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This paper studies the causal impact of political connections on innovation. Using a unique hand-collected data set of sudden deaths of politically connected independent directors (i.e., retired government officials) in Chinese firms, we find that an unexpected loss of political connections increases a firm’s patent applications by 34% (14 patents). The innovation response is more pronounced in firms with stronger connections: when the connected directors held higher-level bureaucratic positions or when firms operate within their geographical jurisdictions. Upon losing political connections firms face higher competitive pressure and divert resources from rent-seeking into innovation investment. Our findings highlight the role of competition in the substitution between political connections and innovation, particularly in settings where formal institutions are weak.

Social innovation (SI) research tends to understand rural SI processes as collective initiatives of equally engaged, supportive, and like-minded people. However, recent research has indicated that SI projects often benefit from dedicated key players who find support in their communities but also must deal with resistance and barriers. Against this backdrop, this article explores the figure of the key player in SI research and exposes the patterns of rural SI processes with the empirical cases of two small communities in Germany that jointly created rural infrastructure systems, thus seeking emancipation from remote political and economic control and marginalization. Using the empirical cases, we tested and specified a heuristic framework of key players that combines analytical dimensions at the micro-, meso-, and macro-levels. According to our findings, the heuristic framework is appropriate for analyzing key players in rural SI processes. Notably, we show that SI processes benefit from assertive key players and strong communities capable of joint action. Both are crucial for dealing with internal opposition and overcoming external hurdles that appear when novel approaches irritate familiar solutions and routines.

In Africa's Great Lakes region, many rural communities face serious challenges including chronic poverty, lack of infrastructure, high unemployment, inadequate education systems and healthcare services, as well as a fundamental absence of public social protection mechanisms. In some contexts, rural dwellers suffer from the additional burden of armed conflict and political violence. Yet, rural populations show remarkable indications of resilience and exhibit innovative ways of handling their problems by themselves. Some of these approaches can be qualified as social innovations. With its focus on the role of social work in rural social innovation processes, this article aims to contribute to some under-researched aspects at the intersection of social innovation, rural studies, and social work practice. Empirical evidence of rural social innovations is based on a regional study on indigenous and innovative models of problem solving in five African countries. Here, the focus is on two case examples from Uganda and Rwanda. For Uganda, a community-based concept of household clusters to promote rural development called akabondo is presented. The example from Rwanda is called umugoroba w'ababyeyi and refers to a family strengthening and community development program that has been mainstreamed into government policies. This model is located in the challenging context of a post-genocide society. A critical analysis of these models refers to the question whether they fall into the category of a social innovation; to major players in implementing such innovations; to their impact on rural communities and the wider society; as well as to challenges facing such innovations.

The phenomenon of rural marginalisation has intensified across the European Union after the 2008 global economic crisis, since the traditional state forms have been proved unable to promote an all-inclusive governing. Beyond-the-state governance systems are socially innovative, horizontal, networked, and collaborative institutional arrangements that are committed to breaking through this rural marginalisation. Marginalised rural areas provide a favourable context for socially innovative governance, since they contain small cohesive communities, while at the same time poor governing penetrates them. Nevertheless, social innovation in rural governance remains largely unexplored. The novel contribution of this article consists in underlying this research gap and exploring the question of how socially innovative governance is fostered or impeded within marginalised rural regions. Comparative research was conducted in between the marginalised rural regions of Muhlviertel in Austria, Baixo Alentejo in Portugal, and Phthiotis in Greece. The comparative results revealed some of the parameters that foster socially innovative governance; a decentralized government structure, advanced interregional networking, a discourse dissemination among the stakeholders and the civil society, as well as an organizational stability of the involved institutions for social innovation to become embedded. This article points to socially innovative governance that has a more codified and systematized hypostasis by recommendation of unique governance qualities.

This study examines the impact of bonded zone policy on the performance of firms. We use a difference-in-differences approach and exploit differences in the timing of bonded zone approval as our id...

We use a randomized controlled trial to evaluate the impacts of an adult education program, targeting mothers in rural India, on investments in health and education of one’s children and family one year later. The program increased involvement in their children’s education (but did not affect schooling outcomes), and impacted investment in family health and hygiene practices. We note that the program made the mothers more knowledgeable about health matters and document positive changes in some measures of bargaining power. The program increased the mothers’ confidence in dealing with people outside their family, and increased their mobility.

Conflicts between ethnic groups can threaten group survival and exacerbate son preference in conformity with the traditional role of men as group defenders. We study the impact of the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict over the Nagorno-Karabakh region on the subnational variation of sex ratios among children in Armenia that has one of the world's highest sex ratios at birth. Difference-in-differences analysis show that communities closer to the conflict region have higher sex ratio among children relative to the communities further away. The findings from household surveys show that fear of war is associated with a stronger son preference at the individual level.

Co-production in climate change has arisen in response to improving climate knowledge. Climate service co-production provides climate knowledge for decision-making, benefiting vulnerable communities with useful and usable information such as flooding risk areas. A climate service co-production project, including mapping technologies, has been conducted in Jakarta, Indonesia. However, it has not been integrated into mainstream spatial planning. This paper investigates an enabling environment for the integration of climate service co-production and spatial planning using a collaborative governance framework. We conducted semi-structured interviews, photovoice, and focus group discussions. The results highlight factors to enable integration; (1) an institutional reform to put climate service co-production on the agenda, (2) top-down priorities aligned with local-level needs, (3) local government will and leadership to execute the tasks and actions towards climate resilience, (4) trust of the local government with the community, (5) integrated geospatial data to have an effective climate knowledge to spatial planning.

