Home About us Contact
|
Home About us Contact | ||
|
|
||
Regional Development (regional + development)
Selected AbstractsNatural Resources and Regional Development: An Assessment of Dependency and Comparative Advantage ParadigmsECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY, Issue 1 2003Thomas Gunton Abstract: The role of natural resources in regional development is the subject of a debate between dependency theorists, who argue that natural resources impede development, and comparative-advantage theorists, who argue that resources can expedite development. This debate is assessed by a case study analysis of the impact of resource development on a regional economy. The case study uses a model to estimate the comparative advantage of the resource sector. The results show that natural resources have the potential to provide a significant comparative advantage relative to other economic sectors by virtue of generating resource rent, which is a surplus above normal returns to other factors of production. The case study also shows that there are considerable risks in resource-led growth, including the propensity to dissipate rent and increase community instability by building surplus capacity. These risks are amenable to mitigation because they are largely the result of poor management of resource development. The case study demonstrates that the most productive analytical approach for understanding the role of natural resources in the development process is a synthetic approach, which combines the insights of the dependency and comparative-advantage paradigms into a unified framework. It also demonstrates that the concept of resource rent, which has frequently been ignored in development theory, must be reintegrated into the unified framework to improve the understanding of the role of natural resources in the regional development process. [source] How Does Structural Reform Affect Regional Development?ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY, Issue 4 2000Resolving Contradictory Theory with Evidence from India Abstract: Regional theory offers little coherent guidance on the prospects for interregional development after structural reform in developing nations. In this paper I suggest a basic set of hypotheses in which the neoliberal nation-state is simultaneously a reduced state (less concerned about promoting regional balance) and an enlarged state (directing development toward selected regions). Under the new regulatory structure the location of post-reform investments may be expected to favor the coast, advanced regions, and existing metropolises (especially the edge areas); these expectations may be more true for foreign direct investments than domestic investments (especially the direct investments of the state). I use disaggregated pre- and post-reform industrial data from India to test the hypotheses. The results offer partial to full support for all hypotheses, providing evidence of the return of cumulative causation, and raising concerns about the political economy of future development in the lagging regions. [source] The Dynamics of Regional Development: The Philippines in East Asia , Edited by Arsenio Balisacan and Hal HillGROWTH AND CHANGE, Issue 3 2009Anne Booth No abstract is available for this article. [source] Knowledge-Based Services, Internationalization and Regional Development , Edited by James W. Harrington and Peter W. DanielsGROWTH AND CHANGE, Issue 2 2009Harrison S. Campbell First page of article [source] The Governance of Global Production Networks and Regional Development: A Case Study of Taiwanese PC Production NetworksGROWTH AND CHANGE, Issue 1 2009DANIEL YOU-REN YANG ABSTRACT This article applies a global production networks (GPN) perspective to the trans-border investments of Taiwanese personal computer (PC) companies in the Northern Taiwan, Greater Suzhou and Greater Dongguan regions. The findings of extensive field research are used to illustrate two conceptual arguments. First, we show the on-the-ground complexity of inter-firm governance arrangements within the PC industry, thereby casting doubt upon attempts to reduce notions of governance to simplistic, industry-wide categorisations. Second, by comparing Greater Suzhou and Greater Dongguan, we demonstrate that even within a single production system, there is geographical variation in the nature of the strategic coupling between the GPN and local institutional formations. We argue that conceptualising such geographical and organisational complexity is critical to understanding the regional development potential of GPNs. [source] Regional Development and Spatial Planning in an Enlarged European Union , Edited by Neil Adams, Jeremy Alden and Neil HarrisGROWTH AND CHANGE, Issue 3 2008Marina Van Geenhuizen First page of article [source] The Role of Small Towns in Regional Development and Poverty Reduction in GhanaINTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF URBAN AND REGIONAL RESEARCH, Issue 2 2008GEORGE OWUSU Abstract Ghana, like many other countries in sub-Saharan Africa, lacks a clearly articulated urban development strategy. Urban growth has been rapid but largely uncontrolled. Ghana's adoption of a decentralization programme in 1988 focused some attention on small towns. The country's more recent adoption of the Millennium Development Goals and other specific poverty reduction strategies requires more concerted state promotion of small towns. Improved service provision and delivery through small towns is a necessary component of any successful poverty reduction or regional development strategy. Résumé Le Ghana, comme de nombreux autres pays de l'Afrique subsaharienne, manque de stratégie d'aménagement urbain claire et explicite. L'expansion urbaine a été rapide et généralement non maîtrisée. Le Ghana ayant lancé un programme de décentralisation en 1988, les petites villes ont