Infrastructure planning in rural Massachusetts

This paper describes the importance of understanding and dealing with the problems of infrastructure planning and maintenance in rural communities. Infrastructure is defined to include roads, bridges, water and wastewater collection and treatment systems, and public buildings and capital equipment. The authors base their findings primarily on the experience of communities in Massachusetts, but these findings are readily applied to the situation of rural communities elsewhere in the U.S.A. and other developed countries. Three major conclusions are presented in the paper: the need for rural communities to develop long-range plans for infrastructure maintenance and finance; the need to develop effective local institutions to assume this responsibility, and the importance of managing growth in fast-growing rural areas in order to minimize the need for major expansion of infrastructure systems.     

城乡统筹是解决“三农”问题的根本

十六大报告根据我国经济和社会发展的阶段性特点,立足我国国情和农村实际,提出了一个重大思路,把解决"三农"问题摆在了国民经济和社会发展的重要位置,并着重指出解决"三农"问题是全面建设小康社会的重大任务。解决"三农"问题,必须跳出传统的就农业论农业、就农村论农村的局限,从战略高度统筹城乡社会经济发展,这才是解决"三农"问题的方向。     

城乡结合部交通优化机制及其规划设想

随着社会经济发展,我国城市化发展速度不断加快,城市规模不断膨胀,同时,城市形态、结构和功能也处于不断演化之中。城市与城市、城市与乡村间的人流、物流、能流和信息流等规模大且日益频繁。因此,迫切需要高质量、高速度和多层次的交通出行方式连结城市与城市、城市与区域。了解和研究城乡结合部交通发展机制,有机疏散城市交通压力,保证城市集聚效应和扩散效应畅通无阻,     

低碳生态视角下对城乡规划的几点思考

一、低碳生态视角下的城乡规划 1992年联合国环境与发展大会通过《21世纪议程》,注重生态化发展理念和可持续发展思想的新发展模式开始逐步受到国际社会的重视和认可。妁联合国气候变化框架公多锈第3次缔约方大会于1997年12月在日本京都召开,149个国家和地区的代表通过了旨在限制发达国家温室气体排放量以抑制全球变暖的《京都议定书》。中国于1998年5月签署并于2002年8月核准了该议定书。目前已有170多个国家签订了该议定书。2005年2月16日,椋都议定书》正式生效。这是人类历史上首次以法规的形式限制温室气体排放。     

The centre and the local: Policy and practice in rural education provision

This paper examines the factors that are currently affecting the viability of small primary schools (90 pupils or less) in England and Wales. It is argued that the contemporary pattern of rural schooling provision is a reflection of the uneven interplay between the central state, the local state, small schools and their communities. Recent legislative reforms have increased the explanatory significance of national education policies and locally-managed schools, at the expense of disempowered local education authorities. An analysis of policies in a sample of authorities shows how the centralization of educational control, since 1988, has created a more unsympathetic educational and economic environment for smaller schools. However, a review of locally-based support strategies including interschool co-operation, anti-closure campaigns and voluntary fund-raising shows that the future for small primary schools may not be as pessimistic as past trends and a narrow focus on the educational policy framework would suggest. Therefore, this study highlights the importance of studying the impact of individual and collective social action within the context of wider structural factors shaping rural localities.     

The creative countryside: Policy and practice in the UK rural cultural economy

This paper explores emerging policymaking and research into rural creative industries, drawing on a case study from the county of Shropshire in the UK. It begins with a critique of existing creative industries policy, which is argued to focus almost exclusively on the urban as the site of creative work. The paper highlights an emerging body of critique of this neglect of the rural in cultural policy, which is matched by a neglect of the cultural in rural policy. Attention then turns to an investigation of the size, scope and characteristics of the creative sector in Shropshire, with findings based on a consultancy report commissioned by public sector actors keen to highlight and promote the county's creative work. This material is used to illustrate some of the distinctive issues facing the UK rural creative sector, which current policy is ill-equipped to address. The paper ends by reflecting these findings back to the broader academic and policy contexts.     

完善社会主义市场经济时期的城乡规划体系

当前我国正处在由建立社会主义市场经济向完善社会主义市场经济推进的时期,作为深化体制改革和完善市场经济体制的要求以及推进政府职能转变的重要内容,城乡规划正逐步从计划经济条件下政府发展目标的技术工具,向完善市场经济条件下的政府公共政策转变.     

