The Selendang Ayu Shipwreck and Oil Spill: Considering Threats and Fears of a Worst‐Case Scenario*

On December 8, 2004, the Selendang Ayu, a Malaysian‐flagged freighter, ran aground off Unalaska Island in Alaska's Aleutian chain. Despite rescue efforts by the United States Coast Guard, six of the Selendang Ayu's crew members died. In addition to the deaths, more than 300,000 gallons of heavy bulk fuel oil spilled into the sea. Much of the oil washed onto the island's shores, into areas providing cultural, recreational, subsistence, and commercial fishing resources for residents of the renewable resource community of Dutch Harbor/Unalaska. The purpose of this article is to identify and examine different dimensions of risk, based on qualitative research conducted in 2005. We use a contextual constructionist approach to understand risk, which conceptualizes risk as an objective hazard, threat, or danger that is mediated through social and cultural processes. Research methods included 31 personal interviews, participatory observation, and a review of media coverage. Findings revealed several dimensions of risk perceived by residents: the incident in relation to Dutch Harbor/Unalaska as a high‐risk community and more general current events; threats to the community's annual $1 billion seafood industry; threats to Alaska Native subsistence culture; and issues of future risk and uncertainty. Interviews and observations support our conclusion that the Selendang Ayu incident represented a “shot across the bow” that could have been a “worst case” if oil had contaminated commercial fish processing. Residents believe that it is only a matter of time before another, more damaging accident occurs. Given this general perception, it is important to more clearly assess risk in Dutch Harbor/Unalaska and help the community increase resilience to the multiple hazards it faces. More broadly, Dutch Harbor/Unalaska serves as an example—all communities could benefit from better risk assessments and increased attention to resiliency.     

Title IX: Help or Hindrance?

ABSTRACT

The goal of this article is to provide a practical guidance for anyone who has experienced sexual harassment or assault in academia and is considering the possibility of pursuing disciplinary measures by means of filing a Title IX complaint. Sexual harassment is an abuse of power by those who possess it against those who do not; the Title IX process does not remedy this power imbalance. And, academic institutions often have interests that compete with the welfare of their students, and which may enable harassers. We address some of the risks that the Title IX process may create for those who are already vulnerable, and suggest that some of the responsibility for enacting reforms should be taken up by professional associations. Because they often control professional journals and conferences, they could be effective advocates for a more fair and equitable educational environment if they choose to take a more active role in discouraging misconduct in their disciplines.     

Playing Numbers Or Politics? Approaches to the Prioritisation of Development Needs in South Africa

This paper uses a case study to highlight the implicit political and developmental assumptions which underpin an indicator and index based prioritisation of developmental needs. A key issue for the successful implementation of development objectives in South Africa is the identification and prioritisation of development needs. Indicators could play an important role in terms of informing the decisions made by various levels of government. An indicator based index supported by a computerised system called the Development Indicators Monitoring System (DIMS) has been used to prioritise housing and service provision need within the province of Gauteng. The article shows that the prioritisation of areas in terms of service need is sensitive to the index construction method employed. It is argued that various choices around the index construction method depend on certain developmental assumptions which are fundamentally political choices. In particular, the choice between absolute and relative indicators of need has a considerable impact on the prioritisation of areas. However, this is not a total rejection of the use of indicators in the planning process. Rather, it is a call for the appropriate use of the tools that are available.     

The Venezuelan Government and the Global Field: The Legislative Battle over Foreign Funding for Nongovernmental Organizations

In recent years, several governments have targeted nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) by enacting legislation that prohibits foreign funding for them. This article uses diplomatic cables, newspaper articles, and interviews with representatives from NGOs and donors to explain the Venezuelan government's passage of legislation prohibiting foreign funding for political NGOs in 2010. Existent political, sociological, and globalization‐oriented theories fail to explain the passage and timing of this legislation. Instead, I utilize and extend global fields theory to examine the Venezuelan government's redirection of its foreign relations, which I argue generated the political opportunity for the government to pass this legislation. I show that the government initially remained keyed into a global subfield involving groups that successfully pressured it to reconsider a more radical form of legislation prohibiting direct foreign funding for all NGOs when it came up for discussion in 2006, including the U.S. and Western European governments, and domestic NGOs. By 2010, however, the government had become embedded within a global subfield involving authoritarian and anti‐imperial governments that had already passed similar legislation, and domestic community councils. These newfound relations insulated the government from reconsideration and allowed it the political opportunity to pass a new, less radical piece of legislation.     

Minimum Wages in a Segmented Labor Market: Evidence from South Africa

The segmented labor market model describes the impacts of minimum wages on covered and uncovered sectors. This paper examines the impacts of an industry-specific minimum wage in South Africa, a state characterized by high unemployment, a robust union movement, and the presence of a large informal sector. Under the industry-specific wage law, formal agricultural and household workers are covered, while workers in other sectors are not. The unique aspect of this paper lies in the ability to compare the impacts of minimum wage legislation on formal covered, informal covered, formal uncovered, and informal uncovered workers. This natural experiment allows us to test whether industry-specific minimum wage legislation leads to higher wages, whether wage increases are restricted solely to covered formal sectors or if there are spillover effects, and whether such legislation manifests in disemployment effects. We find evidence of higher wages yet disemployment among black workers in formal markets. In informal markets we find no employment effects, but higher wages in formal markets appear to have spilled over into informal markets in covered sectors.     

Re‐invigorating democracy?: White middle class identities and comprehensive schooling

Recent research on social class and whiteness points to disquieting and exclusive aspects of white middle class identities. This paper focuses on whether ‘alternative’ middle class identities might work against, and disrupt, normative views of what it means to be ‘middle class’ at the beginning of the 21^st Century. Drawing on data from those middle classes who choose to send their children to urban comprehensives, we examine processes of ‘thinking and acting otherwise’ in order to uncover some of the commitments and investments that might make for a renewed and reinvigorated democratic citizenry. The difficulties of turning these commitments and investments into more equitable ways of interacting with class and ethnic others which emerge as real challenges for this left leaning, pro‐welfare segment of the middle classes. Within a contemporary era of neo‐liberalism that valorises competition, individualism and the market even these white middle classes who express a strong commitment to community and social mixing struggle to convert inclinations into actions.     

Family matters: a discussion of the Bangladeshi and Pakistani extended family and community in supporting the children's education

This paper looks beyond an individualised type of parental involvement and discusses the role of the extended family in relation to school. We draw on the different social capital theories to explain its implications and also to discuss its efficacy. Our focus is on the Bangladeshi community and the Pakistani community in two towns in the North East of England. British South Asian parents are variously accused of having too high educational expectations of their children or not being interested at all and that Pakistani and Bangladeshi parents in particular have no or limited relationships with their children's schools. In this paper we demonstrate that parental involvement in these two communities resides not simply in the hands of the parents but within the wider family. We challenge the deficit model of British South Asian families as indifferent to the education of their children and we identify the potential resource of the extended family.