bénéficié d'un certain intérêt. L'adoption plus récente des Objectifs du Millénaire pour le Développement, ainsi que d'autres stratégies de réduction de la pauvreté, implique davantage de concertation dans la promotion gouvernementale des petites villes. Une amélioration de la mise à disposition des services dans les petites villes constitue un élément nécessaire à toute réussite en matière de réduction de la pauvreté ou de stratégie de développement régional. [source] EMBEDDED CONTRASTS IN RACE, MUNICIPAL FRAGMENTATION, AND PLANNING: DIVERGENT OUTCOMES IN THE DETROIT AND GREATER TORONTO,HAMILTON REGIONS 1990,2000JOURNAL OF URBAN AFFAIRS, Issue 2 2009A. J. JACOBS ABSTRACT:,Since the early 1980s, scholars have debated whether or not the converging forces of globalization have disembedded city-regions from their national contexts. This study explored this question through a comparison of post-1990 growth trends in the Detroit and Greater Toronto Area,Hamilton regions (GTAH), two urban areas within the same natural region and closely linked by industrial production flows, yet politically situated within two separate Federalist states. Guided by Nested City Theory, it reveals how their dissimilar contexts for race, local autonomy, and multilocal planning have helped foster divergent spatial patterns in the two regions. In particular, provincial controls governing municipal fragmentation, Ontario's Planning Act, and subregional/microregional planning have been key embedded structures helping to limit population decline and disinvestment in GTAH core cities. In the process, this article shows how urban trajectories have remained nested within multilevel spatial and institutional configurations. Its findings also call for greater consideration of nested state/provincial factors in cross-national comparisons of cities within Federal states. Finally, its conclusion offers a starting point toward a more nuanced specific version of Nested Theory to be called the Contextualized Model of Urban,Regional Development. [source] Regional development, nature production and the techno-bureaucratic shortcut: the Douro River catchment in PortugalENVIRONMENTAL POLICY AND GOVERNANCE, Issue 6 2008Antonio A. R. Ioris Abstract The introduction of the Water Framework Directive in Europe represents a unique opportunity to promote more inclusive strategies for the long-term preservation of (socionatural) water systems. However, the analysis of the Portuguese experience, using the River Douro as a case study, reveals still considerable shortcomings in the assessment of problems and the formulation of solutions. Instead of promoting a meaningful dialogue between social groups and spatial areas, there is a systematic attempt to conform to legal requisites by taking a ,techno-bureaucratic' shortcut that largely reproduces the distortions of previous regulatory approaches. Decisions on water management are part of political disputes about regional development and state reform, such as in relation to the provision of water and electricity by public utilities. Nonetheless, these broader issues have been kept tacitly away from the WFD agenda, which has been concentrated on adjusting established procedures to the (formal) requirements of the new regulation. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment. [source] Why some regions will decline: A Canadian case study with thoughts on local development strategies,PAPERS IN REGIONAL SCIENCE, Issue 1 2006Mario Polèse Regional development; local development; periphery; location; economic decline Abstract., The authors present the case of five Canadian peripheral regions, which they argue are destined to decline. The explanation of the reasons why future decline (in absolute population and employment numbers) is inevitable constitutes the article's central focus. The authors suggest that regional decline will become an increasingly common occurrence in nations at the end of the demographic transition whose economic geographies display centre-periphery relationships. Such broad structural trends cannot be easily altered by public policy. The authors reflect on the implications of regional decline for the formulation of local economic development strategies. Local economic development strategies should not, they argue, be advanced as a means of arresting population and employment decline. To suggest that the regions studied in this article will decline because of a lack of social capital or insufficient number of local entrepreneurs, is not only misleading but may also be counterproductive. [source] The Economics of HIV/AIDS: A SurveyDEVELOPMENT POLICY REVIEW, Issue 1 2003Edoardo Gaffeo This article surveys the main economic issues associated with the HIV/AIDS epidemic, paying special attention to sub,Saharan Africa. It explores the economic and behavioural determinants of HIV transmission, the microeconomics of market failures associated with high HIV prevalence, the prospects for regional development from a macroeconomic perspective and the efficient design of policies for coping with the epidemic. In line with the recent appeal by the UN Secretary General, the article argues that, without a decisive effort to halt HIV/AIDS, people living in the region are bound to experience a further fall in their standard of living in both relative and absolute terms. However, to be effective, anti,AIDS programmes must be rooted in sound economic principles. [source] Knowledge Bases, Talents, and Contexts: On the Usefulness of the Creative Class Approach in SwedenECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY, Issue 4 2009Bjørn Asheim abstract The geography of the creative class and its impact on regional development has been debated for some years. While the ideas of Richard Florida have permeated local and regional planning strategies in most parts of the Western world, critiques have