The Economic Development Potential of Minority-Owned Businesses

The consensus view that discriminatory barriers limit the size and scope of America’s minority-business community is factually well-grounded. Rarely examined, however, is the question of why these firms are flourishing. The authors examine the scope of this growth and its causes. The process of selectively reducing discriminatory barriers inhibiting minority entrepreneurship’s development began in the 1960s, moved forward in the 1970s, and continues presently. This path-dependent process of lowering barriers has altered the incentive structures, previously making the entrepreneurial choice an unattractive one for most minorities. This, in turn, has drawn into business ownership a younger generation of highly educated and experienced minorities, many of whom have successfully obtained bank loans. Spatially, minority neighborhoods as well have successfully attracted talented, experienced African American and Latino owners and financing for their firms. Those with abundant expertise have driven the substantial gains in numbers of workers employed by minority-owned businesses.

Suburban (mis)fortunes: Outer suburban shrinkage in Tokyo Metropolis

Tokyo’s suburban territory now forms part of an increasing multi-dimensional urban–suburban divide in socio-demographic, economic and political and administrative (fiscal) dimensions. Drawing on the Tokyo case we argue the need for theory to take more seriously shrinkage in suburban fortunes. Specifically, we highlight the double meaning of shrinkage as a complex, multifaceted and path-dependent process and as a municipal-level political and policy response. In this paper we offer a theoretical framework for understanding urban (sub)transformation attuned to Japanese conditions and, by extension, other developmental states. We go on to explore the multi-dimensioned isolation of Tokyo’s suburbs in terms of metropolitan-wide inter-governmental, inter-sectoral and inter-actor dynamics. In conclusion we observe the need for theory to be inclusive of the range of trajectories of suburbanisation and for politics and policy to adopt redistributive metropolitan spatial imaginaries.

Contesting Commemorative Landscapes: Confederate Monuments and Trajectories of Change

Following the racially motivated shootings at an African American church in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015, a wave of contentious campaigns around Confederate statuary emerged, or at least intensified, in communities across the country. Yet local struggles have culminated in vastly different alterations to the built environment. This paper develops a framework for differentiating distinct “modes of recontextualization” rooted in the relocation and/or modification of commemorative objects. Building on models of memory as an iterative, path-dependent process, we track recontextualization efforts in three communities—St. Louis, Missouri; Oxford, Mississippi; and Austin, Texas—documenting how each mode alters the meaning of contested symbols. An analysis of local news sources in the year following recontextualization shows how each mode exerts identifiable proximate effects on broader political debates and, through that process, structures the horizon of possibility for longer-range outcomes.

Urban Violence and the Spatial Question

This chapter examines the spatial correlates of urban violence in Latin America, identifying how urbanization processes over the past several decades have created socio-spatial exclusion. It links those spatial patterns to the emergence and proliferation of illicit activities, organized crime, and territorially expanding networks of violence emanating from marginal neighborhoods to the city as a whole. Both state and non-state armed actors are key actors in this path-dependent process by virtue of their efforts to monitor and/or control urban territory for their own gain. In addition, the chapter assesses several recent programs undertaken by local authorities in attempts to reduce the scourge of urban violence. Drawing on examples from Medellín, Sao Paulo, and Mexico City, it identifies the spatial interventions that have made most headway in improving security for urban citizens and discusses the governance arrangements that have made these spatial interventions possible.

The Transformative Potential of Active Citizenship: Understanding Changes in Local Governance Practices

This paper focuses on understanding the transformative potential of active citizenship in green space governance. Through an in-depth case study, we show how citizens promoted the redevelopment of a brownfield into a green space, but eventually also contributed towards a broader co-creative shift in local governance. In this process, we highlight how a shift in citizens’ activities from contestation towards collaboration led to the uptake of citizen-driven discourses and activities in spatial planning. The social connectivity between governance practices is of key importance in this transformation—successful governance practices that involve active citizens can inspire others. Even so, transformation is often a slow and path-dependent process which also depends on an enabling policy environment. Cooperating with authorities provides citizens with power, but also requires alignment with official rules. Creating and maintaining effective partnerships will remain a challenge for citizens and policymakers that strive for societal transformations.

Moral reasoning is the process of asking moral questions and answering them

Reasoning is the iterative, path-dependent process of asking questions and answering them. Moral reasoning is a species of such reasoning, so it is a matter of asking and answering moral questions, which requires both creativity and curiosity. As such, interventions and practices that help people ask more and better moral questions promise to improve moral reasoning.

Introduction

This chapter establishes the main issues to be explored in this book, including the dramatic transformation that Sinn Féin and the IRA underwent. It provides a critique of existing explanations, arguing that they mistakenly assume the politics of Sinn Féin is driven primarily by the military capacity of the IRA. Existing explanations also assume that interplay between the British state and Irish republicans led to their moderation, but these explanations neglect the wider institutional context in which republicans chose to change their strategy. In contrast, this chapter sets out the argument that sustained contact with, and inclusion in, key political processes, namely party politics and a consolidated framework of democratic institutions, extracted moderate concessions from republicans in a gradual and path-dependent process.

Conclusion

This chapter provides a summary of the main arguments and empirical evidence of the book. It re-emphasizes the argument that inclusion drove the process of moderation in a gradual and path dependent process. It also argues that moderation was strategic and involved extensive movement away from revolutionary violence towards working through the existing system and accepting reformism. However, it did not entail core value change or the abandonment of core goals. It provides an assessment of how republicans are pursuing their goal of a united Ireland in a post-peace process era, arguing that republicans have been largely ineffective in their efforts and are instead now relying on exogenous factors to advance their cause. It concludes by considering the implications of Irish republicanism for other cases of separatist conflict and for comparative peace processes. It argues that the pathway to moderation offered here highlights that moderation can occur when internal change within a movement is met with tolerance from the ruling state to allow that movement to politicise without abandoning core goals.

Field burning practices in a southern region of Brazil

Purpose – The practice of field burning has been used for many years in the south regions of Brazil as an ideal way to maintain pastures. The purpose of this paper is to understand if such activity is logically explicable or if it is the result of a cultural reality, being “prisoner” of this technique because of path dependence, within the paradigm of the path dependence theory. Design/methodology/approach – This present research is exploratory. The use of cases study was the most appropriate technique to explore the field burning practices and their impact in this specific region of Brazil, while describing its context, for which limits are not clearly defined. Thus, this research carries out a multi-case study that provides a greater perception than a single case and has an identical methodological structure. Findings – This paper analyzed the reasons why the producers insist with the procedure and identified these reasons are not merely economical. The study demonstrates a clear path dependent process and it became obvious that once the technique is part of the family use history, it anchors a strong conviction that field burning is actually the best technique to be used for land maintenance. Research limitations/implications – This work suggests a need for other specific researches to substantially complement field burning practices to other phenomenon. Practical implications – The fact that alternative techniques are rejected, giving priority to field burning, it may suggest that other situations and practices may be tied to inadequate or less profitable technologies as well (milk, confined raising, pasturing). The study raises the question on the validity of such practice as a paradigm of reason and pragmatism, or as a “Platoons Cavern” in which they are “trapped” in their decision process developed over time. Originality/value – Presence and implications of environmental laws, which tend to be observed by the producers much more because they fear punishment than because they really understand the benefits of its application; showing the government’s failure in teaching and informing the producers about environmental laws.