the finding that, isolated from the office and colleagues, they recalculate time in relation to an optimally productive hour. Telework is characterized less by time flexibility than increasing work periods.
Gender and Time Poverty: The Neglected Social Policy Implications of Gendered Time, Transport and Travel
Authors: Turner Jeff , Grieco Margaret
Published: March 2007

Women in the developed world have different transport and travel patterns from men. Women are often involved in poorly resourced, highly complex, multiple-purpose trips (trip chaining); men tend to make single-purpose trips at higher cost and using superior modes of transport. These differences in transport and travel patterns are generated out of differential access by gender to economic resources, social resources and time resources. Women are time poor as a consequence of the disproportionate level of household tasks they are required to perform within present social structures. This research note identifies gaps in current UK social policy development around getting single mothers from welfare into work. It suggests a range of information technology based solutions which could assist single mothers in accomplishing the complex coordinatory task set them by the new policies on lone parenthood which need to be accompanied by improvements in transport if the `welfare to work' policy is to be successful.
Belonging Through Time
Authors: Golden Deborah
Published: March 2007

This article addresses the links between national identity, temporal order, and the re-socialization of migrants. Anchored in an ethnographic account of encounters between Israeli Jews and migrants from the former Soviet Union, it looks at ways in which temporal re-ordering was rendered crucial to the moral transformation required of the newcomers. A close look at these encounters reveals that at the heart of this re-socialization project lay the endeavour to link the lives of the newcomers with the life of the Israeli nation-state by persuading them to bracket off their present circumstances in favour of a shared, imagined, past and future.
Reminiscences of an Extreme Century
Authors: Ester Peter , Vinken Henk , Diepstraten Isabelle
Published: March 2007

The new millennium has inspired social observers to contemplate the events that shaped the 20th century. Little is known about how the general public and generations within it interpret the landmark events of this century. If generation theory is correct one may hypothesize that different generations remember and interpret distinct events. Generations share different collective memories and, consequently, intergenerational differences are expected in the time heuristics that generations apply. This hypothesis is tested with the Dutch CentERdata Millennium Survey ( N = 1391). It is observed that though generations recall similar events, they interpret these events in distinct ways, based on their formative experiences.
Perceptual Time Patterns (`Time-Styles')
Authors: Usunier Jean-Claude G. , Valette-Florence Pierre
Published: March 2007

Issues pertaining to the perception of time are central to many marketing dynamics, especially for consumer behaviour. This article first presents time frames as they are established within a society (mostly described by sociology and anthropology) in relation to the perception of individuals (mostly through experimental and social psychology, as well as the marketing literature). A psychometric scale is then introduced in order to capture these time orientations (`time-styles'). Three hundred questionnaires containing 180 items, based on previous studies, have been administered. Six main dimensions are identified: preference for economic/organized time; preference for non-linear/unorganized time; orientation towards the past; orientation towards the future; time submissiveness; time anxiety.
Farming Women, Time and the `Re-agrarianization' of Consciousness
Authors: Inhetveen Heide
Published: March 2007

The article examines the suggestion that an ecological time concept might be achieved by the `re-agrarianization' of consciousness: as in agriculture, thought and action are to be related to the pace of natural processes. Data from empirical investigations of time management amongst women involved in peasant agriculture are used to indicate that, although peasant agrarian time does contain important elements of ecological time, agrarian time is also always formed by social processes and power structures. This is evident at the moment, particularly given that structural changes in peasant agriculture are leading to an industrialization and `denaturalization' of agrarian time. At present, the garden, more than anywhere else, seems to be the place in which farming women can experience a `good time'.
Everyday Time and Life Time
Authors: Alheit Peter
Published: March 2007

