World class from within: Aspiration, connection and brokering in the Colombo real estate market

This paper explores how the aspirational urban form of the ‘world-class city’ is produced from within the city itself. Rather than focusing on global competition between cities, the analysis considers how local actors in key industries discursively and materially produce the world-class city through their labor. The analytic of connection is introduced as central to understanding how world-class city-making projects are achieved. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in Colombo’s high-end real estate sector, the article examines how a successful broker creates and manages connections across different scales and registers. It focuses on three key areas: (1) the rhetorical connections drawn between luxury real estate and national development; (2) the connections created between wealthy foreign clients and local property owners and (3) the work of connecting disparate narratives about supply and demand for luxury housing. I highlight that against the backdrop of considerable economic and political uncertainty, connections are valuable even if they do not result in immediate profit. Offering a glimpse into the world of white-collar professionals in the luxury real estate industry, this paper underscores that world-class city-making projects are embedded in local realities even as they reflect generalized patterns of urban development.

Exploring Municipal Mobilization across States

This chapter zooms out to examine the state-level features that are associated with differences in the intensity of local government lobbying. Several state characteristics correlate with municipal lobbying, such as local property tax limitations, but two of the most striking are the combination of term limits and the level of professionalization in the state legislature. Cities are also more likely to mobilize as state transfers comprise a greater share of municipal budgets. These findings suggest that lobbyists might be particularly useful at facilitating representation in complex legislative environments with high turnover among elected officials—especially when cities depend on the state for revenue.

The Intersectionality of Educating Black Students in Michigan: Public School Finance, Racial Segregation, and Housing Policy

This research investigates Michigan’s system for funding public schools, particularly for Black students, via critical race theory, focusing on structural racism and discrimination embedded in education finance laws, housing policies, and residential and educational segregation. Our research questions are (i) How does district per-pupil funding in Michigan vary by race and income? (ii) Does variation by race and income depend on whether funding is from state or local sources? (iii) How does district property wealth in Michigan vary by race and income? and (iv) How does the proportion of property wealth Michigan districts commit to local education funding vary by race and income? We find that the average Black student receiving free or reduced-price lunch (FRL) receives $411 less per pupil than the average White student receiving FRL and $783 less per pupil than the average White student who does not receive FRL. These disparities stem entirely from differences in locally sourced district revenues that are the result of vast differences in property wealth. On average, a one-percentage-point increase in a district’s proportion of Black students receiving FRL is associated with a $2,354 decrease in taxable value of property per pupil, implying that a district with all Black students receiving FRL would have $235,400 less taxable value per pupil than a district with no Black students receiving FRL. Through its continued reliance on local property taxation, the school finance system in Michigan is just another example of how laws and policies reinforce structural racism and discrimination against Black students. This study can discern a self-reinforcing system that relegates Blacks to a subordinate socioeconomic status regarding school finance, segregation and housing policy, and discrimination.

Algorithms for thermal diffusivity measurement of heterogeneous 1D materials based on Infrared Microscopy Enhanced Angstrom Method

An infrared microscopy enhanced Angstrom method has been develpoed to measure the thermal diffusivity. Infrared microscopy technique can acquire temperatures of multiple points at one shot. Two algorithms for calculating thermal diffusivity were proposed and compared in practice. One is based on global temperature data and the other is based on local temperature data. The according calculated thermal diffusivities are denoted as α n G and α n L . Three 1D materials of different heterogeneity (Cu wire, Ni-Cu wire and PVA-CNT fiber) were measured on the experimental platform. The calculated α n G and α n L values show that for homogeneous material such as Cu, these two algorithms give similar results, while for heterogeneous ones (Ni-Cu and PVA-CNT), they come to be discrepant. The data fluctuation analysis of f n L zooms in the discrepancy and verifies that α n L is more sensitive to local property change and more competent in revealing heterogeneous properties.

Improvement of Sheet Metal Properties by Inducing Residual Stresses into Sheet Metal Components by Embossing and Reforming

In sheet metal forming, combination of embossing and reforming allows the mechanical properties of sheet metal materials to be specifically improved. Here, local property modification is achieved by the residual stresses induced as a result of the one-sided embossing process followed by a reforming step. The residual stresses induced in this specific way can lead to a significantly increase in the fatigue strength of processed sheet metal components. However, in order to ensure this kind of component optimization in continuous operation, the induced stresses have to be homogeneous. In this respect, the main objective of the study reported about in this paper was to identify a forming strategy, consisting of the process steps embossing and reforming, that generates preferably homogeneous residual stress distributions into sheet metal blanks. For this, numerical and experimental investigations were carried out with samples of the stainless steel (X6Cr17) having a thickness of 1.5 mm. It was found that embossing and reforming, integrated into a conventional forming process, is a novel approach to specifically induce very localized homogeneous compressive residual stresses in sheet metal materials. This eliminates the need for costly post-processing by means of surface treatment.

The Racially Unequal Impacts of Disasters and Federal Recovery Assistance on Local Self-Employment Rates

This study examines racial inequalities in changing self-employment rates associated with natural hazard impacts and federal recovery assistance in ethnoracially diverse metropolitan counties between 2000 and 2010. It advances the viewpoint that such inequalities can stem from hoarded opportunities tied to white privilege in addition to commonly highlighted social vulnerabilities tied to racial inequities and exclusion. To test that proposition, we conduct change-score analyses using county-level data from the US Census Bureau, the Spatial Hazard Events and Losses Database for the United States, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Results indicate that (a) overall, self-employment rates increase with local property damages from natural hazards, especially among white and Latino workers; (b) those increases are largely explained by the amount of federal public assistance received for disaster recovery, not property damages themselves; and (c) white workers experience the most positive and consistent increases in self-employment from federal recovery assistance. Implications for understanding racial inequities stemming from current and future disasters and government assistance are discussed.

The “glocalisation” of Istanbul's retail property market

PurposeThe continuation of globalisation and liberalisation processes has prompted the restructuring of many national and local property markets. The research examines the evolution of Istanbul's retail property market to identify how global and local agents engage with one another to produce a unique “glocalized” outcome.Design/methodology/approachThe morphogenetic approach is adapted and applied to analyse the dynamics of market change. The focus is on the character and behaviour of national and international market actors and how they interact with the wider political economy. The research uses a combination of elite interviews, document analysis and corporate case studies to obtain empirical evidence.FindingsThe liberalisation of the Turkish economy heralded the entry of the first international companies into Istanbul's retail property market in the 1990s. International involvement expanded rapidly after 2004, accelerating the process of market re-structuring. However, while the number of global buy-outs increased, the expansion of local property companies–and the establishment of some international/national corporate partnerships–was even more marked. This resulted in a “glocalised” market with a strong and distinctive local culture.Originality/valueIstanbul has been a major centre of trade for millenia. This is the first substantive analysis of the recent restructuring of the city's retail property market. Previous research on market maturity and market evolution has paid limited attention to the dynamics of change. The paper describes the use of a process-based theoretical framework (morphogenesis) that was explicitly designed to analyse structural shifts in socio-economic conditions through an examination of the characteristics and behaviours of the actors involved.

Does the Strength of Incentives Matter for Elected Officials? A Look at Tax Collectors

In Pennsylvania local property taxes are collected by elected officials, known as tax collectors, whose compensation varies widely in both structure and level across municipalities. This paper analyses the existence of a pay-performance relationship for these officials. Using data on the percentage of property taxes that are actually collected at the municipal level, the paper finds that as the compensation tax collectors receive goes up, they collect more in taxes. This relationship is however true only for collectors who are compensated on a commission basis and not for collectors compensated on the basis of a flat salary.