River basin planning as a strategy for rural development in Nigeria

River basin planning has existed in one form or another since the third millenium B.C. when some of the earliest civilizations evolved in the great drainage basins of Mesopotamia, Egypt and north-west India. It has, however, undergone several modifications before finally culminating in the comprehensive planning for simultaneous development of all resources of a river basin.The idea of river basin planning was first mooted in Nigeria by the Food and Agriculture Organization in the late 1960s. Beginning in the early 1970s, the Federal government of Nigeria also came to the belief that river basin planning could play a significant role in the country's development. At the height of the ‘oil boom’ in 1976 and with the incipient manifestation of structural problems in the national economy, the government took a giant step in river basin planning by the establishment of 11 river basin development authorities. River basin planning is viewed as a ‘new approach’ to rural development and has involved more substantial capital outlay than all the other rural programmes combined.This paper examines the implementation and impact of these projects, which are large-scale and capital intensive, and which may be incompatible with a strategy aimed at improving the lot of the peasant farmers. The projects have wrought havoc on the prevailing rural economy and social-economic structures. Even if they were to achieve the primary objective of increasing rural productivity, this may be at a great cost to the rural populace and the environment.Perhaps more important is that river basin planning has the potential of substituting one form of dependency for another (food importation being substituted for the importation of fertilizer, pesticides, herbicides, equipment, machines and foreign experts). The projects are thus benefiting a powerful combination of interests comprising local and foreign contractors, land speculators, bureaucrats, rural elites and incipient capitalist farmers who have not borne any losses in the process of implementation.     

我国生育政策城乡一体化方案与配套支持

我国生育政策城乡一体化是人口转变与社会发展之必然。一方面,城乡二元的生育政策很难体现城乡公平,用生育政策的优惠来弥补社会保障功能的匮乏这一做法已越来越不符合社会发展趋势;另一方面,二元生育政策本身的复杂性增加了政策执行过程中的成本与困难。生育政策城乡一体化应以城市与农村均实行一孩半政策作为既简化又稳妥的改革方案。生育政策城乡一体化还应配备配套措施,完善生育政策的评估指标,将少生与不生纳入评估范畴,促进城乡医疗、养老、教育等公共服务机会均等化、户籍管理动态化,还要正确理解人口老龄化,为生育政策城乡一体化提供良好的执行环境。     

在县域层次城镇规划中落实新农村建设任务的尝试

一、改善农村人居环境是建设和城镇规划部门落实新农村建设任务的重点 长期以来我国存在着城乡分割的二元结构。重城轻乡、城乡分离导致城乡差距不断拉大．致使广大农民未能同步享受改革开放的成果．给社会带来了不和谐的隐患。在二元结构体制下．城镇规划工作同样是城乡分治．城镇规划的重心始终放在城镇．很少顾及乡村．存在着严重的城镇偏向。目前．我国整体经济水平有了很大提升．基本具备了城市支援农村、工业反哺农业的条件,如果再继续忽视农村、农业、农民的发展,就会造成严重的社会问题．     

Secular state,religious lives: Islam and the state in Malaysia

Debates on secularism in Malaysia often revolve around the legal, especially the constitutional, framework. To this end several NGOs organised a road show in 2006 to debate issues surrounding freedom of religion. Not only were these events mobbed by angry crowds, but also the state intervened and shut down these and future discussions on the topic of religion, deeming such debates sensitive. This article addresses the particularities of secularism in Malaysia vis-à-vis Olivier Roy's thesis in ‘Secularism Confronts Islam’ that sees religious space and secular space as discernable yet not antithetical and Charles Taylor's thesis in the ‘Secular Age’, where he points to a new definition of secularism as a pluralist and transcendent notion of belief. In Malaysia both variants are present, with the state playing a dangerous game situating itself between reactionary Muslim forces and a moderate majority.     

Science,Policy, and Controversy in the Cholesterol Arena

This article investigates the relationships between scientific knowledge and dietary policy in the cholesterol arena, a site of controversy for over 40 years. It draws on the concepts and methods of Anselm Strauss, especially social worlds/arenas theory, to analyze the negotiations and conflicts through which both scientific knowledge and public health policy were created. Science/policy interactions were shaped by shifting distributions of power and legitimacy among many interested social worlds. These shifts reflected changing cultural, commercial, and political conditions which, over the decades, favored the entrenchment of initially provisional and tentative dietary recommendations. The cultural foundations of policy interventions can be as salient as scientific research. They can also contribute to ongoing instability in controversial arenas.     