Most human beings are aware of living in a certain age, that life is a transitory phenomenon, and that time passes - slowly or quickly. Since the discovery of time, humanity has gained control over time as a dimension, but the question that needs to be posed is who exerts this control and how this relates to us as individuals. I wish to draw a distinction between `everyday time' as something relatively routine, or cyclical, and `life time' as a linearly experienced framework in which we seek biographical continuity and coherence. Making this distinction lays bare the culturally specific asynchrony between these two time frames, and the issue of who controls them. In capitalist modernity, the battle for control over time continues to be waged in many different ways. The strategies used by individuals to `heal' the gap between everyday time and life time make everyone a potential rebel offering resistance against the appropriation of time.
Rethinking Social Time: Feminist Perspectives
Authors: Leccardi Carmen
Published: March 2007

In the final years of the 20th century, conceptions of time and work are changing rapidly. The crisis of (paid) work as the fundamental principle regulating society and personal identity has cast doubt on the legitimacy of an exclusively economic and quantitative interpretation of time. This paper argues that feminist thought can make a major contribution to the revision of the temporal paradigm that has hitherto been dominant. It will be shown that the radical change of perspective associated with a feminist critique of this malestream time makes it possible to deconstruct/reconstruct the categories generally used for the analysis of social time.
The `Civilization' of Time
Authors: Ikuko Nishimoto
Published: March 2007

Over the past century, Japanese society has undergone a radical change in its temporal experience, moving from one following the rhythms of nature to one of mathematical precision, namely, the western time system. Why did Japan westernize its time? This paper argues that it was for the sake of industrialization, where time was equated with profit. The accelerating sense of time reflected Japan's desperate efforts to catch up with the western level of industry in the shortest possible time.
Time Shattered
Authors: Paolucci Gabriella
Published: March 2007

The aim of this paper is to examine the temporal dimension of city life in postindustrial society. Typical aspects of the experience of women in cities will be discussed and an attempt made to understand why it is that `city time' has recently begun to form part of the political discourse of women. Using the metaphor of the city as a time machine, it is suggested that city time is constitutionally linked to the onset of the modern concept of time as a resource belonging to an economic system based on the production and exchange of goods. Women, situated as they are at the centre of the complex network of the city's temporal interdependencies, are viewed as the privileged protagonists of the new postmodern temporal condition. However, the increasing demands made on their time, both quantitatively and qualitatively, at the workplace and in the home, marks the friction which results from the objectivization of time based on economic calculations and the temporal experiences linked to each individual's situational context.
Security on the Korean Peninsula: Continuity and Change
Authors: KIHL YOUNG WHAN
Published: March 2007

Continuity and change characterize security on the Korean peninsula, while the USA's ongoing anti-terrorism campaign raises concern in relation to North Korea. This article examines the Korean peninsula from global, regional, and local perspectives, ascertaining security dynamics and trends. It contrasts recent efforts to restore the northern continental triangle (North Korea, China, and Russia) with the continued stability of the southern maritime triangle (South Korea, Japan, and the United States). The impact of the stalemated inter-Korean dialogues upon the security of the Korean peninsula and each of the major powers is also considered. The possible resumption and agenda of the dialogue between the United States and North Korea are under dispute. North Korea acted to let the Clinton administration know that it was willing to trade its nuclear and ballistic missile capabilities for economic resources, if the price was right. Whether North Korea will indeed bargain away its military trump cards for economic payoff remains to be seen. North Korean leader Kim Jong II is a master of control rather than a beleaguered beggar, as he is sometimes portrayed in the international media.
The National State as Mediator of Regional Development Outcomes in a Global Era
Authors: Cumbers Andrew
Published: March 2007

In recent years, commentators have downplayed the role of the national state in shaping regional economic development. In particular it has been argued that globalization processes are undermining the national level as a container of economic regulation and action. This has been accompanied by a celebration of the regional level as a site for constructing competitive advantage, amid growing evidence of increased sub-national economic agglomeration. This article contests this view, arguing that in the current era the state remains a key actor in both mediating the effects of global economic integration and shaping the trajectories of regional economies. The argument is illustrated through a comparative analysis of oil-based regional economic developments in the UK and Norway. The case studies highlight the contrasting role played by the national state in the two countries and the varied spatial outcomes and prospects that arise as a result.
From Museum to Mass Entertainment
Authors: van Aalst Irina , Boogaarts Inez
Published: March 2007

In a relatively short period of time, the museum cluster has become a key element of the tourism sector and an important contributor to the urban economy. In their competition to attract visitors, residents, and businesses, more and more cities are profiling themselves as a Cultural City, an Entertainment City, or a Fantasy City. Meanwhile, museums have evolved from buildings devoted primarily to educational and cultural presentations into public spaces where the visitor reigns.