This paper studies how the expansion in schooling infrastructure affects the female literacy rate using the Education for All program in India. I exploit the variation in the targeting of the program to educationally and not educationally backward sub-districts. Using regression discontinuity and panel data of all schools in India, I find that there was a significant expansion in the number of girls' schools and residential schools for girls in the educationally backward areas. But being classified as educationally backward did not lead to a significant effect on either the female literacy rate or the gender gap in literacy rate. To achieve a quicker solution to low levels of literacy, alternative cost effective methods compared to large scale infrastructure programs can be explored.

Countries enact environmental regulations to achieve sustainable development andecological sustainability. However, environmental regulations do not guarantee envi-ronmental sustainability unless implemented efficiently. Furthermore, political institu-tions play a key role in the formulation and management of environmentalregulations. This research examines the relationship between democracy, environ-mental regulations, economic growth, and ecological footprint (EF) in the panel of G7nations from 1985 to 2017. Second generation econometric techniques are used toanalyze the data. The empirical evidence indicates that economic growth enhancesEF while democracy and environmental regulations positively contribute to ecologicalsustainability by reducing EF. The causal outcomes reveal that democracy Grangercauses EF and renewable energy indicating that democracy curbs environmental deg-radation and stimulates the share of renewables. Further, democracy and environ-mental regulations Granger cause each other. Lastly, the implication of these findingsfor sustainable development and ecological sustainability are discussed.

Grain is not only the basic living materials of urban and rural residents, but an important strategic resource related to the national security. Therefore, grain security is an important aspect of national security. Farmers' willingness to grow grain is the key factor to guarantee food security. Based on the structural equation model, the main factors that influence the farmers' willingness to grow grain were studied in this paper by investigating 486 dispersed farmers in six counties (cities, districts) of three prefecture-level cities in Shandong Province. The study indicated that aside from the difficulty of measuring the influence of personal characteristic factors, the national grain subsidy policies, grain price, grain planting scale, other farmers' production behaviors, and promotion of agricultural technology affected the farmers' willingness to grow grain in varying degrees. Further regional multi-group analyses demonstrated that the farmers' willingness to grow grain showed an increasing trend from east to west in Shandong Province. Additionally, grain subsidy policies and family characteristic factors had obvious regional differences on the farmers' willingness to grow grain. Therefore, optimizing and improving the national grain subsidy policies, encouraging the management of a moderate scale, stabilizing prices of grain, increasing the propaganda of agricultural information and promoting agricultural technology were the key factors to increase the farmers' willingness to grow grain.

In recent years, China's rural areas have undergone intense restructuring motivated by various flows derived from e-commerce, which has triggered a new wave of rural rejuvenation. Attempting to reveal the process and mechanism of rural economic restructuring driven by e-commerce, this paper takes Xiaying village in central China to conduct an empirical study by introducing the theory of “space of flows” and applying the method of semi-structured interview. The results show that e-commerce has become a technical catalyst to the variation of industry structure, employment pattern and household economy. Xiaying village has performed a leap from traditional agriculture to commercial service and constructed a complete e-commerce oriented industry chain, which is distinguished from the traditional path of rural modernization adhering to the gradual evolution of the primary, secondary and tertiary industry in China. In response, the employment pattern is diversified and tends to be de-agriculturalization, thus providing an economic advancement opportunity for rural households. As a matter of fact, rural elites, technology innovation (e-commerce platform), resource endowments and government support all contributed greatly to this restructuring process. What distinguishes it from others is the strong mobility and exchange of urban and rural elements, which functions as the initial engine. Essentially, this transition can be considered as the impact of the network on the geographic space restructuring rural economy.

In this paper, we first detect the uneven distribution of regional inequality in rural China with the per capita net income data at county level, and then diagnose the various factors that contribute to this as well as its driving mechanisms using the four-dimension transitional framework. The results suggest that rural inequalities are clustered at the province level, and those most unequal regions tend to be geographically gathered. Stemming from the framework, the study reveals that the spatio-temporal disparity in rural inequality is deeply embedded in the quadruple-transition process of marketization, globalization, decentralization and urbanization. Employing both the pooled OLS and spatial regime models, the study further unfolds that influences of the transition processes are diversified across regions and study periods. We finally argue that human investment rather than economic growth plays the key role in reducing the rural inequality in eastern provinces, and that the formulation of policies in line with regional characteristics would be helpful to address or alleviate rural inequality.

With 76% of the total main workforce in agriculture and more than 50% small and medium landowning households, the village provides an important case study for understanding agrarian resilience. The conceptualisation of resilience has been majorly confined to a system or a territorial boundary. Agrarian resilience too is commonly assumed to be driven by forces within the agriculture and the rural. i.e. land ownership remains constant, the labour of the peasantry is spatially limited to agriculture, the capital is generated within agriculture and the networks and skills of the peasantry is also confined to agriculture. This has underscored the role of factors and processes working outside the agriculture in conceptualising agrarian resilience. While the primacy of the agrarian processes cannot be denied, there are often processes working outside an agrarian system that can also enable resilience. i.e. the rural workforce can diversify its labour outside agriculture in the urban non-farm sector, capital can also be generated from sources outside the agriculture. In this context, using the case study of a village dominated by small and medium landowning households in the Patiala district of Punjab in India, the paper shows that resilience is driven by processes both within and outside agriculture.

Discussions of China's hollowed village reconstruction (HVR) program tend to divide initiatives into community-based model (CBM, led by local actors which is also called bottom-up model) and government-led model (GLM, driven by policy makers which is also called top-down model). In this paper, we propose a theoretical framework, which goes beyond these two models. Then, we take three typical villages which experienced different models of HVR in recent years as case studies, exploring the intersection of the process of decision-making, the structure of governance and the performance of projects. Both theoretical analysis and case studies show that a hybrid governance structure (HGS), with limited range of reconstruction in the distribution and functions of rural land, is most in line with China's background for HVR and rural vitalization. The participatory process is very important for these three modes, with villages and communities as the important carriers for participation and interaction. Not only villagers can truly participate in the planning and decision-making process in the HGS's approach, which enables villagers to have more autonomy, but also enhanced the project's performance by integrating villagers' interests and willingness with government proposals, matching the subjective and the objective conditions. This research indicates that we can integrate diverse driving forces of village revitalization, pay more attention to the governance's structure and operating models of reconstructing. More importantly, this study responds to Elinor Ostrom's common-pool resource theory and suggests a way forward in the public governance of rural vitalization in contemporary China.

