bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Gender, Contracts and Wage Work: Agricultural Restructuring in Brazil's São Francisco Valley
Authors: Collins Jane L. 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTBrazi&#x006c;̂s São Francisco Valley provides an example of the ways in which agro‐food firms are attempting to mobilize and control labour as they expand production of fruits and vegetables for domestic and global markets. In crops where cost reduction is a primary concern, firms choose highly ‘flexible’ forms of labour mobilization, drawing on the casual labour of migrants from the Brazilian Northeast. In crops where the quality and timing of produce are of great importance, firms use either subcontracting arrangements that mobilize family labour, or the labour of local women and children. In this way, firms involved in the production of fruits and vegetables show many similarities to their counterparts in certain branches of industry: they are actively experimenting with labour arrangements that tap the most vulnerable segments of the international workforce, and that appropriate unpaid family labour.
The Development Impact of NGO Activities in the Red Sea Province of Sudan: A Critique
Authors: Ati Hassan Ahmed Abdel 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTThis article examines the results of, and the prospects for, the declared shift of NGOs from relief operations to development activities in the Red Sea Province of eastern Sudan. Statistical and qualitative information contained in the reports of NGOs themselves provides the main data source on which the analysis is based. Although NGOs have been successful in conducting massive relief operations in the area, the article asserts that they have not yet and are not expected to achieve any tangible results on the development front. The main reason for this is the apparent misconception of development on the part of the NGOs as an isolated, localized activity which they can perform; another is the NGOs' failure to recognize the difference in the methods, means and prerequisites necessary for relief and for development; a third is the failure of NGOs to equip local institutions to absorb and/or sustain any achieved ‘development’, since most NGOs operate in complete isolation from governmental and traditional Beja institutions.
NGOs, Disaster Relief and Asset Transfer in the Horn: Political Survival in a Permanent Emergency
Authors: Duffield Mark 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTFamines have winners and losers. Conventional analysis has concentrated on the losers: what has been neglected is that famines can result from the conscious exercise of power in pursuit of gain or advantage by the politically strong. This article is an attempt to analyse the process of political survival in the context of permanent emergency. Through examples of local asset transfer, and indicating how this process articulates with a wider regional parallel economy, the paper offers an analysis of political survival in the arc of crisis that runs from Sudan through southern Ethiopia to Somalia. The role of donors and NGOs is examined in terms of how they relate to the weak and the strong within the asset transfer economy. Donors are seen to have supported the strong whilst the position of NGOs is more contradictory. Although programme measures to protect assets have been developed, and the disjuncture between the rules of sovereignty and the protection of human rights has been highlighted, these measures have essentially failed. A review of trends since the end of the Cold War suggests that the chances of preventing the further consolidation of a transfer economy within the region are negligible. The position of those who gain from such a destructive se the process of political survival in the context of permanent emergency. Through examples of local asset transfer, and indicating how this process articulates with a wider regional parallel economy, the paper offers an analysis of political survival in the arc of crisis that runs from Sudan through southern Ethiopia to Somalia. The role of donors and NGOs is examined in terms of how they relate to the weak and the strong within the asset transfer economy. Donors are seen to have supported the strong whilst the position of NGOs is more contradictory. Although programme measures to protect assets have been developed, and the disjuncture between the rules of sovereignty and the protection of human rights has been highlighted, these measures have essentially failed. A review of trends since the end of the Cold War suggests that the chances of preventing the further consolidation of a transfer economy within the region are negligible. The position of those who gain from such a destructive process seems assured.
New Technologies, Employment and Labour Markets in Developing Countries
Authors: James Jeffrey 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTThis article is concerned with the impact of new technologies ‐ especially, but not entirely, those that are related to microelectronics ‐ on employment and labour markets in developing countries. Taking the form of a literature survey it looks at those impacts that have already occurred as well as effects that seem likely to occur in the future. Both sets of issues are addressed within an analytical framework that views the impact of technical change as the end result of a process which begins with the generation and proceeds via the diffusion of new technologies. The need for so broad an approach is shown to stem from the multiplicity of ways in which the generation and diffusion of new technologies influence each other and condition the ultimate impact of these technologies on employment and labour markets. Because many such mechanisms have not yet received much attention in the literature, there appears to be substantial scope for further research.