This article examines the increased attention that cities are giving to investments in museum facilities and to the development of spatial concentrations of museums, known as museum clusters. Two case-studies - Amsterdam’s Museumplein and Berlin’s Museuminsel - are used as a backdrop for the description, illustration, and analysis of recent trends.
The Politics of Partnership
Authors: Syrett Stephen
Published: March 2007

In the production of a dominant ideology for local economic policy, concepts of partnership currently play a key role. However, conceptualizations of partnership which inform the policy process are often weakened by a failure to recognize the unequal power relations between social partners, as well as by implicit assumptions of the existence of a range of partners available to be drawn into the local development process. This article explores current dominant notions of partnership and forms of economic governance and the role of international organizations in promoting particular ideologies of partnership. Through analysis of recent experiences in Portugal, this article examines how in practice the development of partnerships has been heavily constrained by the underdeveloped nature of local social partners, plus the unequal power relations between local and central state organizations and other locally based institutions. It is argued that policies promoting partnership must recognize these inequalities between partners and show awareness of the need to build up local institutional capacities for promoting economic development. Such policies are required in order to construct a politics of partnership embedded in democratic and participative processes of local development and to avoid the domination of the local development process by restricted local and national interests.
Perception of AIDS in Mumbai: A Study of Low Income Communities
Authors: Bharat Shalini
Published: March 2007

Social perception of an illness impacts people's ways of responding to the sick and to the illness itself. In particular, illnesses that are given to moral interpreta tions such as STDs and AIDS elicit more negative than positive responses. This paper seeks to understand how AIDS isperceived and interpreted within a cultural setting. Using the qualitative research approach, 18 focus group discussions were held with young and adult men and women in lower and lower middle income groups in Mumbai. Familiarity with AIDS was found to be high among the re spondents but discussions revealed several misconceptions and fears about it. In general, men had greater awareness and knowledge but more misconceptions as well compared to women. The findings reconfirm the several AIDS metaphors and symbols described in other cultural settings. These include the perception of AIDS as a dreaded, shameful, invited and "othered" disease; its strong associa tion with sex and sex workers; its fatal outcome and its androcentric focus. These perceptions are discussed in the context of local beliefs and norms ofgender rela tions. Implications of the findings for AIDS prevention and advocacy work are discussed.
Questions of Revolutionary Identity and Sexuality in the Contemporary Radical Left Movement in Andhra Pradesh
Authors: Vindhya U.
Published: March 2007

This article deals with the making of identity of women in the course of collectivt struggle, with particular reference to the contemporary radical left movement in Andhra Pradesh. The theoretical context of this research project is located in the tension between the structural ard psychological perspectives on human behaviour on the one hand, and the feminist and radical left approaches to women's political (public) identity on the other hand The relating, mixing and matching of these two pairs of differences, structural/psychological, and private/public, one close to the radical left, and the other to the feminists, show that there is some tension between them. The article focuses on the implications of this tension for an understanding of the identity of women who participate in revolutionary movements.
The Bulk and the Front of Psychology in India
Authors: Sinha Jai B.P.
Published: March 2007

Indian psychology has been rapidly expanding. The number of psychologists, institutions offering courses in psychology, research publications, and journals are increasing. However, the bulk of research remains replicative and imitative. There is a slow and gradual increase in problem-oriented and culture sensitive research carried out by a small minority of front runners who are constrained by the lack of intellectual and professional support, infrastruc tural deficiencies, and inadequate financial and human resources. Together they create obstacles which leave many psychologists with hardly any energy for sustained research of high standard. The paper traces the roots of these proximate impediments to three major predisposing factors: pervasive poverty, excessive political interference and government control, and social values and practices in India. The new policy of the government together with the awareness of Indian psychologists of the societal demands and their roles, it is hoped, are likely to create a condition conducive for the rapid growth of "appropriate" psychology in India.
Psychology, Social Policy and Social Development
Authors: Tyler Forrest B.
Published: March 2007