Socioeconomic status and infant mortality: evidence from a rural agricultural state

The extent to which the traditional inverse relationship between infant mortality and socioeconomic status holds true in Kansas is examined for the years around 1950, 1960, and 1970. A social-ranking approach and correlation and regression analysis fail to confirm this inverse relationship. The authors suggest that the social organization characteristics of a rural U.S. state may provide a quality of life that transcends socioeconomic differentials.     

Counterurbanisation and rural depopulation revisited: landowners,planners and the rural development process

"This paper reopens the debate between Weekley (1988) and Rowsell (1989) over why pockets of depopulation have persisted within parts of rural Britain which have experienced net growth through counterurbanisation. It argues that Weekley has not fully appreciated the context for local population losses, namely the emergence of a new structural relationship between people, households, and dwellings, and the growing tension between production and consumption interests in rural locales. Moreover, the paper disputes claims that depopulation is triggered by the actions of either the landowner or the planner. Drawing on case study material informed by critical realism, it argues that planners and landowners have been drawn into an asymmetrical power relationship. This has tended to buttress landed interests and, in so doing, reproduce mechanisms which protect the less populous communities from growth and change."     

Development,the state,and transnational political connections: state and subject formations in Latin America

Focusing on the processes of making and sustaining transnational political ties between actors, international actors and states, this paper reviews recent work from a number of disciplines on globalization and politics, and outlines an agenda for future research. Rather than seeing transnational political linkages merely as forerunners to the loss of local sovereignty, the paper argues for a wider conceptualization of transnational connections, embedded within processes of state formation in Latin America. Using a variety of examples, it is argued that transnational networks are associated with a wide range of meanings and a variety of responses by diverse actors. Drawing on recent work in political science, post‐structuralism and anthropology, it is suggested that geographical concepts ‐ related to scale, process and networks ‐ offer a means through which to analyze and ‘map out’ these transnational political processes.     

Globalisation,identity and the state

The government of Botswana had to strike a fine balance between not isolating the liberation movements, not letting them use Botswana as a military base and not appearing to harbour ‘terrorists’. The government realised that overtly supporting the liberation movements was potentially suicidal, for the country could easily be punished by South Africa: trade links could be severed and communication networks paralysed. The settler regimes did try to infiltrate and weaken the liberation movements in Botswana and carried out acts such as kidnapping, intimidation and deportation, to try to prevent the liberation movements from threatening the status quo in southern Africa. Using evidence from the Botswana National Archives, oral interviews, and newspaper reports, the article examines the means the Botswana government adopted to deal with the situation and safeguard the security of its citizens.     

Local responses to central state restructuring of social housing provision in rural areas

This paper examines local impacts of recent central state restructuring of social housing provision in rural areas. Positioning such changes within a context of wider discussions on local government restructuring and regulation theory, attention is focused on some key local responses to social housing restructuring in two areas of rural Wales in the early 1990s. In this section of the paper consideration is given to the increasing residualization of the local social housing sector, changing systems of social housing allocation and management, and the localized mediation of central state restructuring of social housing through different housing agencies.     

Poverty and population: a study of reproductive ideals and attitude towards family planning among the rural poor in Uttar Pradesh

Data for this study were obtained between September 1986 and May 1987 from a sample of 506 rural poor male heads of household aged 20-50 years who lived in four developed and four underdeveloped villages in Kanpur and Varanasi districts in Uttar Pradesh, India. Poor households were identified as those headed by adult males with earnings under Rs 55/month and as those with less than 2 acres of land. Only persons who considered themselves poor were included. Findings reveal that over 80% of respondents reported that poverty was due to external factors such as fate. 18.77% attributed poverty to their own actions. 16.80% attributed poverty to personal factors. Reasons did not vary by the development level of villages. Only 12.5% reported living in good living conditions. Ideal family size was stated as 2 sons and 1 daughter. 6.3% indicated disapproval of family planning. About 70% had knowledge of at least one method. Almost all respondents were aware of sterilization, and about 50% knew about condoms. High fertility was attributed by respondents to carelessness, lack of planning, religiosity, illiteracy, ignorance, and lack of knowledge of family planning methods. Family planning acceptance among the study population was low. The interpretation of findings is that the rural poor are insecure and alienated and that the locus of control is external. The suggestion is made that Malthusian pressure from population size and density may be more effective in reducing family size in the future. Poor acceptance of family planning is attributed to a lack of social security.