The Global Flea Market: Migration, Remittances and the Informal Economy in Tonga
Authors: Brown Richard P. C. , Conneil John 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTSome common assumptions about the form and use of migrants' remittances in the South Pacific are examined and questioned in the light of information from a micro‐economic study of one group of remittance recipients in the flea market of Nuku'alofa, the capital of the Kingdom of Tonga. The findings of this study suggest that economic analysis and policy recommendations based on the existing macro‐economic data on recorded remittances and other economic aggregates should be treated with caution. The unrecorded inflows of remittances in kind and the associated spread of the domestic informal sector have had some important implications for the functioning of Tonga's economy. There is some evidence to suggest that the growth of informal, international trade is fostering other significant changes in the domestic economy. The functioning of remittance‐dependent economies such as Tonga is much more complex than existing economic analysis suggests, and involves substantial investment – not just consumption – with the emergence of entrepreneurs and the manipulation of dependence, rather than merely passive receipt of cash and expenditure focused on consumption.
Ecological Conflicts and the Environmental Movement in India
Authors: Gadgil Madhav , Guha Ramachandra 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTNature‐based conflicts have increased in frequency and intensity in India. They revolve around competing claims over forests, land, water and fisheries, and have generated a new movement struggling for the rights of victims of ecological degradation. The environmental movement has added a new dimension to Indian democracy and civil society. It also posesan ideological challenge to the dominant notions of the meaning, content and patterns ofdevelopment.
Gender, Environment and Population
Authors: Heyzer Susan Joekes with Noeleen , Salles Ruth Oniang'o and Vania 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTBased on field research from three regions with distinct variations in environment, population density, livelihood bases and levels of resource dependency, this study investigates the gender aspects of environmental change. It seeks to illustrate the relevance of gender factors for the patterns of adaptation to change, for the welfare impact of changes on the population, and for the ramifications for resource management and livelihood generation at the community level. It employs a gender analysis to examine the impact of such changes on population variables, particularly on health and nutrition, and to explore the more general question of whether women's socio‐economic status is being threatened by the pressures of environmental change.
Social and Political Dimensions of Environmental Protection in Central America
Authors: Utting Peter 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTThis study takes a critical look at mainstream efforts to protect and rehabilitate the environment in Central America. Despite some notable successes, many forest protection and tree planting schemes have not been effectively implemented and have even contributed to further environmental degradation, social inequality and impoverishment. It is argued that the trade‐off between environmental protection and human welfare which characterizes many schemes to protect forests and promote tree planting undermines not only local livelihoods but also the possibility of achieving basic environmental objectives, given the nature of local responses and their effects on project implementation. There is a need for a more integrative and socially‐aware approach to environmental planning which addresses two fundamental problems: the failure to locate environmental protection initiatives within a broader development framework and the failure to integrate concerns for environmental protection with the needs and rights of local people. Addressing these two problems of ‘macro‐’ and ‘micro‐coherency’ in environmental planning requires not only dealing with the many technical, administrative and financial constraints which typically characterize environmental programmes and projects, but also changes in the balance of social forces.
Intellectuals, Economic Reform and Social Change: Constraints and Opportunities in the Formation of a Nigerian Technocracy
Authors: Bangura Yusuf 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTCrisis and economic reforms have changed the status of intellectuals and their relations with dominant élites and policy makers. Because of the technical and ideological nature of these reforms, policy makers have tended to rely on intellectuals as opposed to bureaucrats to shape the agenda of change. This has converted a large number of intellectuals into technocrats and undermined the fabric of academic life in universities. Nowhere is this more pronounced than in developing countries with a large middle class and an economic or financial base that ensures some degree of independence from the multilateral financial institutions. Understanding the success or failure of economic reforms in developing countries requires some analysis of the complex relations between technocrats and political leaders and the societal constraints both sets of actors face. This article explores these issues in the context of Nigeria, whose academic community, bureaucrats and professionals grew in leaps and bounds in the 1970s, following an oil‐induced boom. The crisis of the 1980s led to attempts at economic reform and a highly programmed strategy of political change in which academics played a leading role. The article examines the effectiveness of intellectuals in government, and compares the Nigeria case with technocratic experiments in Ghana, Botswana and Côte d̂Ivoire.