The 1995 UN World Summitfor Social Development emphasised the importance of insuring human security and the active involvement ofpeople at the grass-roots level in the effort to solve worldwide problems of poverty, employment and social integration. This paper discusses ways in which psychologists can contribute to achieving these goals. Reference is made to psychologists'potential contributions of concepts and methodological approaches as well as their relevant knowledge and skills. Examples are included to illustrate past and potential contributions to attaining these objectives of (a) psychologically based programmes which are transculturally sensitive, and (b) psychologists' social and individual change expertise.
Work Organisation and Economic Management in Sub-Saharan Africa: From a Eurocentric Orientation toward an Afrocentric Perspective
Authors: Nsamenang A. Bame
Published: March 2007

The paper examines the reasons for the neglect of indigenous economic motives and work organisations in sub-Saharan Africa. A historical account of the evolu tion of economic motives and modes of production is presented. It is argued that capitalistic forms of production which were prevalent were directly related to colonialprocesses. The concept of development has been critically examined in the context of sub-Saharan Africa and factors responsible for the failure of develop ment have been identified. A wide range offactors are discussed ranging from a gross neglect of indigenous economic motives and wisdom to an almost obsessive reliance on foreign models. This has led to a Eurocentric redefinition of the con cept of development. The need for considering indigenous economic motives and development is discussed.
Gandhi, Tagore and a New Ethics of Argumentation
Authors: Giri Ananta Kumar
Published: March 2007

Discourse, dialogue and deliberation are important frames for thinking about and creating an ideal inter- subjective condition and a dignified society at present. This article presents the contours of such a new ethics of argumentation by carrying out a detailed discussion of the relationship between Gandhi and Tagore, and the way they argued with each other. Their arguments and counter-arguments were not for the sake of win ning any egotistic victory but for exploring truth. It also connects this new ethics of argumentation in dia logue with the agenda of moral argumentation offered by Jurgen Habermas, the heart-touching social theor ist of our time.
Clothing the Political Man: A Reading of the Use of Khadi/White in Indian Public Life
Authors: Chakrabarty Dipesh
Published: March 2007

The author examines the symbolism of the Indian politician's common dress: white coarse khadi cham pioned by Gandhi. Does its continued survival during the post-independence era signify merely hypocrisy, empty ritual? What does it implicitly communicate about the public and private intents ofpoliticalfigures? What values does the khadi conceal in its texture? Do they serve any purpose? Chakrabarty's analysis concludes by admitting that though khadi no longer conveys any message as to the prevalence of Gandhian convictions, yet it constitutes a deep-seated resistance by Indian democracy and politics to the wholesale loss of their identity in the rising surge of global capitalism.
Information Technologies and Late Development: Innovative Capacity or Hidden Reproduction of Core-Periphery Cleavages?
Authors: Rothboeck Sandra
Published: March 2007

This paper will address the question as to whether successful economic development in newly industrialising countries (NICs) from East Asia leads to a relative narrowing of the gap between the independence from 'pace-setting countries' in new technologies, or whether the phenomenon of 'late development'should not really be considered effective in terms of self-sustaining development. With regard to the increasing importance of infor mation and communication technologies (ICT), this paper tries to give an assessment of the relative merit of both interpretations while concluding that a negative reading seems to be theoretically and empirically more appropriate.
Research Performance of Scientists in Academic Institutions in India: An Empirical Exploration
Authors: Kumar Pattnaik Binay , Chaudhury L.
Published: March 2007