been numerous. Florida's 3T's (technology, talent, and tolerance) have been adopted without considering whether the theory fits into the settings of a specific urban and regional context. This article aims to contextualize and unpack the creative class approach by applying the knowledge-base approach and break down the rigid assumption that all people in the creative class share common locational preferences. We argue that the creative class draws on three different knowledge bases: synthetic, analytical, and symbolic, which have different implications for people's residential locational preferences with respect to a people climate and a business climate. Furthermore, the dominating knowledge base in a region has an influence on the importance of a people climate and a business climate for attracting and retaining talent. In this article, we present an empirical analysis in support of these arguments using original Swedish data. [source] Some Notes on Institutions in Evolutionary Economic GeographyECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY, Issue 2 2009Ron Boschma abstract Within the evolutionary economic geography framework, the role of institutions deserves more explicit attention. We argue that territorial institutions are to be viewed as orthogonal to organizational routines since each territory is characterized by a variety of routines and a single firm can apply its routines in different territorial contexts. It is therefore meaningful to distinguish between institutional economic geography and evolutionary economic geography as their explanans is different. Yet the two approaches can be combined in a dynamic framework in which institutions coevolve with organizational routines, particularly in emerging industries. Furthermore, integrating the evolutionary and institutional approach allows one to analyze the spatial diffusion of organizational routines that mediate conflicts among social groups, in particular, those between employers and employees. An evolutionary economic geography advocates an empirical research program, both qualitative and quantitative, that can address the relative importance of organizational routines and territorial institutions for regional development. [source] Toward a Reconceptualization of Regional Development Paths: Is Leipzig's Media Cluster a Continuation of or a Rupture with the Past?ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY, Issue 3 2003Harald Bathelt Abstract: This article develops a model of regional development that is then used to examine the evolution of two media industries in Leipzig, Germany. We note that the city's current media cluster, centered on television/film production and interactive digital media, shares little in common with the city's once-premier book publishing media cluster. Treating interactive learning as the primary causal mechanism that drives economic growth and change, our conceptual framework incorporates both sectoral/technological and political crises as mechanisms that rupture regional development paths. These regional development paths are not homogeneous, but instead consist of bundles of various technological trajectories. Regions recover from crises as their actors continually rebundle local assets until they find a combination that generates growth. As a result of these crises, new opportunities for growth may arise for new and previously marginal industries. In turn, these expanding industries shape the region's development path. [source] Industrial Agglomeration and Development: A Survey of Spatial Economic Issues in East Asia and a Statistical Analysis of Chinese RegionsECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY, Issue 3 2003C. Cindy Fan Abstract: In this article, we explore the issue of industrial agglomeration and its relationship to economic development and growth in the less-developed countries of East Asia. We present theoretical arguments and secondary empirical evidence as to why we should have strong expectations about finding a positive relationship between agglomeration and economic performance. We also review evidence from the literature on the roles of formal and informal institutions in East Asian regional economic systems. We then focus specifically on the case of China. We argue that regional development in China has much in common with regional development in other East Asian economies, although there are also important contrasts because of China's history of socialism and its recent trend toward economic liberalization. Through a variety of statistical investigations, we substantiate (in part) the expected positive relationship between agglomeration and economic performance in China. We show that many kinds of manufacturing sectors are characterized by a strong positive relationship between spatial agglomeration and productivity. This phenomenon is especially marked in sectors and regions where liberalization has proceeded rapidly. We consider the relevance of our comments about industrial clustering and economic performance for policy formulation in China and the less-developed countries of East Asia. [source] Natural Resources and Regional Development: An Assessment of Dependency and Comparative Advantage ParadigmsECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY, Issue 1 2003Thomas Gunton Abstract: The role of natural resources in regional development is the subject of a debate between dependency theorists, who argue that natural resources impede development, and comparative-advantage theorists, who argue that resources can expedite development. This debate is assessed by a case study analysis of the impact of resource development on a regional economy. The case study uses a model to estimate the comparative advantage of the resource sector. The results show that natural resources have the potential to provide a significant comparative advantage