Urbanization
Urbanization can be the root of many problems. A housing challenge emerges because there are not enough houses to hold the influx of people in the city. There is also a work shortage as not enough jobs are open for people to work and make a living. Thus, many people seek jobs in the informal sector.
"city level studies have revealed that the social response to economic crisis and austerity has produced a variety of changes at the household level. These include increased labor force participation by women and income earning on the part of children and the elderly" (p. 435). From this quote it is clear that economic crisis affects the most vulnerable populations in society; women, children and the elderly. In times of economic hardship it must be twice as hard to scrape together a living, which can affect their diet, their kid's ability to go to school etc.
"Bangalore is the Silicon Valley of India and has developed a world reputation as a computer soft-ware center. For many cities their global niche is to provide a manufacturing base, often founded on low labor costs and export-oriented activities" (p. 433) It is interesting how cities are urban centers for technology but lots of it is built on under-paid workers and for some, the exploitation of women and children.
According to the book, Bombay has one of the highest population densities in the world, one reason is because the area was originally seven linked islands. People live in shelters made out of plastic, cardboard, cloth or whatever they can find. Right next to these slums is 'Bollywood,' India's gleaming epicenter for film and where the wealthy live. It is interesting to note that the author said the slums as intransitory, so a family can live on a crowded patch of pavement for 20-30 years; communities develop and mature and for slums to seem established to a foreigner's eyes might be a little surprising, since they may seem so uncluttered and unorganized to the naked eye.
When people live in crowded areas and they are poor, they will tend to have poor health and nutrition. They tend to live shorter lives. Increased # of births and migration contribute to urban growth. Some social needs: water, sanitation, drainage. In summary, it is important for governments and city planners to recognize urban dwellers as active citizens. In this century, the world's poorest populations will be in the South and urban poverty will be a problem due to rapid urbanization. When one is poor, it is tough to make a living in the city.
Monday, May 10, 2010
Ch. 7 Journal
Environment & Sustainability
issues at hand: increasing industrialization is destroying the environment
some causes: overpopultion, overgrazing, energy production, increased production
some effects: atmospheric pollution from car exhaust, coal burning, soil depletion & erosion
questions to think about: what will happen if everyone in China consumed on the same level as Americans?
we need to learn how to manage the 'global commons'
This chapter talks about the change in perception of the environment, from the 'conquest of nature' to 'managing the commons.' Conquest of nature meant that our interaction with the environment was required to survive- it was a " either we take over nature to survive, we nature takes over us" mentality. Conquest of nature involves transforming the environment creatively and as a necessity. An important author in the 1960s, Rachel Carson, published "Silent Spring" revealed the destructiveness caused by DDT, which affected the food chain. An example of environmental destruction is when Japanese fishermen were affected by high levels of mercury found in fish, called the case of "minamata" in the 1970s. More recently, there is an oil spill in the ocean and a company under BP is responsible for the million (or billions?) of dollars in damage. I heard on the news today they are still trying to stop the oil leak from reaching the coastline of Louisiana. Their latest strategy is to fill sandbags to stop the oil flow underwater. Environmental concerns were discussed at the Brundtland Commission.
It is disappointing that the United States did not sign the Kyoto Protocol, a treaty meant to reduce carbon emissions, when the US was responsible for 25% of the carbon emissions in the world. As a powerful nation, it is important to set an example to take care of the environment and we had failed in that category.