Since the implementation of China's open-door policy in 1978, the number, structure, and environmental conditions of rural settlements have changed dramatically. This study examined the changes in rural settlements and the factors behind rural change in Guangdong Province using land-use datasets from 1980, 1990, 1995, 2000, 2005, 2010, and 2015, a digital elevation model, and data for transport networks and physical characteristics. Different stages of change in the rural settlements became evident: there was expansion from 1980 to 2000 and rapid decline from 2000 to 2010. Urban growth was facilitated by converting high-production cropland. The density of rural settlements was highest in areas with medium-level development: the density was highest in eastern and western parts of the province, lower in the center, and lowest in the north. The patterns and changes in rural settlements were most strongly related to water sources and transport systems; however, some physical variables (terrain, precipitation, and temperature) were significantly associated with the probability of occurrence of rural settlements. We argue that comprehensive, systematic planning systems should be established for rural areas and that it is necessary to recognize the value of the cultural heritage of southern Guangdong. To ensure the success of a rural revitalization strategy, it is important to introduce regional development schemes that resolve inequalities between less and more economically developed areas.

The uneven distribution of welfare not only hinders social fairness but also affects the optimal allocation of resources for rural residential land. Recourse to traditional welfare theory or Amartya Sen's function and ability welfare theory is inappropriate in this situation as neither is focused on the influence of welfare differences. Therefore, this study aims to provide a new focus for welfare economics in integrating the concept of the internal group welfare gap into overall welfare evaluation. Fuzzy mathematics is applied to calculate welfare and the concept of the Gini coefficient is used to evaluate the welfare gap. The resulting model is applied to the cities of Guangzhou, Chongqing, and Wuxi before and after rural residential land circulation (RRLC) to determine their resulting changes in welfare and welfare gap. From this, it is found that, after RRLC, the farmers' overall welfare increased by 17.5%, 15.1%, and 23.5% respectively, while the welfare gap of Guangzhou and Wuxi was improved, and Chongqing was decreased. This means the welfare gap widened in Guangzhou and Wuxi, while narrowed in Chongqing. Concluding remarks call for increased government attention to the fair distribution of welfare between different groups of farmers by increased social security and a more detailed consideration of the groups involved.

Resumen En este artículo se presentan argumentos a favor de una pedagogía social basada en el enfoque de las capacidades y su potencial para el desarrollo y se aboga por una pedagogía social que eduque para el ejercicio pleno de la libertad. Asimismo, se ofrece una definición de pedagogía social y un resumen general del enfoque de las capacidades tal como lo desarrollan Amartya Sen y Martha Nussbaum, describiendo en detalle las diez capacidades centrales definidas por esta última autora. Igualmente, se describe el modelo socioeducativo diseñado por el Centro Universitario de Participación Social y el Cuerpo Académico Pedagogía Social y Orientación Educativa de la Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla, México, indicando la relación directa entre el modelo socioeducativo descrito y el enfoque de las capacidades. Finalmente, se concluye que es posible, a través de la pedagogía social, tender un puente de realización entre el enfoque de las capacidades y los contextos sociales injustos. Abstract In this paper, we present some arguments in favor of a social pedagogy based on the capabilities approach and its potential for development. We promote a social pedagogy that educates for the full exercise of freedom, and offer a definition of social pedagogy. In addition, we summarize the capabilities approach as developed by Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum. We describe in detail the ten core capabilities defined by Nussbaum. Next, we briefly describe a socio-educational model designed by the University Center for Social Participation and the research group "Social Pedagogy and Educational Orientation" of the Universidad Autonoma de Puebla, Mexico. We emphasize the direct relationship between this socio-educational model and the capabilities approach. Finally, we conclude that it is possible, through social pedagogy, to build bridges between the "capabilities approach" and the impoverished social contexts.

Gravity variables such as distance, adjacency, colony, free trade agreements or language are used to capture the effects of trade costs in empirical studies. By using actual data on trade costs, this paper decomposes the overall effects of such variables on trade into those through three gravity channels: duties/tariffs (DC), transportation-costs (TC), and dyadic-preferences (PC). When PC is ignored as is typical in existing studies in the literature, it is shown that nearly all gravity effects are due to distance, 29 percent through DC and 71 percent through TC. The tables turn as the additional channel of PC is introduced and shown to dominate other channels, with adjacency contributing about 45 percent, distance about 32 percent, colony about 14 percent, free trade agreements about 7 percent, and language about 2 percent. It is implied that gravity variables mainly capture the effects of demand shifters rather than supply shifters (as implied by the existing literature). The results are further connected to several existing discussions in the literature, such as welfare gains from trade and the distance puzzle.

Using district level data for urban areas in Java, we reassess the impacts of minimum wages on formal and informal sector employment, unemployment and labour participation. We employ the spatial Du...

This research proposes a first approximation of Inequality of Opportunity (IOp) in Mexico based on a concept of ex-post compensation, fully consistent with Roemer s approach of In-equality of Opportunity. This framework considers the advantage reached by an individual to be determined by the circumstances at origin and by the effort exerted. Following Brunori and Neidhofer (2020), we construct a data-driven procedure using regression trees to identify types based on circumstances. To identify degrees of effort, an algorithm estimates the distribution of outcome in each type based on coefficients of Bernstein polynomials. Our results underline the differences, in terms of opportunities, faced by individuals, based on the territory in which they grew up, the household context, and their sex. We find that the education and the wealth of parents are the principal circumstances that shape their trajectories. Importantly, territorial variables are significant determinants of IOp among the most disadvantaged at origin, but they hold less importance for the most advantaged. IOp is lower in urban areas, in the Northern region and in Mexico City compared to other regions. The Southern region and rural territories are the most unequal. We also estimate that the weight of IOp in terms of total inequality varies according if we adopt an ex-post or an ex-ante approach, which can lead to different conclusions.