relative to other economic sectors by virtue of generating resource rent, which is a surplus above normal returns to other factors of production. The case study also shows that there are considerable risks in resource-led growth, including the propensity to dissipate rent and increase community instability by building surplus capacity. These risks are amenable to mitigation because they are largely the result of poor management of resource development. The case study demonstrates that the most productive analytical approach for understanding the role of natural resources in the development process is a synthetic approach, which combines the insights of the dependency and comparative-advantage paradigms into a unified framework. It also demonstrates that the concept of resource rent, which has frequently been ignored in development theory, must be reintegrated into the unified framework to improve the understanding of the role of natural resources in the regional development process. [source] Entrepreneurial Policy: The Case of Regional Specialization vs.ENTREPRENEURSHIP THEORY AND PRACTICE, Issue 5 2008Spontaneous Industrial Diversity Regional economic development policy is recognized as a key tool governments use to foster economic prosperity. Whether specialization (or diversity) of economic activities should be a regional development policy goal is often debated. We address this question in a local-diversity context, by reviewing traditional arguments in its favor, supplemented with evidence for more entrepreneurial concepts like industrial symbiosis and Jacobs externalities. We show that the context of entrepreneurship matters more to policy than the type and form of resulting industries. Policies enabling entrepreneurs to exploit opportunities in a context of spontaneously evolved industrial diversity are better facilitators of regional development. [source] Regional development, nature production and the techno-bureaucratic shortcut: the Douro River catchment in PortugalENVIRONMENTAL POLICY AND GOVERNANCE, Issue 6 2008Antonio A. R. Ioris Abstract The introduction of the Water Framework Directive in Europe represents a unique opportunity to promote more inclusive strategies for the long-term preservation of (socionatural) water systems. However, the analysis of the Portuguese experience, using the River Douro as a case study, reveals still considerable shortcomings in the assessment of problems and the formulation of solutions. Instead of promoting a meaningful dialogue between social groups and spatial areas, there is a systematic attempt to conform to legal requisites by taking a ,techno-bureaucratic' shortcut that largely reproduces the distortions of previous regulatory approaches. Decisions on water management are part of political disputes about regional development and state reform, such as in relation to the provision of water and electricity by public utilities. Nonetheless, these broader issues have been kept tacitly away from the WFD agenda, which has been concentrated on adjusting established procedures to the (formal) requirements of the new regulation. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment. [source] The four-capital method of sustainable development evaluationENVIRONMENTAL POLICY AND GOVERNANCE, Issue 2 2008Paul Ekins Abstract This paper is part of the special issue of European Environment devoted to the outputs of the EU SRDTOOLS project,1 which developed and applied a new model of regional sustainable development evaluation. The paper introduces the concept and framework of the four-capital model, which was used in the project. First it discusses some issues around sustainable development evaluation, before introducing the theory of the four-capital model. It then describes how indicators can be used to evaluate programmes such as those financed by the EU Structural Funds against criteria for sustainable regional development in terms of the four capitals. An ,ideal' indicator set is listed in the appendix. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment. [source] Critical thresholds, evaluation and regional developmentENVIRONMENTAL POLICY AND GOVERNANCE, Issue 2 2008Patrick ten Brink Abstract This paper is part of the Special Issue of European Environment devoted to the outputs of the EU SRDTOOLS project, which developed and applied a new model of regional sustainable development evaluation. This paper introduces as an evaluation criterion the idea of critical thresholds, which up to now have not been sufficiently integrated into thinking and decision making in the context of regional development. Decision making explicitly or implicitly accepts trade-offs across economic, social, human and nature domains. Some of these trade-offs, especially when they may threaten system integrity, are not sufficiently understood. The paper discusses how critical thresholds and trends can be integrated into evaluation methods and provides some insights from practical applications. It concludes that such integration into regional planning and evaluation should support objectives for sustainable development and improve decision making and environmental governance. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment. [source] The environmental dimension of sustainable regional development in the English regions: reflections upon the experience of North West EnglandENVIRONMENTAL POLICY AND GOVERNANCE, Issue 5 2005Sue Kidd Abstract This paper explores the practice of sustainable development and the emphasis given to environmental considerations in the English regions. Part 1 provides an overview of the rise of regional governance in England and the place of sustainable development within the new regional structures. Part 2 then focuses upon the North West, and the changing emphasis given to the environmental dimension of sustainable regional development is explored with reference to a series of key regional documents. Part 3 considers the extent to which the analysis of the North West might be indicative of other English regions. This is followed by consideration of the importance of institutional structures in promoting sustainable patterns of regional development. It is concluded that an institutionalist perspective may be helpful in understanding why some regions are performing better than others in promoting sustainable patterns of development, and various avenues of future research are proposed. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment. [source] Environmental and economic development issues in the Polish motorway programme: a review and an analysis of the public debateENVIRONMENTAL POLICY AND GOVERNANCE, Issue 2 2002E. J. Judge This paper examines the development of the Polish motorway programme, though the lessons apply generally throughout the central and east European (CEE) region. This has particular significance for European transport policy as three major corridors of the Polish motorway network also form crucial links of the Trans European Network (TEN). Thus, until recently, motorways have been presented on the one hand (by the Polish government and its supporters) as a boost to national and regional development, and on the other (by its detractors, principally the environmental lobby) as a threat that will suck development out of the country, while saddling it with substantial environmental costs. Environmental pressure groups have sought to refute economic development arguments using Western research, and have seen such research as influential in public debate and decision making. Based on evidence drawn from official reports and documents and a content analysis of the public debate on motorway development using the media archive of the Polish Motorways Agency, this paper suggests that these arguments have so far in fact been overshadowed by environmental considerations, and even more by financing issues. However, the future direction of policy is uncertain because of political changes after the September 2001 election. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment. [source] Incorporating the environment into structural funds regional programmes: evolution, current developments and future prospectsENVIRONMENTAL POLICY AND GOVERNANCE, Issue 2 2001Peter Roberts During the last two decades the environment has become an important element in a number of areas of member state and European Union policy. A key instrument for the delivery of environmental objectives is the European Union's Structural Funds. These Funds provide support for regional development programmes, which are developed and managed by partnerships representing the European Commission, member state governments and regional stakeholders. A potential model for these environmentally driven regional programmes is provided by the concept of ecological modernization. Environmental concerns have now been absorbed into the regional programmes and it is likely that in future even greater emphasis will be placed on the environmental (and social) dimensions of regional development. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment [source] (RE)PRODUCING A "PERIPHERAL" REGION , NORTHERN SWEDEN IN THE NEWSGEOGRAFISKA ANNALER SERIES B: HUMAN GEOGRAPHY, Issue 4 2008Madeleine Eriksson ABSTRACT. Building on theories of internal orientalism, the objective of this study is to show how intra-national differences are reproduced through influential media representations. By abstracting news representations of Norrland, a large, sparsely populated region in the northernmost part of Sweden, new modes of "internal othering" within Western modernity are put on view. Real and imagined social and economical differences between the "rural North" and the "urban South" are explained in terms of "cultural differences" and "lifestyle" choices. The concept of Norrland is used as an abstract essentialized geographical category and becomes a metonym for a backward and traditional rural space in contrast to equally essentialized urban areas with favoured modern ideals. Specific traits of parts of the region become one with the entire region and the problems of the region become the problems of the people living in the region. I argue that the news representations play a part in the reproduction of a "space of exception", in that one region is constructed as a traditional and undeveloped space in contrast to an otherwise modern nation. A central argument of this study is that research on identity construction and representations of place is needed to come to grips with issues of uneven regional development within western nations. [source] Space, culture and economy,a question of practiceGEOGRAFISKA ANNALER SERIES B: HUMAN GEOGRAPHY, Issue 1 2001Kirsten Simonsen This article addresses the current debate within geography and other circles studying urban and regional development of the relationship between culture and economy. It revolves around two arguments. First, that the relationship should be seen not only as a question of epochal change, of de-differentiation and culturalisation of the economy; it should be considered as an analytical rather than a historical question. Second, it is argued that a theoretical articulation may be gainfully employed starting from the level of social ontology-particularly an ontology of practice. These arguments are developed starting from a critical discussion of two dominant bodies of thought about the relationship, following which, a demonstration of the inseparability of practice and meaning is used to conduct a theoretical re-articulation of culture and economy. Finally, the spatiality of the culture economy relation is considered, displacing the emphasis from connectivity in bounded regions towards joint involvement in the production of space on