Search results

Length: 96 minutes Oral history interview of Lisa Ann Brock by Amanda Anderson

THIS PAPER CRITIQUES THE NEW REPUBLIC, AND FINDS IT COMPLEX ON SOCIAL ISSUES, SCHIZOPHRENIC IN OTHER ISSUES, THAT IT HAS LOST FAITH IN THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY, THAT IT IS BECOMING MORE CONSERVATIVE, AND THAT ITS APOLOGIES FOR STALINISM AND COMMUNISM ARE BASED ON A LONG AND CHECKERED HISTORY. THE AUTHOR BELIEVES THAT TNR SHOULD BE ACCLAIMED FOR HONESTY FACING UP TO SOME OF THE CONTRADICTIONS IN LIBERALISM.

Series foreword / by Robert Gottlieb -- Foreword / by Carl Anthony -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- Roots of the regional equity movement and the reinterpretation of metropolitan space -- Moving beyond apartheid in America's metro regions -- From bootstrap community development to regional equity / Cynthia M. Duncan -- Scaling up: regional equity and the revitalization of progressive politics / Angela Glover Blackwell and Manuel Pastor -- Reinterpreting metropolitan space as a strategy for social justice / John A. Powell -- Environment, transportation, and land use in the quest for racial justice -- The roots of environmental justice / Peggy M. Shepard and Kizzy, Charles-Guzman -- Addressing urban transportation equity in the United States / Robert D. Bullard -- Race, class, and real estate / Sheryll Cashin -- Geographic context, sustainability, and regional equity development and opportunity in small towns and rural communities / Cynthia M. Duncan and Priscilla Salant -- Katrina is everywhere: lessons from the Gulf Coast / Amy Liu and Bruce Katz -- Growing together, or growing apart? Central Labor Councils and Regional Equity (San Francisco Bay Area) / Amy Dean -- Breakthrough stories and strategies in the quest for regional equity -- Saying no to forces destroying the community -- Rekindling hope in Cleveland (Cleveland, Ohio) / David Goldberg -- Closing the gaps: the national vacant properties campaign / Don Chen -- Neighbors building neighborhoods: community stewardship to revitalize mid-size cities (Rochester, New York) / Mayor William A. Johnson, Jr -- Transforming brownfield communities: the Naugatuck Valley Project (New England) / Kenneth Galdston -- Getting grounded in place, time, and community -- Community activism for creative rebuilding of neighborhoods (Chicago, Illinois) / Mary Nelson and Stephen McCullough -- Opportunity-based housing in Atlanta (Atlanta, Georgia) / Steve Lerner -- A regional approach to affordable housing / Hattie Dorsey -- Preserving Heirsa property in coastal South Carolina (Charleston, South Carolina) / Faith R. Rivers and Jennie Stephens -- Exploring new horizons: connecting local struggles to global and regional stories -- LAX rising (Los Angeles, California) / Danny Feingold -- Community benefits agreements: a strategy for renewing our cities / Greg Leroy -- Reshaping a region after September 11 (New York Metro Region) / Robert Yaro, Chris Jones, Petra Todorovich, and Nicolas Ronderos -- Faith-based organizing for metro equity in Detroit / Victoria Kovari -- Values, vision, and message: the spirit of metro equity / Greg Galluzzo, Mike Kruglik, and Rev. Cheryl Rivera -- Saying yes: framing regional collaborations to win -- Bridging the Bay: university/community collaborations (San Francisco Bay Area) / Manuel Pastor, Rachel Rosner, Juliet Ellis, and Elizabeth Tan -- Poor city, rich region: confronting poverty in Camden : from dependency to sustainability in Camden, New Jersey / Howard Gillette, Jr -- The "inside game": a reinvestment strategy / Jeremy Nowak -- The "outside game": can faith move mountain-less New Jersey? / David Rusk -- Farms to schools: promoting urban health, combating sprawl, and advancing community food systems (Southern California) / Robert Gottlieb, Mark Vallianatos, and Anupama Joshi -- Regional equity and the future of sustainable metropolitan communities -- Building the capacity of the regional equity movement -- Building the capacity of the regional equity movement / Angela Glover Blackwell and L. Benjamin Starrett -- Reaching out to new strategic partners -- Business, grassroots, and the regional agenda / Bart Harvey -- Measuring success: using metrics in support of regional equity / David Rusk -- Networking for social justice: the African American forum on race and regionalism / Deeohn Ferris -- Sharing the new story: regional equity and strategic media / Andrea Torrice and Ellen Schneider -- Uncovering global linkages for sustainable metropolitan communities -- Climate change and the quest for regional equity / Van Jones -- A global perspective: community-driven solutions to urban poverty / Celine Cruz and David Satterthwaite -- Beyond segregation, toward a shared vision of our regions / Myron Orfield -- Resources -- Bibliography -- Contributor bios -- Authors' organizations -- Index.