We investigate whether pandemic-induced contagion disamenities and income effects arising due to COVID-related unemployment adversely affected real estate prices of one- or two-family owner-occupied properties across New York City (NYC). First, OLS hedonic results indicate that greater COVID case numbers are concentrated in neighborhoods with lower-valued properties. Second, we use a repeat-sales approach for the period 2003 to 2020, and we find that both the possibility of contagion and pandemic-induced income effects adversely impacted home sale prices. Estimates suggest sale prices fell by roughly $60,000 or around 8% in response to both of the following: 1,000 additional infections per 100,000 residents; and a 10-percentage point increase in unemployment in a given Modified Zip Code Tabulation Area (MODZCTA). These price effects were more pronounced during the second wave of infections. Based on cumulative MODZCTA infection rates through 2020, the estimated COVID-19 price discount ranged from approximately 1% to 50% in the most affected neighborhoods, and averaged 14%. The contagion effect intensified in the more affluent, but less densely populated NYC neighborhoods, while the income effect was more pronounced in the most densely populated neighborhoods with more rental properties and greater population shares of foreign-born residents. This disparity implies the pandemic may have been correlated with a wider gap in housing wealth in NYC between homeowners in lower-priced and higher-priced neighborhoods., Comment: 38 pages, 5 tables, 3 figures, Revised 1/27/2022

This paper investigates the effects of social assistance on subjective well-being looking at the case of Kyrgyzstan. For this purpose, we exploit recent changes in the design of social assistance and apply a difference in difference (DiD) method combined with an inverse probability weighting (IPW) technique. In contrast to the existing literature, we find that in the short-term, the receipt of social assistance benefits is associated with lower levels of subjective well-being. Our findings also reveal that participation in social assistance leads to some reduction in satisfaction regarding recipients' own economic conditions. Moreover, we find that the negative effects on subjective well-being disappear for the oldest generations, which experienced the dissolution of the Soviet Union. By contrast, the effect is negative for the youth, who grew up in a new society where needing help is ultimately the responsibility of the individual citizen. For individuals with high trust in political institutions, the negative effect of state intervention does not hold, while it persists in case of low trust in political institutions.

This paper considers the digitalisation of food infrastructure as a wider context within which smart farming and big data applications in agriculture are being introduced. It examines the use of digital devices aimed providing traceability and transparency across different sites of food supply chains, from farm to fork. The infrastructural perspective problematises ideas of digitalisation as a technological fix to the uncertainness of food supply chains, and highlights the relational nature of food. Digital devices aimed at ensuring food integrity and the control of supply chains are shown to reconstitute infrastructures of qualification by which the qualities of foodstuffs are established as they move through the processes of the supply chain, from production to consumption. The paper identifies question of power around the ongoing process of infrastructuring that generate a requirement for more labour by some actors; the possibility of new politics and relationships built around increased circulation of quality information; and questions of who controls access to information that are obscured by different understandings of transparency.

In this paper we use an anti, intra and inter-categorical intersectional approach, and ethnographic enquiry in Dhaka, Bangladesh, to nuance debate over gender and participation in urban water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) projects in low-income settlements. We make three claims. First, that a mismatch exists between how ‘women’ are framed and targeted in WASH projects and everyday experience characterised by the unequal distribution of benefits and burdens. Second, the likelihood of participation and leadership in WASH projects differs between women according, especially, to age, income, marital and occupancy status, social and political relationships. Third, the same interconnected leaders - including married ‘power couples’ - are involved in all development projects, with implications for the consolidation of power and authority. We call for urban development research, policy and practice to better engage with difference and the conflicting roles certain women and men play in NGO management, local politics and broader claim-making.

This paper offers an alternative approach for engaging sociologically, ontologically, and politically with digital farming platforms. A challenge faced by any approach looking to upend intellectual conventions, especially ontological ones, lies in the question of representation, namely, how do we talk about digitization in novel theoretical ways using language rooted in more than two millennia of western human-centered thought? One way to deal with this challenge, the one adopted in this paper, involves decentering familiar terms and repurposing them. Thus, rather than organizing the argument around familiar terms like small and big data, I argue instead that we organize data-assemblages according to what they do, which makes this a political ontological project. To do this, I offer the relational predicate of weak data and strong data, suggesting that they are good to think with in this regard. The argument ultimately lands at a place for analyzing these platforms that offers the potential for critique and perhaps even a degree of optimism, as I suggest a framework for normatively evaluating these practices. The paper draws upon various empirical studies of digital agriculture conducted by the author, which include interviews with farmers, farm laborers, hacktivists, investors, and engineers from numerous countries and locales.

Using unique direct observations of patient-provider interactions linked to patient exit interviews and detailed household surveys, this paper assesses the relationship between patient wealth and the quality and price of antenatal care in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Overall, the analysis finds a significant wealth-quality gradient, with a standard deviation increase in wealth being associated with an increase of 4 percentage points in protocol compliance. This increase in compliance represents 8 percent of the average quality of care received by women in the lowest wealth quintile. Over half of the wealth-quality gradient is driven by lower facility quality in poorer areas. However, the analysis also finds statistically significant within-village and even within-facility wealth-quality relationships. Within villages, wealth-quality gradients are primarily driven by wealthier women seeking care at higher-quality even if more distant facilities. Within the same facilities, poorer women tend to receive worse care, but on average they also pay less for the same quality of care compared with wealthier women. The price gap increases in the local ratio of wealthy to poor households, suggesting that providers do not charge different prices only for redistributive reasons.