vocab: sustainable development (SD)- development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs
neoliberal view: nature can be summed up in economics, resources given a price in capital and SD achieved by following the laws of economics
people-centered view: focuses on local concerns, the needs of the local people working in partnership with gov. associations to achieve SD, includes traditional medicine practices
global environment management view: this emphasizes cooperation between countries to be good stewards of environmental resources, teamwork! view was presented at Agenda 21 'Earth Summit' meeting in Rio in 1992
In summary: sustainable environment involves the participation of everyone. The author said that in the future, the outlook of SD seems to be the relationship between social and economic interests instead of the relationship between humans and the environment. Environmental problems not only affect nature but also the the livelihood of human beings, as well as animals, the food chain etc. Achieving SD will impact all sectors of life, not only economically but also politically, socially and individually. I think that a big change can come from America. We have the potential, but our consumption levels are still high and we, as a nation, waste a lot. If America established new laws to conserve the environment this will be effective. Look at Singapore, Canada or (from my own experience) Hong Kong. Everyone in HK touts a cloth bag. I know in some governments they will charge people for plastic bags. Good idea. Americans would probably fight law tooth-and-nail but if no one enforces these laws to stand for the goal of achieving SD, no one else will. Non-profits and other group alreaday try and if the gov. will back them up, the green movement will be all the better. A sidenote: some companies like Sam's club and Ikea do not bag items. Instead, they load them back onto the shopping cart so customers can just load them into their cars. There is no need for a plague of plastic bags.
I feel like an environmentalist writing this, but it always gets to me how Chamapaign has no recyling program. I heard there's a rumor that Champaign will develop one soon. Anyways... just comparing America to Senegal in terms of bathing habits. When I was in Senegal, people in the village usually took cold bucket showers. This saves a TON of water, in comparison to 20 minute hot steaming showers. Imagine if all Americans started taking bucket showers, how much water that would save!
issues at hand: increasing industrialization is destroying the environment
some causes: overpopultion, overgrazing, energy production, increased production
some effects: atmospheric pollution from car exhaust, coal burning, soil depletion & erosion
questions to think about: what will happen if everyone in China consumed on the same level as Americans?
we need to learn how to manage the 'global commons'
This chapter talks about the change in perception of the environment, from the 'conquest of nature' to 'managing the commons.' Conquest of nature meant that our interaction with the environment was required to survive- it was a " either we take over nature to survive, we nature takes over us" mentality. Conquest of nature involves transforming the environment creatively and as a necessity. An important author in the 1960s, Rachel Carson, published "Silent Spring" revealed the destructiveness caused by DDT, which affected the food chain. An example of environmental destruction is when Japanese fishermen were affected by high levels of mercury found in fish, called the case of "minamata" in the 1970s. More recently, there is an oil spill in the ocean and a company under BP is responsible for the million (or billions?) of dollars in damage. I heard on the news today they are still trying to stop the oil leak from reaching the coastline of Louisiana. Their latest strategy is to fill sandbags to stop the oil flow underwater. Environmental concerns were discussed at the Brundtland Commission.
It is disappointing that the United States did not sign the Kyoto Protocol, a treaty meant to reduce carbon emissions, when the US was responsible for 25% of the carbon emissions in the world. As a powerful nation, it is important to set an example to take care of the environment and we had failed in that category.
vocab: sustainable development (SD)- development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs
neoliberal view: nature can be summed up in economics, resources given a price in capital and SD achieved by following the laws of economics
people-centered view: focuses on local concerns, the needs of the local people working in partnership with gov. associations to achieve SD, includes traditional medicine practices
global environment management view: this emphasizes cooperation between countries to be good stewards of environmental resources, teamwork! view was presented at Agenda 21 'Earth Summit' meeting in Rio in 1992
In summary: sustainable environment involves the participation of everyone. The author said that in the future, the outlook of SD seems to be the relationship between social and economic interests instead of the relationship between humans and the environment. Environmental problems not only affect nature but also the the livelihood of human beings, as well as animals, the food chain etc. Achieving SD will impact all sectors of life, not only economically but also politically, socially and individually. I think that a big change can come from America. We have the potential, but our consumption levels are still high and we, as a nation, waste a lot. If America established new laws to conserve the environment this will be effective. Look at Singapore, Canada or (from my own experience) Hong Kong. Everyone in HK touts a cloth bag. I know in some governments they will charge people for plastic bags. Good idea. Americans would probably fight law tooth-and-nail but if no one enforces these laws to stand for the goal of achieving SD, no one else will. Non-profits and other group alreaday try and if the gov. will back them up, the green movement will be all the better. A sidenote: some companies like Sam's club and Ikea do not bag items. Instead, they load them back onto the shopping cart so customers can just load them into their cars. There is no need for a plague of plastic bags.