Based on an empirical study conducted among 250 academic scientists of India in chemi cal sciences and technology, this article is an attempt to map out only the objective aspects of the phenomenon under investigation, that is, quality research performance among sci entists. In the process, the article examines several hypotheses pertaining to the relation ship between quality research performance (dependent variable) and its empirical and objective predictors (independent variables). That apart, it also examines the well-known Ortega Hypothesis in the sociology of science. Derived from the body of published litera ture, the following is the set of independent variables being examined: (a) type of institu tion the scientist belonged to; (b) research environment at the centre/department; (c) reward system in science; (d) diversity in research activities; (e) motivation; (f) prestige of the graduate school attended; and (g) total quantity performance. All of the above inde pendent variables have been found to be causing significant variations in the dependent variable—quality research performance. Last, the verification of the Ortega Hypothesis brought in the apparently contradictory observation that many important contributions in science came from non-diligent, average scientists who even produce less in quantity.
A Science Policy to Cope with the Inevitable?
Authors: Salomon Jean-Jacques
Published: March 2007

Planning to cope with the Indian population dynamics is the central issue of the remarkable book edited by V. Gowariker, The Inevitable Billion Plus. The paper discusses the feasibility of Gowariker's proposals by examining first the science and technology policy experiences of the so-called developed countries, and then the lessons that can be drawn for a developing country such as India. With the end of the Cold War, the grounds for the support of basic science are everywhere reconsidered. This may be an opportunity for India, doomed to remain a 'mixed economy' whatever the fate of the liberal reforms, to design an alternative path of development aimed at reconciling the economic and strategic imperative of innovation with the nonetheless pressing imperative of social improvement. Such a policy is not so much to train Western-style researches as to increase and spread basic technical skills in line with local needs.
Critical Theory in Political Practice: Sustainable Development and Development Theory
Authors: Jacob Merle
Published: March 2007

The paper explores the notion that critical theory is an appropriate conceptual framework for the reconstruction of one perspective in the contemporary discourse on environment and development, sustainable development (SD). The discussion reveals how the central problems in SD (such as its high level of interpretative flexibility, inconsistency with state-of-the-art findings in theory and empirical studies) are intimately connected to the relationship between theory and praxis in develop ment studies.

The paper is divided into two parts. The first part situates SD in the context of development studies. The main aim is to highlight the cognitive structure of develop ment theory and its relationship to praxis. The second part presents an argument for the reconstruction of SD as critical theory and outlines some of the theoretical problems posed by this task.
Technological Competition in Deep Water: The Success of a Company in a Country in the Peripherv
Authors: Furtado André Tosi
Published: March 2007

Peripheral countries tend to absorb new technology rather than produce it. They tend to adopt instead of create, and learn by introducing incremental innovations. In some cases, this technological trajectory based upon incremental innovation can lead to the emergence of radical innovation. This paper shows such a case in deep water offshore oil exploration, which was done by the Brazilian state-owned petroleum company. Petrobrás arrived at the technological frontier and is recognised as a leader in a field which now has competing technologies. The case permits an understanding of this competition, which, given the local nature of the learning process, is a competition between companies and even economic spaces. The paper examines the factors that affect the use of technologies with similar competing technologies. Finally, the paper examines the significance of such technological trajectories in peripheral countries. The strategy followed by Petrobrás is examined in order to understand how a company, in a mature technological sector and a not so innovative national context, has been so successful.
Collaboration and Conflict: Artisanal Jati Panchayats and the Eighteenth Century Jodhpur State
Authors: Sahai Nandita Prasad
Published: March 2007

In an effort to move away from the entanglement of states with elite centres of power, this essay examines the interface of the Jodhpur State with artisanal caste councils orjati panchayats as representative of 'popular' non-elite organisations. It questions the perception of a hiatus between state and society and instead argues that despite tensions in their relationship, close collaboration of the Jodhpur State with locally rooted jati panchayats was a way of enrolling popular support for the rulers, and thereby facilitating the enforcement of order/governance. As such, it tries to expand our understanding of the dynamics ofpower politics, the processes of administration, and the nature of governance in pre-colonial India.
Travel Accounts as Early Sources of Knowledge about Russia in Medieval Western Europe from the mid-Thirteenth to the early Fifteenth Centuries
Authors: Mund Stéphane
Published: March 2007

