Political Opportunities (political + opportunity)

Distribution by Scientific Domains

Terms modified by Political Opportunities

  • political opportunity structure

  • Selected Abstracts


    Global constraints on rural fishing communities: whose resilience is it anyway?

    FISH AND FISHERIES, Issue 1 2007
    Martin D Robards
    Abstract Sustaining natural resources is regarded as an important component of ecological resilience and commonly assumed to be of similar importance to social and economic vitality for resource-dependent communities. However, communities may be prevented from benefiting from healthy local resources due to constrained economic or political opportunities. In the case of Alaskan wild salmon, the fisheries are in crisis due to declining economic revenues driven by the proliferation of reliable and increasingly high-quality products from fish farms around the world. This stands in contrast with many of the world's wild-capture fisheries where diminished biological abundance has led to fishery collapse. Furthermore, increasing efficiency of salmon farm production, globalization, and dynamic consumer preferences, suggests that the wild salmon industry will continue to be challenged by the adaptability, price and quality of farmed salmon. Conventional responses to reduced revenues by the wild-capture industry have been to increase economic efficiency through implementing a range of entry entitlement and quota allocation schemes. However, while these mechanisms may improve economic efficiency at a broad scale, they may not benefit local community interests, and in Alaska have precipitated declines in local ownership of the fishery. To be viable, economic efficiency remains a relevant consideration, but in a directionally changing environment (biological, social or economic), communities unable to procure livelihoods from their local resources (through access or value) are likely to seek alternative economic opportunities. The adopted strategies, although logical for communities seeking viability through transformation in a changing world, may not be conducive to resilience of a ,fishing community' or the sustainability of their wild fish resources. We use a theoretically grounded systems approach and data from Alaska's Bristol Bay salmon fishery to demonstrate feedbacks between global preferences towards salmon and the trade-offs inherent when managing for the resilience of wild salmon populations and human communities at different scales. [source]


    Governing Elites, External Events and Pro-democratic Opposition in Hong Kong (1986,2002)

    GOVERNMENT AND OPPOSITION, Issue 4 2003
    Ming Sing
    While China has been the most important constraint on Hong Kong's democratization, another neglected constraint has been the limited mobilization power of the pro-democracy opposition in both civil and political society for most of the period from 1984 to 2002. The mobilization power of the pro-democracy opposition, mediated by their degree of internal unity and ability to capitalize on external political opportunities, affected its overall bargaining power vis-à-vis the Chinese and British government over democratization in different phases. The self-censorship among Hong Kong's media, plus economic recession since the Handover, further sapped the mobilization and bargaining power of pro-democratic forces. [source]


    Mumbai's Development Mafias: Globalization, Organized Crime and Land Development

    INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF URBAN AND REGIONAL RESEARCH, Issue 1 2008
    LIZA WEINSTEIN
    Abstract For over a decade, researchers have analyzed the effects of liberalization and globalization on urban development, considering the local political implications of shifts at the national and global scales. Taking the case of Mumbai, this article examines how the past 15 years of political reforms in India have reshaped property markets and the politics of land development. Among the newly empowered actors, local criminal syndicates, often with global connections, have seized political opportunities created by these shifts to gain influence over land development. The rise of Mumbai's organized criminal activity in the 1950s was closely linked to India's macroeconomic policies, with strict regulation of imports fuelling the growth of black market smuggling. Liberalization and deregulation since the early 1990s have diminished demand for smuggled consumer goods and criminal syndicates have since diversified their operations. With skyrocketing real estate prices in the 1990s, bolstered by global land speculation, the mafia began investing in property development. Supported by an illicit nexus of politicians, bureaucrats and the police, the mafia has emerged as a central figure in Mumbai's land development politics. The article examines the structural shifts that facilitated the criminalization of land development and the implications of mafia involvement in local politics. Résumé Depuis plus d'une décennie, les chercheurs ont analysé les effets de la libéralisation et de la mondialisation sur l'aménagement urbain en étudiant les implications politiques locales de transformations effectuées à l'échelle nationale et planétaire. Prenant le cas de Mumbai, cet article examine comment les réformes politiques des quinze dernières années en Inde ont reconfiguré les marchés immobiliers et les politiques d'aménagement foncier. Parmi les nouveaux acteurs, les syndicats du crime locaux, opérant souvent dans des réseaux internationaux, ont saisi les occasions politiques créées par ces changements pour gagner en influence sur l'aménagement foncier. A Mumbai, l'activité accrue du crime organisé dans les années 1950 était étroitement liée aux politiques macroéconomiques de l'Inde, une réglementation stricte des importations alimentant l'essor de la contrebande sur le marché noir. Depuis le début des années 1990, libéralisation et déréglementation ont réduit la demande pour les biens de consommation de contrebande, poussant les syndicats du crime à diversifier leurs opérations. Face à la montée en flèche des prix de l'immobilier dans les années 1990, aidée par la spéculation foncière mondiale, la mafia a investi dans la promotion immobilière. Soutenue par un réseau illégal de politiciens, bureaucrates et policiers, elle est donc devenue un personnage central des politiques d'urbanisme à Mumbai. L'article étudie les transformations structurelles qui ont facilité la criminalisation du secteur foncier, et les implications de la présence de la mafia dans la politique locale. [source]


    Human Rights in an Era of Neoliberal Globalization: The Alien Tort Claims Act and Grassroots Mobilization in Doe v. Unocal

    LAW & SOCIETY REVIEW, Issue 2 2009
    Cheryl Holzmeyer
    This article examines a widely publicized corporate accountability and human rights case filed by Burmese plaintiffs and human rights litigators in 1996 under the Alien Tort Claims Act in U.S. courts, Doe v. Unocal, in conjunction with the three main theoretical approaches to analyzing how law may matter for broader social change efforts: (1) legal realism, (2) Critical Legal Studies (CLS), and (3) legal mobilization. The article discusses interactions between Doe v. Unocal and grassroots Burmese human rights activism in the San Francisco Bay Area, including intersections with corporate accountability activism. It argues that a transnationally attuned legal mobilization framework, rather than legal realist or CLS approaches, is most appropriate to analyze the political opportunities and indirect effects of Doe v. Unocal and similar litigation in the context of neoliberal globalization. Further, this article argues that human rights discourse may serve as a common vocabulary and counterhegemonic resource for activists and litigators in cases such as Doe v. Unocal, contrary to overarching critiques of such discourse that emphasize only its hegemonic potentials in global governance regimes. [source]