I feel like an environmentalist writing this, but it always gets to me how Chamapaign has no recyling program. I heard there's a rumor that Champaign will develop one soon. Anyways... just comparing America to Senegal in terms of bathing habits. When I was in Senegal, people in the village usually took cold bucket showers. This saves a TON of water, in comparison to 20 minute hot steaming showers. Imagine if all Americans started taking bucket showers, how much water that would save!
Sunday, May 2, 2010
'The Fractured Community,' by Kate Crehan
Ch. 3: The Community of Kin
Zambia, prior to independence, was known as Northern Rhodesia. There was a significant prescence of missionaries who helped create a written language to write the Bible from the oral language Kaonde. Europeans discovered copper in the 1920s and began to exploit the nation for its rich minerals, solidifying a copper mining industry. There was a huge labor migration to urban areas for work and protests began in the 1930s. After independence, Zambia's infrastructure began to deteriorate. The North-Western province is sparsely populated and infested with tsetse flies, mkaing it difficult to keep livestock.
Crehan depicts Zambia through Gramsci's definition of the state: "The State is the entire complex of practical and theoretical activities with which the ruling class not only justifies and maintains its dominance, but manages to win the active consent of those over whom it rules." This chapter talks about kin relationships that create the political and relational power structures within society.
The author talks about kinship (the "imaginary community") and local authority as coinciding aspects of the political sphere. However to the people of Zambia, kinship was very important. In comparison to the West, we have "come to think of kinship and its obligations as occupying its own particular domain." The Kaonde kinship is based on matrilineal descent, meaning that a child will belong to the clan of his or her mother. There are 8 kinship "statuses" such as inanji (mother), mwisho (mother's brother) kolojanji (older sibling) nkasanji (younger sibling), mwana (child) mwipwa (nephew/niece) nkambo (grandparent) or munkana (grandchild). These are the roles that people in society identify with. The colonists found it odd that households were female-headed. Chiefs were also identified as "owning the land" and had "authority over everything that happened within their area" but when the author tried to clarify the chief's role, she found out that "the chief had nothing to do with soiety." This distinction between male and female roles is interesting because last week was a discussion about "Women in Development" and "Gender and Development." In some societies they already have a disctinction of roles and women even hold more power than men. Like the Koande, women carry the family name. Therefore sometimes devlopment discourse assumes that women are unequal and need to climb their way up to meet the level of a man's privelege, but some African socieites have already gotten that down. It is wrong to assume that all cultures will benefit from "gender and development."
Ch. 5 Economic Locaations: Men, Women and Production
Setting: Kibala & Bukama, rural Chizela
Kinship commodoties:
"Hoe blades, metal cooking pots, water containers, blankets and ready made goods came to replace locally produced iron, clay pots, bark cloth, animals skins. Other new items introduced to society were bicycles, Bibles, and soap that became part of rural life." In the 1980s the cash economy started to grow because these new items became a necessary part of rural life. There was pressure between the market principles and kinship principles. For example, kinship-based flow of goods would include the ability to send a young child out for errands, or access to a killed animal for meat.
Roles were expected to be filled regardless of age and they were accepted at any skill level.
Men: clearing the bush, making the fields, built houses, fish & game
Women: day-to-day cultivation, kept house in order, cooked and fed her husband and family, beer
The marriage was based on interdependence. I noticed that women's roles were needed daily, and men accessed them on a daily bases whereas men's roles were more "project by project." Polygymy was common place and the more wives one had, the better one would eat. However the wives this was a disadvantage in some respect becauase she had to compete for her husband's attention etc. Divorce was straightforward, however it was avoided by older men. Divorced or single women could always return to her matrikin.
The author states that "what needs to be emphasized is that men obtained access to their basic staple food through women. Harvesting sorghum was a women's job, and if a young man was not married, he would not grow or harvest it because "'no one was there to harvest it." A man harvesting sorghum was seen to be demeaning for his manhood. Women lacked freedom of mobility as compared to men.