different scales. [source] Development Imperative, Terrae Incognitae: a Pioneer Soil Scientist 1912,1951GEOGRAPHICAL RESEARCH, Issue 3 2010J.M. POWELL Abstract James Arthur Prescott was a prominent soil scientist whose career responded to an increasingly complex, recognisably Australian web of interpenetrating spatial scales, served to promote revolutionary global advances in his chosen field, and in the process negotiated the blurred boundaries between ,pure' and ,applied' research. Encounters with this instructive life suggest that, while resolutions of pivotal anxieties might turn on ineluctably personal qualities, they also reflect a dynamic interplay between international, imperial, national and state contexts. Prescott's innovative contributions to soil science, fruits of a tenaciously consolidated career, influenced resource appraisal and environmental management across a prodigious continental expanse. A sustained focus on local and regional development brought him into contact with a wide range of contemporaries, including pioneering geographers, and culminated in his election to a Fellowship of the Royal Society. [source] GEOGRAPHERS AND THE TENNESSEE VALLEY AUTHORITY,GEOGRAPHICAL REVIEW, Issue 1 2004RONALD REED BOYCE ABSTRACT. The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) was the largest, most comprehensive, and most controversial regional development and planning project in U.S. history. Geographers were involved from its inception and made impressive contributions. Aside from the unit area method of data gathering and mapping, little is known about their contributions, some of which were truly ahead of their time. Although their work and recommendations were often discarded and unheeded because of political turbulence, the geographers rarely complained or entered into the political arena. Their work in the TVA has generally gone unheralded and even unappreciated within the geography profession. The primary purpose of this article is to document their contributions. [source] Understanding Remigration and Innovation , An Appeal for a Cultural Economic GeographyGEOGRAPHY COMPASS (ELECTRONIC), Issue 5 2009Claudia Klaerding The acquisition of new knowledge is a crucial capital of highly skilled remigrants and its utilisation in home countries can play a major role for regional economic development. By reviewing the remigration literature it is shown that remigrants are able to create innovation in their home countries and promote regional development. But also theoretical deficits can be identified regarding the structural conditions of transferring new knowledge across regions which precedes potential innovation processes. Recent theoretical ideas cannot sufficiently explain why remigrants become innovative to varying degrees depending on their home regions. A cultural approach of economic geography is needed to highlight the cultural construction of the economy. It allows for remigrants to be perceived as knowledge brokers, which crucially influences the returnee's capacity to innovate. [source] Non-Economic Factors in Economic Geography and in ,New Regionalism': A Sympathetic CritiqueINTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF URBAN AND REGIONAL RESEARCH, Issue 3 2006COSTIS HADJIMICHALIS In the current debate on local and regional development and after several ,turns', dominant critical models have found some security in institutional, cultural and evolutionary approaches. Interest today centres on success and competitiveness and how they are reproduced in a few paradigmatic regions. A distinctive feature of these regions and places is the embeddedness of certain non-economic factors such as social capital, trust and reciprocity based on familiarity, face-to-face exchange, cooperation, embedded routines, habits and norms, local conventions of communication and interaction, all of which contribute to a region's particular success. Although these approaches may not deny the forces of the capitalist space economy, they do not explicitly acknowledge them or take them on board and so they tend to discuss non-economic factors and institutions as autonomous forces shaping development. This essay provides a critique of these concepts based on their (1) inadequate theorization, (2) depoliticized view of politics and de-economized use of economics and (3) reduction of space to territory. The essay concludes that we need a far more penetrating renewal of radical critique of the current space economy of capitalism. Old concepts such as uneven development, the social and spatial division of labour, the geographical transfer of value, accumulation and imperialism must be combined with cultural and institutional issues, with those non-economic factors mentioned above. [source] The Populist Chola: Cultural Mediation and the Political Imagination in Quillacollo, BoliviaJOURNAL OF LATIN AMERICAN & CARIBBEAN ANTHROPOLOGY, Issue 2 2000Robert Albro This argument situates the "image" of the popular woman in the emerging electoral context of Quillacollo, a Bolivian provincial capital. Even as "cholas" remain largely shut out from regional political power, their ubiquitous image culturally mediates political access to the popular sector for men. Hence authorities initiate token economic exchanges with cholas. both to participate intimately in the popular cultural milieu, and to solidify their claims to personal roots in this world. This argument examines the interrelated contexts of national structural adjustment, regional development, the domestic economy, agricultural fiestas, and sexual conduct, as these are "performed" within a regional folkloric calendar, that turn on the currency of the chola as a political "root metaphor." In turn, the role of the chola's image suggests limitations upon her status as historical actor. [source] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||