This thesis is a study of the changing meanings of the thing that is 'Mapungubwe' (most often considered as a thirteenth-century southern African state) within and outside the academy from 1937 and 2017, deliberately excluding meanings that might have existed prior to 1937, analysing the socio-political work Mapungubwe has been made to do in this period. The study explores the shaping and positioning of evidence in the production of narratives that ascribe and/or enforce particular truths or regimes of truth. To do this, I consider the politico-cultural associations that convert an object into evidence of something and make that evidence meaningful. Under what conditions, and for what reasons does this conversion occur? And, what specific meaning is imposed into the object? This is, therefore, an analytical disaggregation and political assessment of the particular signs and symbols through which the composite and contested imaginaire of Mapungubwe has been historically constructed. Necessarily, it is also an unpicking of the languages of evidence. The work is divided into three parts, each dealing with a different strut in the making of Mapungubwe. The first chapter covers the archaeological production of Mapungubwe, from the first excavational work conducted in the 1930s, until more recent work, during the 2010s. During the early twentieth century, the topic of Mapungubwe was cloistered within academic archaeology, particularly at the University of Pretoria. It was only after the end of apartheid that the 'trope' of Mapungubwe began to be deployed in an increasingly wider social realm and integrated into multiple educational and heritage projects, with particular encouragement from the state. The second chapter looks at the introduction and development of the theme of Mapungubwe in the South African national history education curriculum after 2003, when it was also made a UNESCO World Heritage Site and harnessed as name of the Order of Mapungubwe. The chapter analyses the narrative presentation of Mapungubwe in the existing curriculum, and the attending conceptual devices through which this narrative is constructed and sustained. The third chapter scans the explosion of Mapungubwe in popular discourses, about a decade after its strategic foregrounding in school education and institutionalisation as heritage. In this chapter I examine several literary narratives, artistic productions and promotional activities of tourism in conjunction with the current political and economic developments in the area. I make use of sources from various different academic disciplines, including archaeology, history, politics, education and history education, literary theory, as well as relevant samples from fictive writing, sculpture, poetry, touristic longform writing, and advertisements. In bringing together such diverse orders of discourse, the thesis attempts to map the expanding topographies of Mapungubwe - a venture that, I submit, has methodological and topical significance beyond the immediate field of inquiry. Through this work, the reader will be able to see how the language used to describe and inscribe meaning in Mapungubwe has changed over time, exposing the malleability of (precolonial) history in the hands of both professionals and non-professionals. The thesis makes clear to the reader the importance of 'popular' representations of history in the development of modern culture, both in terms of reproducing existing conditions, as well as resisting them. Finally, the thesis troubles the concept of the 'precolonial', and considers what changing purpose the period has had over time, how it shapes our view of history, and how we could alternatively envisage the precolonial and, thus, history.

This dissertation studies the employment effects of cash transfers in a segmented labor market. The first and main chapter shows that an unconditional cash transfer program targeted at mothers has lasting positive impacts on job quality. Five years after having received the cash transfer, treated mothers are more likely to be employed in the formal sector. This appears to be the result of changes in the way recipients search for a job, as treated mothers are unemployed for longer and target better jobs. The second chapter shows the employment effects of a reform in the means-tested, non-contributory pension system of South Africa, which lowered the age of retirement from 65 to 60 for men. The reform caused a large extensive-margin response, as informal workers stop working when they become eligible to the pension. Instead, formal workers do not quit their jobs nor switch to the informal sector to become eligible to the pension. Lastly, this dissertation discusses the lack of self-employment in South Africa. Building on the results of the first two chapters, the last chapter shows that South Africans do not increase entry to self-employment as a result of cash transfers. This indicates that liquidity constraints are not the main reason for the lack of self-employment in South Africa, which is likely to have historical roots stemming from Apartheid. The chapter discusses evidence and potential policy implications of this explanation, alongside possible avenues for future research on this phenomenon. ; Cette thèse porte sur les effets de transferts monétaires sur l'emploi dans le marché du travail sud-africain, un marché fortement segmenté entre secteur formel et informel. Le premier et principal chapitre montre qu'un programme de transferts monétaires inconditionnels destinés aux mères a eu des effets positifs durables sur la qualité de leurs emplois. Sur le long terme, les mères bénéficiaires du transfert sont plus susceptibles d'être employées dans le secteur formel. C'est la conséquence de changements dans la façon dont les mères traitées cherchent un emploi. En leur donnant la possibilité de rester au chômage pendant plus longtemps, le programme de transferts inconditionnels leur permet de viser des emplois de meilleure qualité. Le deuxième chapitre étudie les effets sur l'emploi d'une réforme du système public de retraites en Afrique du Sud, qui est non-contributif et soumis à conditions de ressources. Cette réforme a abaissé l'âge de la retraite de 65 à 60 ans pour les hommes. Elle a entraîné une forte diminution du taux d'activité des travailleurs informels, qui cessent de travailler lorsqu'ils atteignent 60 ans et deviennent éligibles à la pension de retraite non-contributive. Au contraire, les travailleurs du secteur formel ne quittent pas leur emploi et ne se tournent pas vers le secteur informel pour avoir droit à la pension de retraite. Enfin, cette thèse aborde la question du faible nombre de travailleurs indépendants en Afrique du Sud. Le dernier chapitre montre que les Sud-Africains ne travaillent pas plus à leur compte en réponse à des transferts monétaires. Cela indique que les contraintes de liquidité ne sont pas la principale raison du manque de travailleurs indépendants en Afrique du Sud. Cette faible présence de travailleurs indépendants a probablement des racines historiques liées à l'apartheid. Ce troisième chapitre examine les implications potentielles de cette explication, ainsi que les pistes de recherches futures possibles pour une compréhension plus fine de ce phénomène.