Sexual trafficking in women: International political economy and the politics of sex

A recent manifestation of the North/South, East/West political-economic divide is the international sex trade in women, of which trafficking in women for purposes of sexual employment is a large subset. Trafficking in humans in general, and women in particular, has taken center state in many nation-states as an issue of a threat to national security and societal cohesion. This article explores some of the basic facts about trafficking and spotlights it as a truly global phenomenon, with its contemporary origins in the international capitalist market system. Furthermore, it argues that the international political economy of sex not only includes the supply side—the women of the third world, the poor states, or exotic Asian women—but it cannot maintain itself without the demand from the organizers of the trade—the men from industrialized and developing countries. The patriarchal world system hungers for and sustains the international subculture of docile women from underdeveloped nations.     

The Role of Knowledge Bases in Complex Product Systems: Some Empirical Evidence from the Aero Engine Industry

In this paper we argue that the virtual corporation as understood in current management literature does not hold as a universal model throughout various industrial sectors. Complex product systems industries show peculiar features in terms of product characteristics, innovation dynamics and strategic and management options that may render the virtual corporation model inapplicable.The paper begins with a contrast between the simplistic neoclassical approach to the interpretation of the concept of knowledge and the more in-depth evolutionary view. The former understands knowledge as information and its production process and outcomes as easily decomposable. Based on this, advocates of virtual corporation claim the viability of outsourcing strategies based on simple economic factors. The evolutionary approach, on the other hand, considers knowledge as a system of processes deeply rooted in their contexts of production. Tacitness and non-decomposability of the knowledge production processes are highly emphasised in this view. In the light of this contrast and relying on a study of the aero engine industry we reinterpret the notion of virtual corporation showing its limits.     

Lay and Expert Interpretations of Cancer Cluster Evidence

Conflict frequently occurs between community members and environmental/public health officials when an unusual number of cancer cases is reported. This conflict may result from different ways in which laypeople and experts interpret facts to judge whether there is an environmental cause of the cancer cases, but little is known about this issue. Volunteer laypeople (N= 551) and epidemiologists (N= 105) read a hypothetical scenario about cases of cancer on one neighborhood block. Participants judged whether each of the 23 facts about the situation made it “much more likely” to “much less likely” that something in town was causing the cancer cases (7‐point scale). The facts were designed to be “alarming,”“reassuring,” or “neutral” (i.e., according to epidemiological principles, should increase, decrease, or have no impact on the likelihood of an environmental cause). The laypeople were alarmed by most of the facts (mean response significantly greater than the scale midpoint), including all of the neutral facts and over half of the reassuring facts. The experts were more balanced: they were alarmed by none of the neutral or reassuring facts. Their responses showed significantly less alarm than the laypeople's responses (p < 0.0001 for all comparisons). This study reveals that laypeople are not reassured by information that substantially lowers the chance of an environmental cause for cancer cases. Lay responses differ significantly and systematically from experts who are far less alarmed by relevant facts. These findings may help explain the conflicts between the two groups in situations where concern about cases of cancer arises in a community.