There is some evidence that access to schooling reduces fertility along the intensive margin in developing countries, but the transmission channels are not well understood; most education interventions impact financial costs, access, and school quality. We isolate the specific effect of child school fees on maternal fertility by studying a 1997 schooling reform in Uganda, in which the government abolished elementary school fees for up to four children per household. Families with more school-aged children were required to pay fees for the additional ones. We demonstrate that eligibility limits reduced births: women with more than four children in 1997 were 4.2 percentage points less likely to give birth to an additional child in the subsequent two years. We provide evidence that this result is driven by UPE eligibility limits, not by other factors associated with the policy or other secular changes. Fertility effects are persistent over time and survive the lifting of the eligibility limit in 2003. The policy is also associated with a temporary reduction in the desired fertility, with mothers preferring having four children or fewer during the policy period than before.

This paper explores the resilience of the urban informal economy through multi-dimensional conflict. Karachi constituted an ideal case study for the research given the intensity and paradigmatic nature of the multi-dimensional conflict experienced in the city between 2008 and 2013. The paper applies a comparative frame in three sites (Sadar, Orangi and Lyari) to illustrate resilience of the informal economy and its role in supporting the urban poor in Karachi to survive and sometimes thrive, whilst also contributing to peaceful recovery and adaptation, albeit persistent divisions mean violence remains possible. The paper argues for greater recognition of and support for informal economies in urban policy, marking a shift away from the predominant neoliberal forms of governance that diminish the role of the state and burden already vulnerable people with the greatest risks, particularly in fragile, conflict-affected situations where half the world’s poor are predicted to live by 2030.

In this issue, Guest Editors Jean Grugel and Pia Riggirozzi outline the post neoliberal debate and ask whether the legacies of post-neoliberalism in Latin America will continue to reverberate and shape the region’s politics and political economy and if so, how. By exploring these questions Grugel and Riggirozzi discuss approaches to much-discussed topics of democratic citizenship and inclusive and sustainable development. While there is no settled debate, and certainly no settled practice in relation to democracy and development in current Latin America, the editors focus on the various forms of political and social contention surrounding post neoliberalism alternative policy paradigms. Surveying the literature published in Development and Change over the last decade, this virtual issue is concerned with three inter-linked themes: (i) the critique of neoliberal development, in which development itself frequently became conflated with growth and social and cultural homogeneity, and the articulation of alternatives in the shadow of the Sustainable Development Goals; (ii) the ever-present challenges of citizenship and democracy in Latin America, which have consistently underpinned demands for political, cultural and economic changes in the region since twentieth century; and (iii) the nexus between post-neoliberalism, the environment and the sustainability agenda, which is critical for the survival and wellbeing for many of the region’s peoples and communities. The articles reviewed in this issue cover a range of country experiences and trace the evolving critique to and opportunities of post-neoliberalism in Latin America. What becomes clear is that unsettled questions around citizenship, democracy and development are practical as well as theoretical. The Editors therefore propose a much-needed discussion about achievements, limitations and legacies of post-neoliberalism to make sense of its ideological and political economic prospects.

This study focuses on the role of parenthood ideologies on the micro and meso level as individual determinants to take up parental leave among fathers in Belgium. Belgian parental leave policies are characterized by a ‘laisser faire’ mentality regarding the division of parental leave uptake. Based on in-depth interviews with 20 heterosexual couples our study highlights the impact of norms and values on the individual micro-level and social expectations on a contextual meso-level. We present six ideal-typical categories of fathers’ position towards the uptake of parental leave that is defined by synergies or conflicts between parenthood ideologies on different levels and are ultimately likely to determine the individual decision to take up parental leave. The six positions are empowered parental leave takers, ideological crusaders, ideological renegades, ideological breadwinners, ideological explorers and empowered breadwinners.

Federal rental assistance is an important source of affordable housing for low income households, given a growing and severe affordable housing crisis. However, few studies have examined the extent to which rental assistance may improve housing access. This paper examines associations between rental assistance receipt and four dimensions of housing: quality, stability, autonomy and affordability. We draw on data from a longitudinal cohort study of low-income adults in New Haven, Connecticut and use Generalized Estimating Equations to examine associations between rental assistance receipt and housing measures. We find that participants receiving rental assistance had lower odds of reporting housing instability, low quality housing, lack of autonomy related to housing, and some measures of housing unaffordability compared to those not receiving assistance. The large and highly significant effects remain after adjusting for demographic variables and factors that can impact access to rental assistance.

We construct unanticipated government spending shocks for 103 developing countries from 1990 to 2015 and study their effects on income distribution. We find that unanticipated fiscal consolidations lead to a long-lasting increase in income inequality, while fiscal expansions lower inequality. The results are robust to several measures of income distribution and size of the fiscal shocks, to an alternative identification strategy, across expansions and recessions and across country groups (low-income countries versus emerging markets). An additional contribution of the paper is the computation of the medium-term inequality multiplier. This is on average about 1 in our sample, meaning that a cumulative decrease in government spending of 1 percent of GDP over 5 years is associated with a cumulative increase in the Gini coefficient over the same period of about 1 percentage point. The multiplier is larger for total government expenditure than for public investment and consumption (with the former having larger effect), likely due to the redistributive role of transfers. Finally, we find that (unanticipated) fiscal consolidations lead to an increase in poverty.

This paper examines the relationship between government revenue and spending in Thailand using both linear and nonlinear cointegration techniques. A residual-based cointegration test with an unknown structural break is used to detect the linear long-run relationship between government revenue and spending. For nonlinear cointegration tests, both TAR and MTAR models are estimated. The empirical results from the estimate of the redidual-based test for cointegration suggest that there is the positive long-run relationship between government revenue and spending when revenue is dependent variable. However, the results from the estimates of the TAR and MTAR models show the absence of asymmetric adjustments towards the long-run equilibrium. Based upon the results of linear cointegration test, short-run dynamics indicate that any deviation from budgetary disequilibrium will be corrected. In causality sense, there is a short-run unidirectional causality running from government spending to revenue. The evidence appears to support the fiscal spend-and-tax hypothesis. This finding implies that policymakers should be careful in exercising expansionary fiscal policy measures because fiscal deficits will occur when revenue falls short of spending.