My thoughts: The distinction of roles in Zambian society can probably be found throughout Africa. The author documents their roles were clearly and I doubt that the Zambian people would "classify" themselves the way the author had. Her research had an anthropology feel combined with economics, and I guess the two are very closely related if we wanted to look at the kinship relations and market relations. In conclusion the two are intertwined and men are dependent on women and vice versa.
Zambia, prior to independence, was known as Northern Rhodesia. There was a significant prescence of missionaries who helped create a written language to write the Bible from the oral language Kaonde. Europeans discovered copper in the 1920s and began to exploit the nation for its rich minerals, solidifying a copper mining industry. There was a huge labor migration to urban areas for work and protests began in the 1930s. After independence, Zambia's infrastructure began to deteriorate. The North-Western province is sparsely populated and infested with tsetse flies, mkaing it difficult to keep livestock.
Crehan depicts Zambia through Gramsci's definition of the state: "The State is the entire complex of practical and theoretical activities with which the ruling class not only justifies and maintains its dominance, but manages to win the active consent of those over whom it rules." This chapter talks about kin relationships that create the political and relational power structures within society.
The author talks about kinship (the "imaginary community") and local authority as coinciding aspects of the political sphere. However to the people of Zambia, kinship was very important. In comparison to the West, we have "come to think of kinship and its obligations as occupying its own particular domain." The Kaonde kinship is based on matrilineal descent, meaning that a child will belong to the clan of his or her mother. There are 8 kinship "statuses" such as inanji (mother), mwisho (mother's brother) kolojanji (older sibling) nkasanji (younger sibling), mwana (child) mwipwa (nephew/niece) nkambo (grandparent) or munkana (grandchild). These are the roles that people in society identify with. The colonists found it odd that households were female-headed. Chiefs were also identified as "owning the land" and had "authority over everything that happened within their area" but when the author tried to clarify the chief's role, she found out that "the chief had nothing to do with soiety." This distinction between male and female roles is interesting because last week was a discussion about "Women in Development" and "Gender and Development." In some societies they already have a disctinction of roles and women even hold more power than men. Like the Koande, women carry the family name. Therefore sometimes devlopment discourse assumes that women are unequal and need to climb their way up to meet the level of a man's privelege, but some African socieites have already gotten that down. It is wrong to assume that all cultures will benefit from "gender and development."
Ch. 5 Economic Locaations: Men, Women and Production
Setting: Kibala & Bukama, rural Chizela
Kinship commodoties:
"Hoe blades, metal cooking pots, water containers, blankets and ready made goods came to replace locally produced iron, clay pots, bark cloth, animals skins. Other new items introduced to society were bicycles, Bibles, and soap that became part of rural life." In the 1980s the cash economy started to grow because these new items became a necessary part of rural life. There was pressure between the market principles and kinship principles. For example, kinship-based flow of goods would include the ability to send a young child out for errands, or access to a killed animal for meat.
Roles were expected to be filled regardless of age and they were accepted at any skill level.
Men: clearing the bush, making the fields, built houses, fish & game
Women: day-to-day cultivation, kept house in order, cooked and fed her husband and family, beer
The marriage was based on interdependence. I noticed that women's roles were needed daily, and men accessed them on a daily bases whereas men's roles were more "project by project." Polygymy was common place and the more wives one had, the better one would eat. However the wives this was a disadvantage in some respect becauase she had to compete for her husband's attention etc. Divorce was straightforward, however it was avoided by older men. Divorced or single women could always return to her matrikin.
The author states that "what needs to be emphasized is that men obtained access to their basic staple food through women. Harvesting sorghum was a women's job, and if a young man was not married, he would not grow or harvest it because "'no one was there to harvest it." A man harvesting sorghum was seen to be demeaning for his manhood. Women lacked freedom of mobility as compared to men.
My thoughts: The distinction of roles in Zambian society can probably be found throughout Africa. The author documents their roles were clearly and I doubt that the Zambian people would "classify" themselves the way the author had. Her research had an anthropology feel combined with economics, and I guess the two are very closely related if we wanted to look at the kinship relations and market relations. In conclusion the two are intertwined and men are dependent on women and vice versa.
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