While Russia really began to catch Western Europe's attention only from the late fifteenth century, the first detailed information about this country had already appeared in the context of Western European diplomats and missionaries'travels to Centraland Eastern Asia during the thirteenth century. This article will examine these travellers and their accounts, taking into consideration how they got their infor mation and how they contributed to the image of Russia in Western Europe.
Current Issues in HIV Vaccine Development
Authors: Esparza José , Osmanov Saladin
Published: March 2007

An HIV preventive vaccine constitutes the best long-term hope to control the HIV/ AIDS pandemic. A number of scientific challenges must be addressed before a vaccine is developed. An important issue to be solved relates to the significance of the HIV genetic variability in terms of potential vaccine-induced protection. Since 1987 more than 30 different candidate vaccines have been tested in more than 6,000 healthy human volunteers. Most of these trials have been conducted in the United States and Europe, and also in developing countries. The first Phase III efficacy trials were initiated in 1998 and 1999 in the United States and Thailand, and the initial results will be available at the end of 2001. To accelerate vaccine development it is important to conduct multiple trials to simultaneously evaluate several types of vaccines, against different HIV subtypes, in diverse populations. Developing countries must strengthen their infrastructures to be able to conduct trials of the highest scientific and ethical standards.
Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA)
Authors: Bhat Ramesh , Verma Bharat Bhushan , Reuben Elan
Published: March 2007

Measurement of efficiency of any organisation (e.g., hospital, bank, etc.) that uses multiple inputs and generates multiple outputs is complex and comparisons across units are difficult. Charnes and Cooper (1985) describe a non-parametric approach in such situations to measure efficiency and the technique is known as data envelopment analysis (DEA). This analysis method is basically a linear pro gramming-based technique used for measuring the relative performance of organisational units where the presence of multiple inputs and outputs makes comparisons difficult. It involves identification of units, which in relative sense use the inputs for the given outputs in the most optimal manner; DEA uses this information to construct efficiency frontiers over the data of available organisa tion units. This efficient frontier is used to calculate the efficiencies of the other organisation units that do not fall on the efficient frontier and provide informa tion on which units are not using inputs efficiently. The objective of this article is to introduce the technique and demonstrate it through an example to show how relative efficiencies can be determined and identify units that are relatively less efficient.
The AIDS Situation in Nepal
Authors: Suvedi B.K.
Published: March 2007

The HIV/AIDS epidemic in Nepal is spreading rapidly. Until the late 1990s, the country was considered a low-prevalance state. However, since 1997 HIV infection has been increasing alarmingly among injecting drug users and sex workers in many cities, with prevalence in Kathmandu exceeding 60and 15 per cent respectively. In order to address the potential risk to the general population and mitigate its impact on the population with high-risk behaviour, national response, both in terms of HIV prevention and care, must be expanded fast, with full participation of all partners and stakeholders in the country.
Can Investments in Emerging Markets Help to Solve the Ageing Problem?
Authors: Holzmann Robert
Published: March 2007

Pre-funding of pension commitments in OECD economies is increasingly seen as a central strategy to cope with the ageing of their populations. This paper argues that investments in emerging markets can help at the margin, but are unable to solve the demographic problem. While these investments bring potential advantages through enhanced risk diversification, higher rates of return, and accelerated financial market development, the total effects are likely to be limited. Furthermore, in order to harvest them, capital sending and receiving countries must fulfill various politically and economically challenging requirements. For pension policy, the limited con tribution ofpre-funding at home and abroad in order to address the demo graphic problem implies that enhanced emphasis must be given to domestic reforms.
THE MARKETING OF THE WOMEN'S NATIONAL BASKETBALL ASSOCIATION AND THE MAKING OF POSTFEMINISM
Authors: McDonald Mary G.
Published: March 2007