Understanding the dynamics of interregional inequality is important when formulating development policies. In this paper, we investigate the convergence pattern in regional inequality within 49 African countries over the period 1992-2012 using satellite night-light based inequality proxies. We find evidence of multiple equilibria in regional income inequality. Four convergent clubs is distinguished instead of overall convergence. The results show that countries with high regional inequality steadily do not converge over time towards those of countries with low regional inequality, indicating that these countries are indeed stuck in regional income inequality traps. From the convergence analysis, we further analyze through an ordered logit estimation those relevant variables that drive convergence club formation. We find that the level of initial conditions such as GDP per capita, urbanization, natural resources rents and the change in country size are significant in explaining convergence club formation.

There is a lack of affordable and acceptable sanitation solutions for dense, low-income urban settlements. One option that has been proposed is container-based sanitation, where a sealed cartridge installed in a free-standing toilet is regularly changed and adequately separates users from their excreta. Though container-based toilets are considered a safely managed sanitation solution that meets the Sustainable Development Goal for sanitation, little is known about user experiences to inform how such a solution should be viewed by governments. We conducted a longitudinal prospective cohort study of changes in objective and subjective measures of sanitation quality due to the Clean Team Ghana (CTG) container- based toilet service in Kumasi, Ghana from June to December 2019. We collected data immediately prior to installation of a toilet and 10 weeks afterwards for 292 customers. Most initially used public toilets with good structural quality, but sometimes had poor cleanliness, a lack of handwashing facilities, and required a 14.3 minute mean round trip time to use. The evaluation found that CTG delivers a high-quality service that positively impacts the quality of life of CTG customers, as well as saving them money, reducing gender gaps in quality of life, and addressing the needs of those with physical disabilities. Satisfaction with CTG toilet and service characteristics was high, with the largest increases for satisfaction with smell, comfort, disgust, and privacy. Women in particular were positively impacted both for explicitly gendered indicators like the ability to practice menstrual hygiene management, and other indicators where women scored lower than men at baseline, including ease of access, ease of use, and cleanliness. Use of the service also benefitted those who had been unable to use a toilet for physical or social reasons beforehand. Problems with the CTG service, such as leaking, filling, smelling, or not being replaced as scheduled, were reported by fewer than 10% of customers. While one product or service does not fit the needs of all customers, this evaluation supports the growing body of evidence that container-based sanitation provides a service valued by users and acceptable to policymakers in dense urban settlements.

This study extends the literature on the role of institutional quality in international migration to an under-researched aspect: the intention of international migrants to return to the home country. We examined whether the perception of differences in institutional quality between OECD destination countries and Vietnam and the stated importance attached to such differences influence the intention of Vietnamese migrants to return home. We used data from a web-based survey (N = 159) conducted in 2016. The countries where the respondents resided comprised approximately 90% of the Vietnamese diaspora in the world. We considered six different dimensions of institutional quality. We found, both descriptively and by means of weighted logistic regression analysis, that Vietnamese migrants who perceive a greater difference in institutional quality between the destination country and Vietnam are less likely to report intentions to return. This effect is stronger for those who attach greater importance to institutional quality. However, gender shows notable heterogeneity, with the effects of institutional quality being more robust and closer to the theoretical expectations for men than for women.

This essay reviews the following works: The Lima Reader: History, Culture, Politics. Edited by Carlos Aguirre and Charles Walker. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2017, Pp. xv + 272. $26.95 paperback. ISBN: 9780822363484. Peru. 5 tomos. America Latina en la historia contemporanea. Dirigido por Carlos Contreras Carranza. Madrid: Fundacion MAPFRE, 2013–2015. Tomo 1, Crisis imperial e independencia, 1808–1830. Coordinado por Scarlett O’Phelan Godoy. Madrid: MAPFRE, 2013. Pp. 11–336. ISBN: 9788430607884. Tomo 2, La construccion nacional, 1830–1880. Coordinado por Carlos Contreras Carranza. Madrid: MAPFRE, 2014. Pp. 2–360. ISBN: 9788439607884. Tomo 3, La apertura al mundo, 1880–1930. Coordinado por Oscar Gonzales. Madrid: MAPFRE, 2015. Pp. 11–304. ISBN: 9788430607884. Tomo 4, Mirando hacia dentro, 1839–1960. Coordinado por Marcos Cueto. Madrid: MAPFRE, 2015. Pp. 13–312. ISBN: 9788430607884. Tomo 5, La busqueda de la democracia, 1960–2010. Coordinado por Antonio Zapata. Madrid: MAPFRE, 2015. Pp. 13–367. ISBN: 9788430607884.

This article focuses on how two Spanish American Creole writers perceived their port city as a symbol of national prestige, devoted patriotism, and utilitarian significance, at a time when the military and economic status of the port was undergoing transformational changes. It centers on the works of two eighteenth-century Cuban writers, José Martín Félix de Arrate’s Llave del Nuevo Mundo, antemural de las Indias Occidentales: La Habana descripta (1761) and Ignacio José de Urrutia y Montoya’s Teatro histórico, jurídico y político-militar de la Isla Fernandina de Cuba y principalmente de su capital La Habana (1791), to show the ways in which these authors articulated their love for their country while endowing the port and the port city with local political power and cultural prestige. This sense of “topophilia,” a concept described by geographer Yi-Fu Tuan as the “affective bond between people and place,” is what guided the aforementioned authors’ geographic view of the port.

