مجموعه

Catching the development train’: perspectives on ‘top-down’ and ‘bottom-up’ development in post-apartheid South Africa

David Bek

Department of Geography, University of Sussex, UK and University of Durham, UK, bek_dave@hotmail.com

Tony Binns

Department of Geography, University of Sussex, UK

Etienne Nel

Department of Geography, Rhodes University, South Africa

Government policy in post-1994 South Africa, whilst upholding the principles of community participation and development, has been firmly wedded to a neoliberal growth agenda. This paper critically examines whether one element of that new growth agenda, that of Spatial Development Initiatives, has catalysed both ‘bottom-up’ development and also meaningfully assisted micro-entrepreneurs through more ‘top-down’ interventions. The paper focuses on two specific projects, namely the Saldanha Steel Plant and the Paternoster Fish Market, which have been components of a Spatial Development Initiative in the Western Cape. The serious constraints faced by communities in engaging with opportunities for socio-economic upliftment is clearly a cause for concern, and it is suggested that a careful re-evaluation of South Africa’s development paradigm is urgently required.

Key Words: development • grassroots • institutions • neoliberal • South Africa

 

 

 

 

Sustainable Development

Mainstream and Critical Perspectives

Carlos J. Castro

University of Oregon, cjcastro1@hotmail.com

Like democracy and globalization, the concept of sustainable development has become one of the most ubiquitous, contested, and indispensable concepts of our time. Although the concept was first introduced in response to environmental concerns, it has been defined primarily by the mainstream tradition of economic analysis, which tends to marginalize the issue of ecological sustainability itself. Recently, however, scholars advancing various critical perspectives challenged the mainstream economic analysis of sustainable development. This essay examines the presuppositions, logic, and major themes of mainstream sustainable development theory, primarily within economics, and explores the critiques of mainstream analysis offered by various poststructuralist cultural theorists and ecological Marxists. Although considered to be superior in their greater emphasis on ecological sustainability, neither of these critical approaches is deemed adequate in itself. The argument here instead leads to the conception that an adequate approach to sustainable development requires combining insights from various critical approaches and perspectives.

Key Words: sustainable development • poverty • environment • Agenda 21 • World Bank

Advancing Womanist Identity Development

Where We Are and Where We Need to Go

Bonnie Moradi

University of Florida, moradib@ufl.edu

Scholars have called for increased attention to within-group variability in models and measures of identity development. As a step toward responding to these calls, the current review focuses on the womanist identity development model as a model of gender-related identity development that has been argued to be applicable to women across racial/ethnic, class, and other groups. The review provides an introduction to the womanist identity development model and its operationalization, critically analyzes literature on the model and its measurement, and explores directions for further development of womanist identity development theory and research.

Mire-development pathways and palaeoclimatic records from a full Holocene peat archive at Walton Moss, Cumbria, England

P. D. M. Hughes

Palaeoecology Laboratory, Department of Geography, University of Southampton, Southampton SO17 1BJ, UK

D. Mauquoy

Hugo de Vries Laboratorium, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

K. E. Barber

P. G. Langdon

Palaeoecology Laboratory, Department of Geography, University of Southampton, Southampton SO17 1BJ, UK

Plant macrofossil data have been used to identify the successive mire communities occupying both central and marginal locations in the Walton Moss peatland complex, during the last 10 500 years. The reconstructed pathways of mire development indicate that early-Holocene fen and fen-carr communities were succeeded by species indicative of deep mire water tables and oligotrophic conditions. The character of the fen/bog transition (FBT) is compared with similar records of peatland development from Britain and Scandinavia and with independent climate data for the early Holocene. The ‘pseudohochmoor’ of central Europe is suggested as an approximate modern analogue for the dry pioneer oligotrophic mire type and alternative explanations for its presence are explored. The first major increase in ombrotrophic Sphagna occurred at c. 7800 cal. BP. Overlying Sphagnum peats provide a continuous record of climate change, inferred from fluctuations in raised mire surface wetness. The proxy palaeoclimate record, reconstructed using Detrended Correspondence Analysis, registers wet shifts commencing at c. 7800, c. 5300, 4410–3990 (2s range), c. 3500, 3170–2860 (2s range), 2320–2040 (2s range), c. 1750, c. 1450, c. 300 and c. 100 cal. BP. This climate record is compared with a similar one from Bolton Fell Moss and spectral analysis of the time-series gives periodicities of c. 1100 years and c. 600 years between wet shifts.

Key Words: Mire development • Holocene • palaeoclimate • macrofossils • peat stratigraphy • spectral analysis