Grounded in feminist cultural studies perspectives, this article criticizes the marketing of postfeminist ideologies in the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA). While seeking to create new consumers, WNBA accounts construct the league and its advertisers as advocates for gender justice. It is argued that this strategy also reinforces a neoconservative project based on the advocacy of personal responsibility and self-help as antidotes to social problems and inequities that have been magnified via late capitalist economic arrangements.
BAD BOYS AND GENTLEMEN
Authors: Kennedy Eileen
Published: March 2007

This article considers television sport as a gendered genre. Drawing on film theory and feminist media studies, it illuminates the essential masculinization of the hero function within the narrative of televised sport, and suggests that the presence of a number of characteristics (clarity, banter and obscenity) may account for television sport's address to an overwhelmingly male audience. However, not every sport attracts the same audience, and while motor racing draws more male than female viewers, a relatively high proportion of the audience for a sport like snooker is female. The semiotic analysis of these two sports presented in this article suggests that the address of television sport is highly complex. The analysis points to the importance of the interplay of class, gender and nation in the construction of the hero within the narrative of television sport. It is argued that the cultural specificity of the manifestations of the hero in television sports helps explain their varying gendered address.
Cricket and Civilizing Processes
Authors: Malcolm Dominic
Published: March 2007

This article examines Ruud Stokvis's contention that the tendency of figurational sociologists to focus on violence and its control would be unproductive in the study of the development of non-contact sports such as cricket and that the formal organization and standardization of modern sports are their defining features. Following a brief outline of Elias's theory of civilizing processes, the relatively violent tenor of early (pre-1850s) cricket is demonstrated. An examination of the development of the game's structural features (laws, customs, physical environment) illustrates that processes relating to the standardization and national diffusion of cricket are highly interdependent with measures to control the level of violence in the game. Thus, previously described characteristics of the developmental processes of relatively violent sports such as football, rugby and boxing have parallels in, and similarities with, the non-contact sport of cricket.
ASPECTS OF BOXING IN THE WESTERN `CIVILIZING PROCESS'
Authors: Sheard Kenneth G.
Published: March 2007

Despite the feelings of repugnance aroused in many people by boxing it is argued here that the sport may be described as `civilized' in the non-evaluative sense suggested by Norbert Elias. The activity of prize fighting has undergone a sportization process. As part of this process the rules governing it have become more precise, more explicit and more differentiated. Supervision of rule observance has become more efficient. The extent and nature of the violence allowed in the sport has become much more carefully regulated. Elias' theory is modified to suggest that in the course of civilizing processes not only do excessively dangerous and violent activities become increasingly controlled but that the appearance of control assumes added significance. In the case of boxing, cosmetic changes have been introduced into the sport which, at first glance, may appear to make the activity less dangerous but which, in reality, increase those dangers.
THE AESTHETICS OF RISK
Authors: Stranger Mark
Published: March 2007

A combination of participant-observation, survey research, interviews, and semiotics was used to examine risk-taking in Australian surfing. It is argued that: (1) aestheticization facilitates risk-taking in the pursuit of an ecstatic, transcendent experience; and (2) the surfing aesthetic involves a postmodern incarnation of the sublime that distorts rational risk assessment. The study also analyzes the role of the surfing media in constructing and reinforcing images of the sublime.
On-Line Distance Learning: A Model for Developing Countries
Authors: Khan Abdul W.
Published: March 2007

We are increasingly viewing education as an industry, courses and programmes as products, delivery of education as a service, and educational institutions as for-profit ventures. The world trade in education represents an important growth opportunity and, increasingly, the means by which solutions to educational challenges are found. There is no doubt that open and distance learning (ODL) will be the primary mode of lifelong education for knowledge workers in the new millenium. Traditional forms of education provision would not be able to meet the tremendous increase in the demand for lifelong learning across the globe. ICTs must be recognized as the crucial determinant in evolution of ODL systems in the knowledge era.

