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State Efforts (state + effort)

Distribution by Scientific Domains

Humanities and Social Sciences	50%
Business, Economics, Finance and Accounting	33%

Selected Abstracts

Old Age Protection in the Context of Rural Development

IDS BULLETIN, Issue 4 2010
Xiaomei Pei
This study examines the potential of rural communities for generating and allocating resources for rural old age support in the context of decreasing family resources and inadequate state provision. In-depth interviews with elderly people, their families, community leaders and government officials of three villages, respectively located in three provinces provide us with clear evidence on existing local institutional arrangements for rural old age support and the role of both government and community in organising such programmes. They confirm the potential of rural communities to generate and distribute resources for old age support, offering community opportunities for social inclusion through fair flows of resources to promote social harmony and stability, and accelerating economic growth. The findings of the study imply that there is a need for policymakers to link the state effort for old age protection to rural community development, and encourage grassroots efforts in old age support. [source]

Border Practices, Boundaries, and the Control of Resource Access: A Case from China, Thailand and Burma

DEVELOPMENT AND CHANGE, Issue 3 2004
Janet C. Sturgeon
This article traces border practices along boundaries that China and Thailand share with Burma. It portrays a spectrum of small border polities, from principalities on the fringes of Southeast Asian kingdoms, through Nationalist troops in Burma following their defeat in China, to ,drug lords' and ,rebel armies'. The focus here is on Akha village heads who have worked their connections in multiple directions, including into Burma, to position themselves as patrons controlling local resource access. With state appointment as border guardians, village heads become chiefs of new kinds of small border entities, protecting the border for the homeland while enabling certain illicit information, people, and goods to cross. In regions with a history of complex patronage relations, state efforts to control peripheral people, resources, and territories have in fact produced small border chiefs, with practices similar to those of frontier princes in the past. [source]

Explaining race, poverty, and gender disparities in advanced course-taking

JOURNAL OF POLICY ANALYSIS AND MANAGEMENT, Issue 4 2009
Dylan Conger
We use panel data on Florida high school students to examine race, poverty, and gender disparities in advanced course-taking. While white students are more likely to take advanced courses than black and Hispanic students, these disparities are eliminated when we condition on observable pre,high school characteristics. In fact, black and Hispanic students are more likely than observably similar white students to take advanced courses. Controlling for students' pre,high school characteristics substantially reduces poverty gaps, modestly reduces Asian,white gaps, and makes little dent in female,male gaps. Black and Hispanic students attend high schools that increase their likelihood of taking advanced courses relative to observably similar white students; this advantage is largely driven by minorities disproportionately attending magnet schools. Finally, recent federal and state efforts aimed at increasing access to advanced courses to poor and minority students appear to have succeeded in raising the share of students who take advanced courses from 2003 to 2006. However, secular trends (or spillovers of the policies to non-poor, non-minority students) have spurred faster growth for other students, contributing to widening demographic gaps in these years. © 2009 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management. [source]

A Statewide Movement to Promote the Adoption of Tobacco-Free School Policies*

JOURNAL OF SCHOOL HEALTH, Issue 12 2008
Shelley K. Summerlin-Long MPH
ABSTRACT BACKGROUND:, Since most tobacco users become addicted to nicotine as teenagers, prevention efforts for youth remain central to comprehensive prevention programs. National and state efforts that encourage adoption and enforcement of comprehensive tobacco-free school (TFS) policies can lead to significant reductions of youth tobacco use. In 2003, North Carolina (NC) Health and Wellness Trust Fund grantees began to focus statewide on the adoption of and compliance with TFS policies in NC schools. This study examined 46 NC districts that passed TFS policies between 2003 and early August of 2005 to see what factors were important in policy passage in order to support the continued promotion of TFS policy adoption across the state. METHODS:, Detailed interviews were conducted with 118 key informants who were intimately involved with passage of their school districts' TFS policies, and results were coded and analyzed for common themes. RESULTS:, The study found several strategies key to adoption of TFS policies: effective leadership from organizations and individuals in positions of influence, grassroots organizing from community coalitions and youth groups, and communication strategies that optimally position policy adoption and compliance. CONCLUSION:, States that have not yet achieved TFS policy adoption can focus on leadership development, grassroots organizing, and improved communication to advance their advocacy efforts. [source]