Faith-based organizations (FBOs) support Latinx farmworkers in rural spaces across the U.S. Faith drives FBOs to operate in unique ways; however, there is little understanding about how faith shapes FBOs that work in food systems. At the same time, food justice scholars consistently call for making systemic changes to labor and immigration policies while working in solidarity with farmworkers. Even with these arguments, there is still a lack of food justice scholarship investigating immigration, rural spaces, and the FBOs that support farmworkers. Drawing on data from a five-month ethnography with the Valle Vista Farmworker Ministry, this paper begins to address these gaps. This article details how faith guides Valle Vista's activities, analyzes how faith impacts its ability to address injustices, and posits possibilities for food justice actors to study and ally with FBOs. Results reveal that Valle Vista's affiliation with the Church and people's faith guided the FBO in distinct ways. The Church influenced Valle Vista to focus on charity, a perspective aligned with food security, while individual actors' faith drove them to speak out against injustices and design educational and advocacy programs to support farmworkers, activities that aligned with a food justice perspective. These findings indicate that although some food justice actors may be hesitant to work with FBOs, especially with their focus on charity, FBOs could be sites for investigation and collaboration for food justice actors who endeavor to work in rural spaces with farmworkers.

Protected geographical indications (PGIs) are an increasingly popular strategy for securing price premiums on food products in the interest of preserving associated rural livelihoods, however they often fail to show clear benefits for small or otherwise marginalized farmers. Their environmental record for supporting low-impact farming practices is also mixed. This case study of the PGI for Spanish almond-based desserts Turron de Jijona and Turron de Alicante details a yet unstudied form of such failures, where manufacturers seeking to scale production removed the requirement to source their primary ingredient (almonds) from the region's low-input farms and opted for intensively produced ingredients imported from abroad. This uprooting of turron from its agroecological origins highlights how the GI designation creates tension between the need to legitimate a product as rooted in traditional agrarian lifeways and the incentive to expand exports by industrial means. While previous studies show how such tension can result in agricultural intensification benefitting larger landholders within a given region, I argue this inequity and ecological risk operates at a global scale. Importantly, the turron case reveals that “quality” of a product is a moving target shaped not only by culinary legacies but also forged by a global political economy of agriculture suffering chronic overproduction. Finally, the role of the state in structuring PGI institutions more inclusively and adjudicating conflicts among actors along the value chain is fundamental to the capacity of these programs to achieve social and environmental goals.

This essay reviews the following works: Rethinking Productive Development: Sound Policies and Institutions for Economic Transformation. Edited by Gustavo Crespi, Eduardo Fernandez-Arias, and Ernesto Stein; Inter-American Development Bank. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014. Pp. xxix + 461. $54.99 paperback. ISBN: 9781137397164. Macroeconomics and Development: Roberto Frenkel and the Economics of Latin America. Edited by Mario Damill, Martin Rapetti, and Guillermo Rozenwurcel. New York: Columbia University Press, 2016. Pp. xi + 389. $65.00 hardcover. ISBN: 9780231175081. Free Trade and Faithful Globalization: Saving the Market. By Amy Reynolds. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015. Pp. x + 179. $28.99 paperback. ISBN: 9781107435179. Latin America after the Financial Crisis: Economic Ramifications from Heterodox Perspectives. Edited by Juan E. Santarcangelo, Orlando Justo, and Paul Cooney. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Pp. vii + 251. $149.99 hardcover. ISBN: 9781137486615. Meaningful Resistance: Market Reforms and the Roots of Social Protest in Latin America. By Erica S. Simmons. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2016. Pp. xi + 219. $27.99 paperback. ISBN: 9781107562059. Global Capitalism in Disarray: Inequality, Debt, and Austerity. By Andres Solimano. New York: Oxford University Press, 2017. Pp. xi + 235. $35.95 hardcover. ISBN: 9780190626273. The Last Day of Oppression, and the First Day of the Same: The Politics and Economics of the New Latin American Left. By Jeffery R. Webber. Chicago: Haymarket Books, 2017. Pp. 1 + 305. $26.00 paperback. ISBN: 9780745399539.

This article analyzes student mobilization and public discourse on higher education during the June 2013 protests in Brazil in an effort to situate the protests historically. I argue that higher education was a major, yet overlooked, component of the 2013 protests, and that concerns over the failings and shortcomings of Brazil’s university system had deeper roots in institutional problems and student discourses on education, society, and democracy. These historical inequalities combined with institutional memories that offered students models and examples of past mobilization and allowed them to tie their present-day concerns to past examples of student politics. I consider the ways in which the often-overlooked question of educational reform offers insights into ongoing social inequalities in Brazil, the failure of various regimes to address structural issues, and how students in 2013 looked to the past while simultaneously drawing on their own particular educational contingencies. This article situates 2013 historically while exploring the ways in which higher education in the twenty-first century has transformed, even as it remains an important part of political and social struggles between society and the state. Finally, this article explores how the 2013 protests in Brazil reflect ongoing struggles to define the role of the state in society, not just in Brazil but in the Americas more generally.