Governments in developing countries have responded to the emerging realities of global markets. The specific features of ODL and delivery systems for developing countries are presented. And the critical challenges for developing countries to global education are discussed. The virtual Campus Initiative of the Indira Gandhi National Open University is presented as a case, with a model for On-Line Delivery of Programmes and for On-line, For Profit Telelearning Centres. The article ends with an overview of key strategies that would enable open and distance-learning institutions to create and serve global education markets.
A Partnership of Equals? Academic Collaboration between the United Kingdom and Brazil
Authors: Canto Isabel , Hannah Janet
Published: March 2007

In 1988, the British Council and the Brazilian federal agency responsible for funding higher education, the Co-ordenaçao de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nivel Superior (CAPES), signed an agreement to promote and facilitate academic collaboration between universities in the United Kingdom and Brazil. From the Brazilian perspective, this agreement represented an opportunity to establish joint research programs and other activities that moved beyond traditional forms of north-south cooperation to link academics from both countries in a genuine and mutually beneficial partnership. Drawing on case study research of collaborative academic projects financed under this agreement, this article addresses the extent to which these initial aspirations have been realized. The research confirms that constraints arising from historical and contemporary factors continue to pose barriers to genuine partnership. However, it also highlights the limitations of adopting a purely macrolevel analysis, emphasizing the complexity of, and variability between, individual projects. Factors that appear to contribute to the degree of success of the projects investigated are also identified and explored, and it is concluded that the British Council–CAPES agreement is facilitating the emergence of “advanced neocolonial partnerships” in academic collaboration between the two countries.
THE PUZZLE OF LENSKI'S CURVE
Authors: Krymkowski Daniel H.
Published: March 2007

This article responds to calls for more attention to theoretical issues in the study of social stratification and mobility. As a starting point, I reconsider Lenski's Power and Privilege, the last bold effort to create a general theory of social stratification. One of Lenski's most interesting assertions was that the amount of inequality would `vary directly with the size of a society's surplus'. However, the mechanisms underlying this relation were not specified and, as Lenski himself noted, direct portionality fails to hold when one moves from agrarian to industrial societies. Utilizing game theory and a rate of return model, I suggest mechanisms that account for Lenski's curve (the observed curvilinear relationship between the size of the surplus and the amount of inequality).
PARTISANSHIP AS A SOCIAL CONVENTION
Authors: Harvey Anna L.
Published: March 2007

Existing research models partisanship as a function of either running tallies of party performance evaluations or emotional identifications with parties. However, these models are arguably insufficient to account for the variation in the propensity to act on behalf of a party. This article develops and tests a model of partisanship as a social convention. The decision to act on behalf of a party is modeled as an asymmetric n-person coordination game with multiple equilibria, where the payoffs from being coordinated on acts of partisanship are higher than the payoffs from coordination on abstention if the costs of those actions are sufficiently low. Given that such a coordination game will be easier to solve where acts of partisanship are more public, we should see a greater incidence of partisanship in states with laws providing for publicly available party registration, relative to states without such laws. The model is tested using data from the 1984-96 American National Election Studies merged with data on states' party registration laws. Several measures of partisanship are shown to be responsive to the presence of laws providing for party registration, controlling for other factors known to affect the propensity to be partisan.
Gift-giving, Quasi-credit and Reciprocity
Authors: Thomas Jonathan P. , Worrall Timothy
Published: March 2007

The fluctuations in incomes inherent in rural communities can be attenuated by reciprocal assistance. A model of reciprocal assistance based upon rational action and voluntary participation is presented. Individuals provide assistance only if the costs of so doing are outweighed by the benefits from expected future reciprocation. A distinction is made between general reciprocity, where the counter obligation is expected but not certain, and balanced reciprocity, where there is a firm counter obligation. This firm counter obligation is reflected by including a loan or quasi-credit element in any assistance. It is shown how this can increase the assistance given and it may explain the widespread use of quasi-credit in rural communities. Moreover, it is shown that for a range of parameter values consistent with evidence from three villages in southern India, a simple scheme of gift-giving and quasi-credit can do almost as well as theoretically better but more complicated schemes.