Economic Restructuring, Coping Strategies and Social Change: Implications for Institutional Development in Africa
Authors: Bangura Yusuf 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTSince the early 1980s, most African countries have experienced unsatisfactory rates of economic growth and profound changes in livelihood systems, which have affected the way their modern institutions function. However, when confronted with evidence of poor economic performance in countries undergoing adjustment, the international financial institutions often blame governments for their lack of political will in regulating the activities of bureaucrats and vested interests. They recommend policies aimed at restructuring public sector institutions through privatization, public expenditure cuts, retrenchment, new structures of incentives and decentralization. Despite efforts to implement these measures in a number of countries, the problems of low institutional capacity remain. Two key contradictions appear to explain why institutions have been largely ineffective in crisis economies in Africa: the growing contradiction between the interests of bureaucratic actors and the goals they are supposed to uphold; and the contradiction between the institutional set‐up itself and what goes on in the wider society. To understand how these contradictions work, it is necessary to look more closely at the set of values and relationships that anchor institutions on social systems. The issues here are social compromise and cohesion; institutional socialization and loyalties; overarching sets of values; and political authority to enforce rules and regulations. The crises in these four areas of social relations, which are linked to the ways households and groups have coped with recession and restructuring, have altered Africa's state institutions so that it has become difficult to carry out meaningful development programmes and public sector reforms without addressing the social relations themselves.
Household Incomes in Cuban Agriculture: A Comparison of the State, Co‐operative, and Peasant Sectors
Authors: Deere Carmen Diana , Gonzales Ernel , Perez Niurka , Rodriguez Gustavo 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTThis article presents the results of a 1991 household income survey of the three main groups in Cuban agriculture: wage workers on state farms, members of production co‐operatives, and peasant producers. It is shown that since the 1959 revolution household income levels in the agricultural sector have improved dramatically, while regional differences have been ameliorated considerably. Households in the private sector of Cuban agriculture have fared the best. It is also demonstrated that agricultural households rely on multiple sources of income to generate their livelihood. Rather than being strictly proletarian, collective, or petty commodity producers, these households are best characterized by the multiple class relations in which they participate.
Does Agricultural Growth Matter in Poverty Alleviation?
Authors: Gaiha Raghav 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTThis article uses a panel survey of households in the Indian state of Maharashtra to demonstrate that agricultural growth takes too long to trickle down to the rural poor. Unanticipated inflation, on the other hand, aggravates rural poverty, as does domination of the agricultural growth process by large landholders. This affects the poor through the oligopsonistic influence of the landholders in rural labour markets, dampening employment and wages (as compared with the outcome in a competitive market). In the context of structural adjustment, while the emphasis on allocative efficiency through withdrawal of input subsidies and remunerative prices for output is justified, acceleration in agricultural growth by itself is unlikely to make a dent in rural poverty. Measures designed to accelerate agricultural growth must therefore be supplemented by direct anti‐poverty interventions. Consumer price stabilization is particularly important, and would be assisted by an overhaul of the Public Distribution System. Major reforms would include improved flexibility in the scale of the PDS, better targeting through alternative distribution networks when private trade channels are weak or non‐existent, and simplification of registration procedures. The oligopsonistic role of large landholders could be curbed through market‐mediated land redistribution, scrapping of all tenancy regulations when tenancy markets function efficiently, and through large‐scale intervention in rural labour markets along the lines of the Employment Guarantee Scheme.
The Democratization Process and Popular Participation in Africa: Emerging Realities and the Challenges Ahead
Authors: Rasheed Sadig 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTMany observers have judged the recent wave of democratization in Africa as an unstoppable process and have overemphasized the role of external factors in inducing this change. This article argues that the quality of change has been fragile and defective in many respects, and draws attention to the susceptibility of the process of democratic transition to reversals. It goes on to underscore the importance of internal forces in bringing about change and in ensuring the sustainability of democracy in Africa. The tasks that lie ahead for civil society in Africa and the role of the international community and political conditionality of aid in this context are then debated.
Africa after the Cold War: New Patterns of Government and Politics
Authors: Ellis Stephen 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTThe state‐system of Africa is still essentially the one created by the colonial powers and passed on intact at independence. But the political economy of these states — the substance of political life within fixed territorial boundaries — is changing very profoundly as a result of the breakdown of the style of government of recent decades and the decline of economies based on the export of primary commodities. The political economy which is emerging, still within the same territorial boundaries, is best understood by reference to Africa's history over a long period.
The Dynamics of African Agricultural History: Is it Time for a New Development Paradigm?
Authors: Niemeijer David 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTMuch of our present day perception of African agriculture is still indirectly based on the coloured accounts of the early explorers and administrators. It involves an often very static conception of ‘traditional’ African agriculture. Not only does this fail to dojustice to the rich and dynamic history of African agriculture, it has also led to an inappropriate research and development paradigm which treats African agriculture as a disrupted equilibrial system that needs readjustment to return to an equilibrial and productivestate. A diachronic study of African agricultural history reveals that many of our preconceptions of African society and agriculture are invalid: agriculturists are not inert, but respond in innovative and dynamic ways to the perturbations of their natural and socialenvironment. It appears that their survival is not so much dependent on the establishmentof a fine‐tuned equilibrium, but rather on the dynamic responses to these external disturbances. It is very likely that the agro‐ecosystems in large parts of Africa function mainly as non‐equilibrial (unstable), but nevertheless persistent systems. This has importantimplications for development interventions and agricultural research. It requires a shiftfrom a synchronic approach to a diachronic approach that is firmly based on an understaning of the past.