Remaking the World of Chinese Labour: A 30-Year Retrospective

BRITISH JOURNAL OF INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS, Issue 3 2010
Eli Friedman
Over the past 30 years, labour relations, and, indeed, the entirety of working-class politics in China, have been dramatically altered by economic reforms. In this review, we focus on the two key processes of commodification and casualization and their implications for workers. On the one hand, these processes have resulted in the destruction of the old social contract and the emergence of marketized employment relations. This has implied a loss of the job security and generous benefits enjoyed by workers in the planned economy. On the other hand, commodification and casualization have produced significant but localized resistance from the Chinese working class. Up until now, the activities of labour non-governmental organizations and of the official trade unions have contributed to the state's effort of individualizing and institutionalizing labour conflict resolution through labour law and arbitration mechanisms. Finally, we provide a brief discussion of the impact of 2008's Labour Contract Law and the outbreak of the economic crisis on labour relations. We conclude that the continual imbalance of power at the point of production presents a real dilemma for the Chinese state as it attempts to shift away from a model of development dependent on exports. [source]

Leading Sectors and Leading Regions: Economic Restructuring and Regional Inequality in Hungary since 1990

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF URBAN AND REGIONAL RESEARCH, Issue 3 2007
DAVID L. BROWN
Abstract This article examines factors accounting for persisting regional inequality in Hungary during the regime change from socialism to a market economy in 1990. We examine the determinants of regional inequality through the lens of leading sector theory which has been used to explain why some ex-socialist countries have done better than others during the transformation. In other words, we ask whether some regions of Hungary are doing better than others for the same reasons that some ex-socialist countries have outperformed their counterparts. We use county level data from the Hungarian Central Statistical Office to examine whether the quantity and types of foreign direct investment counties have received since 1990 are associated with regional inequality in per capita GDP. We find that foreign capitalists concentrate human-capital-intensive investment in already well performing locations because they have similar supply structures to their home economies. We also contend that no measure of institutional modernization is likely to make lagging regions attractive candidates for human-capital-intensive investments in the near future. Hence, regardless of the national state's efforts to target development to lagging areas, or the effectiveness of local institutions, lagging regions are likely to remain underdeveloped. We recommend that future field-based research be conducted to examine the nexus between FDI, the nation state and localities. Unraveling interrelationships between these three political economy sites will expose the causal forces sustaining regional inequalities during post-socialism. Résumé Cet article analyse les facteurs qui expliquent l'inégalité persistante entre régions hongroises lors du passage du socialisme à une économie de marché en 1990. Nous examinons les déterminants de l'inégalité régionale à travers la théorie du secteur moteur qui a servi à expliquer pourquoi certains ex-pays socialistes ont mieux réussi que d'autres pendant la transition. Plus précisément, nous cherchons à savoir si des régions de Hongrie font mieux que d'autres pour les mêmes raisons que certains ex-pays socialistes ont eu de meilleurs résultats que leurs homologues. Nous utilisons des données départementales provenant du Bureau central hongrois de la statistique afin d'examiner si la quantité et les types d'investissement direct à l'étranger que les départements ont reçu depuis 1990 sont associés à une inégalité régionale en termes de PIB par habitant. Nous établissons ainsi que les capitalistes étrangers concentrent leur investissement à fort capital humain dans des sites qui présentent déjà de bons résultats, les structures d'approvisionnement étant similaires à celles de leur économie nationale. Nous soutenons également que, dans le court terme, aucune mesure de modernisation institutionnelle ne va sans doute transformer les régions en retard en candidates intéressantes pour des investissements à fort capital humain. En conséquence, quels que soient les efforts de l'État national en vue de développer spécifiquement les zones en décalage, ou l'efficacité des institutions locales, les régions en retard resteront sans doute moins développées. Nous conseillons d'entreprendre à l'avenir des études de terrain afin d'analyser le lien entre IDE, État national et régions. Démêler les relations entre ces trois centres de l'économie politique révélera les forces en cause dans la durabilité des inégalités régionales pendant l'après-socialisme. [source]