This article examines two approaches to postdictatorship cinema: trauma theory, which has been especially popular in reading this corpus, and semiotics, which has regained popularity in film analysis in general but is not often employed when analyzing postdictatorship films. The article claims that, though highly productive in the 1990s, trauma theory has become less fruitful after decades of continuous scholarship and after the emergence of administrations that have made the representation of the dictatorship the center of their public policies, such as kirchnerismo in Argentina (2003–2015). While trauma theory yields ahistorical analyses, a semiotic approach that takes into account how indexical, iconic, and symbolic signs merge in the cinematic field allows for historical interpretations that are more adequate for reading postdictatorship films, especially after 2003. The article first outlines the main tenets of the two approaches (trauma theory and semiotics), then assesses their suitability for historical interpretation via a brief analysis of Andres no quiere dormir la siesta , a 2009 Argentine film on the country’s last dictatorship. Resumen Este articulo se propone examinar dos aproximaciones al cine postdictatorial: la teoria del trauma, que ha sido especialmente popular para leer este corpus, y la semiotica, un acercamiento que ha vuelto a ganar popularidad en el analisis filmico en general pero que no es frecuentemente utilizado en la interpretacion de este tipo de peliculas. El articulo argumenta que la teoria del trauma, aunque productiva en los anos noventa, se ha vuelto menos fructifera despues de varias decadas de produccion academica constante y de la emergencia de gobiernos que, como el kirchnerismo en Argentina (2003–2015), han puesto la representacion de la dictadura en el centro de sus politicas publicas. Mientras que la teoria del trauma resulta insuficiente para leer historicamente el cine postdictatorial, una lectura semiotica de como los componentes indiciales, iconicos y simbolicos se combinan en la imagen cinematografica resulta mas apropiada para llevar a cabo una interpretacion historica, especialmente despues del 2003. Luego de delinear estas dos aproximaciones, el articulo las reevalua mediante un breve analisis de una pelicula argentina reciente sobre la dictadura militar, Andres no quiere dormir la siesta.

This essay reviews the following works: Political Landscapes: Forests, Conservation, and Community in Mexico. By Christopher R. Boyer. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2015. Pp. xix + 337 pages. $27.95 paper. ISBN: 9780822358329. Dictablanda: Politics, Work, and Culture in Mexico, 1938–1968. Edited By Paul Gillingham and Benjamin T. Smith. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2014. Pp. vii + 444. $28.95 paper. ISBN: 9780822356370. The War Has Brought Peace to Mexico: World War II and the Consolidation of the Post-Revolutionary State. By Halbert Jones. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2014. Pp. ix + 296. $55.00 cloth. ISBN: 9780826351302. Mexico’s Once and Future Revolution: Social Upheaval and the Challenge of Rule since the Late Nineteenth Century. By Gilbert M. Joseph and Jurgen Buchenau. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2013. $23.95 paper. Pp. x + 252. ISBN: 9780822355328. Instituting Nature: Authority, Expertise, and Power in Mexico’s Forests. Andrew S. Mathews. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011. Pp. xii + 304. $32.00 paper. ISBN: 9780262516440. The Logic of Compromise in Mexico: How the Countryside Was Key to the Emergence of Authoritarianism. By Gladys I. McCormick. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2016. Pp. xiv + 284. $32.95 paper. ISBN: 9781469627748. Myths of Demilitarization in Postrevolutionary Mexico, 1920–1960. By Thomas Rath. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2013. Pp. vii + 256. $29.95 paperback. ISBN: 9780807839294.

Twenty-five years have passed since Haiti’s first free and fair elections. In that time, democratization has been slow and there have been many setbacks. This article offers some observations regarding Haiti’s democratization journey by examining how the government introduced a massive industrial park that required the displacement of a large number of farmers. In a departure from historical practice, when faced with opposition, the government deployed its security forces sparingly. Also, the levels of transparency and civil society engagement were not terrible. Although it is insufficient and superficial, movement is in the right direction. In contrast, local government officials may have lost status and legitimacy during the process, which could hinder future democratization. Finally, the footprint of outsiders in this project was massive, confirming how profoundly Haiti’s democratization is transnationalized. This makes tracking its democratic development extremely challenging and yet necessary given the country is not alone in this predicament. Resumen Han pasado veinticinco anos desde las primeras elecciones libres y justas en Haiti. Desde entonces, la democratizacion ha sido lenta y ha sufrido muchos contratiempos. Este articulo ofrece algunas observaciones con respecto al proceso de democratizacion en este momento. Al hacerlo, examina como el gobierno ha introducido un extenso parque industrial en el noreste del pais, el que requirio el desplazamiento de un gran numero de campesinos. Los resultados son mixtos. En una divergencia de la historia, cuando se enfrento con la oposicion, el gobierno envio sus fuerzas de seguridad con moderacion. Por otra parte, los niveles de transparencia y el compromiso de la sociedad civil no eran pasables. Aunque puede resultar insuficiente y superficial, el proceso democratico parece ir avanzando en la direccion correcta. Por otro lado, puede ser que los oficiales del gobierno local hayan perdido posicion y legitimidad durante el proceso, lo que puede impedir la democratizacion. Finalmente, el involucramiento de extranjeros en este proyecto era masivo, lo que confirma que la democratizacion de Haiti es transnacional. Asi, seguir el desarrollo democratico es algo extremadamente desafiante pero necesario ya que este pais no esta solo en esta situacion.

This essay reviews the following works: Hacer patria/To Build a Homeland. Dir. David Blaustein, Prod. Zafra Difusion S.A. and Tornasol Films S.A. Argentina, 2007, 127’. DVD. Estamos aqui (Danken Got)/Here We Are. Dir. Cintia Chamecki and Andrea Lerner. Prod. Chamecki Productions, 2013, Brazil, 79’. Film is available on Vimeo. El barrio de los judios/The Jewish Neighborhood. Dir. Gonzalo Rodriguez Fabregas. Prod. El Apapacho. Uruguay, 2011, 70’. Film is available on YouTube.

This essay reviews the following works: Worldly Philosopher: The Odyssey of Albert O. Hirschman. By Jeremy Adelman. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2013. Pp. xv + 740. $39.95 cloth. ISBN: 9780691155678. Kalman Silvert: Engaging Latin America, Building Democracy. Edited by Abraham F. Lowenthal and Martin Weinstein. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2016. Pp. vii + 195. $24.50 paper. ISBN: 9781626375550. Disciplinary Conquest: U.S. Scholars in South America, 1900–1945. By Ricardo D. Salvatore. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2016. Pp. xii + 329. $94.95 cloth. $26.95 paper. ISBN: 9780822360957.