Palace Fundamentalism and Liberal Democracy: Oil, Arms and Irrationality
Authors: Mernissi Fatema 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTWith the end of the Cold War, some students of international affairs have suggested that the next field of conflict will be defined in cultural terms, between West and East, and particularly between liberal democracy and Islam. In this essay, it is argued that constructing a dichotomy between ‘rational’ Western democracy and ‘irrational’ Islam is not only dangerous but hypocritical. Support for the most backward and fanatical forms of Islamic fundamentalism has long been an element in the global geopolitical strategies of Western democracies. The trade in oil and arms has had particularly perverse social and political effects, which must be confronted in order to provide greater opportunities for the development of a modern civil society in the Arab world.
The Future of the State
Authors: Hobsbawm E. J. 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTAfter reviewing the historically specific characteristics of the modern nation state, this essay discusses both supranational and infranational forces which now work to undermine some of the powers and functions of even the oldest and most firmly established states. Two popular visions of alternative arrangements, associated with free‐market ultra‐liberalism and the philosophy of ‘small is beautiful’, are rejected, since neither the market nor the decentralization or breakup of existing states can provide adequate solutions to their problems. As trends in economic development increase the likelihood that wealth will be generated by a smaller proportion of total populations, the redistributive function of the public sector is likely to become more important than ever.
NGOs and Environmental Public Goods: Institutional Alternatives to Property Rights
Authors: Meyer Carrie A. 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTNGOs are linked to environmental objectives for good reason: non‐profit NGOs provide a flexible, private‐sector answer to the provision of international environmental public goods. The non‐profit sector can link for‐profit, non‐profit, and public‐sector objectives in complex contracts. This article examines how, for the case of the National Biodiversity Institute (INBio) in Costa Rica, such complex contracts with both domestic and international parties provide partial solutions to public goods problems in the absence of private property rights over genetic resources. INBio's ‘monopoly’ position, legitimized by the local government, brings in rents from genetic resources which are reinvested in the production of public goods.
Clinical aspects of autoimmunity in animals*
Authors: DEAR M. G. 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTThe concept of autoimmunity and its role in disease‐states in man and animals are discussed. A clinico‐anatomical classification of the autoimmune diseases is presented to facilitate diagnosis. With this as a basis, the clinical recognition of the autoimmune state and the diseases which it causes, or accompanies, in animal medicine are described and comparative features reviewed. This is concluded with brief comments on treatment and future studies.Résumé. On envisage le concept de l'auto‐immunité et de son rôle en pathologie humaine et animale. Une classification clinico‐anatomique est décrite pour faciliter le diagnostic. En partant de là, on décrit les signes permettant de reconnaître les états d'auto‐immunité et les maladies qu'ils provoquent ou accompagnent chez les animaux et on passe en revue les données d'une étude comparative. Un bref commentaire sur le traitement et les études futures conclut cet article.Zusammenfassung. Der Begriff der Autoimmunität und ihre Rolle bei Krankheitszuständen von Mensch und Tier werden besprochen. Eine klinisch‐anatomische Klassifikation der autoimmunen Krankheiten wird zwecks Erleichterung der Diagnose dargestellt. Davon ausgehend werden die klinische Erkennung des autoimmunen Zustands und der Krankheiten, die er verursacht oder begleitet, auf dem Gebiete der Tiermedizin beschrieben und gemeinsame Züge hervorgehoben. Daran schliessen sich kurze Bemerkungen über die Behandlung und über weitere Untersuchungen.
Dysgerminoma of the ovary in a bitch
Authors: ISHMAEL J. 
Published: October 2008

ABSTRACTA case of dysgerminoma of the ovary in a bitch is reported. Sex chromatin was not found in the tumour cells.Résumé. On rapporte un cas de dysgerminome de l'ovaire d'une chienne. On n'a pas trouvé de chromatine sexuelle dans les cellules de la turneur.Zusammenfassung. Ein Fall von Disgerminom im Eierstock einer Hündin wird besprochen. Geschlechtschromatin wurde nicht in den Tumorzellen gefunden.