The Political Economy of Rural-Urban Conflict

The Political Economy of Rural-Urban Conflict PDF Author: Topher L. McDougal
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192511203
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 287

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Book Description
In some cases of insurgency, the combat frontier is contested and erratic, as rebels target cities as their economic prey. In other cases, it is tidy and stable, seemingly representing an equilibrium in which cities are effectively protected from violent non-state actors. What factors account for these differences in the interface between urban-based states and rural-based challengers? To explore this question, this volume examines two regions representing two dramatically different outcomes. In West Africa (Liberia and Sierra Leone), capital cities became economic targets for rebels, who posed dire threats to the survival of the state. In Maoist India, despite an insurgent ideology aiming to overthrow the state via a strategy of progressive city capture, the combat frontier effectively firewalls cities from Maoist violence. This book argues that trade networks underpinning the economic relationship between rural and urban areas - termed 'interstitial economies' - may differ dramatically in their impact on (and response to) the combat frontier. It explains rebel predatory tendencies towards cities as a function of transport networks allowing monopoly profits to be made by urban-based traders. It explains combat frontier delineation as a function of the social structure of the trade networks: hierarchical networks permit elite-elite bargains that cohere the frontier. These factors represent what might be termed respectively the 'hardware' and 'software' of the rural-urban economic relationship. Of interest to any student of political economy and violence, this book presents new arguments and insights about the relationships between violence and the economy, predation and production, core and periphery.

The Political Economy of Rural-Urban Conflict

The Political Economy of Rural-Urban Conflict PDF Author: Topher L. McDougal
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192511203
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 287

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Book Description
In some cases of insurgency, the combat frontier is contested and erratic, as rebels target cities as their economic prey. In other cases, it is tidy and stable, seemingly representing an equilibrium in which cities are effectively protected from violent non-state actors. What factors account for these differences in the interface between urban-based states and rural-based challengers? To explore this question, this volume examines two regions representing two dramatically different outcomes. In West Africa (Liberia and Sierra Leone), capital cities became economic targets for rebels, who posed dire threats to the survival of the state. In Maoist India, despite an insurgent ideology aiming to overthrow the state via a strategy of progressive city capture, the combat frontier effectively firewalls cities from Maoist violence. This book argues that trade networks underpinning the economic relationship between rural and urban areas - termed 'interstitial economies' - may differ dramatically in their impact on (and response to) the combat frontier. It explains rebel predatory tendencies towards cities as a function of transport networks allowing monopoly profits to be made by urban-based traders. It explains combat frontier delineation as a function of the social structure of the trade networks: hierarchical networks permit elite-elite bargains that cohere the frontier. These factors represent what might be termed respectively the 'hardware' and 'software' of the rural-urban economic relationship. Of interest to any student of political economy and violence, this book presents new arguments and insights about the relationships between violence and the economy, predation and production, core and periphery.

The Political Economy of Rural-urban Conflict

The Political Economy of Rural-urban Conflict PDF Author: Topher Leinberger McDougal
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 162

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Book Description
This dissertation occupies the intersection between the fields of International Development, Political Economy, and Peace & Conflict Studies to examine how economic networks spanning the rural-urban divide condition conflict dynamics between an urban-based state and its rural-based challengers. In some cases of such violent internal conflict, the combat frontier is messy and erratic, as insurgents target cities as their economic prey. In other cases, the combat frontier is tidy and stable, seemingly representing an equilibrium in which cities are effectively protected from violent non-state actors. What accounts for these divergent outcomes? This question bears special importance in an era characterized by increasingly eroded capacity of states to exercise the famous Weberian monopoly on the use of coercive force. To explore this question, I did fieldwork in two regions representing these different outcomes. In West Africa (Liberia and Sierra Leone), capital cities became economic targets for rebels, who posed dire threats to the survival of the state. In Maoist India, despite an insurgent ideology aiming to overthrow the state via city capture, the combat frontier effectively firewalls cities from Maoist violence. I interviewed firm managers, traders, and, where possible, locals at risk for rebel recruitment. I employed formal modeling, and qualitative (semi-structured interviews, coding) and quantitative (multivariate and logistic regression) methods to analyze, first, the effects of violence on the structure of rural-urban trade networks, and second, the effects of trade network morphology on the structure of the combat frontier itself. I found that the trade networks that underpin the economic relationship between rural and urban areas may differ dramatically in their response to, and effect on, the combat frontier, depending on what type of underlying social structure they are based upon. Those based upon ranked, or hierarchical, social structures, were structured in such a way as to facilitate elite-elite trade deals between urban-based traders and rebel commanders that benefited the rural insurgents. By contrast, those based upon unranked, or egalitarian, social structures tended to disallow this sort of deal structure, concentrating profits in urban areas, destabilizing the combat frontier, and further incentivizing the targeting of cities. This study then seeks to recast dynamics of violent internal conflict as a dialectic relationship between intensification (production, often in state-controlled urban areas) and extensification (predation, often in rebel-held rural areas). It attempts to reconcile the opposing views that Development processes both drive and undermine violent conflict, and suggests that, in the absence of a monopoly on the use of coercive force, the state may benefit from geographic containment of competitive force by way of these "interstitial economies."

The Political Economy of Rural-Urban Conflict

The Political Economy of Rural-Urban Conflict PDF Author: Topher L. McDougal
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 019251119X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 230

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Book Description
In some cases of insurgency, the combat frontier is contested and erratic, as rebels target cities as their economic prey. In other cases, it is tidy and stable, seemingly representing an equilibrium in which cities are effectively protected from violent non-state actors. What factors account for these differences in the interface between urban-based states and rural-based challengers? To explore this question, this volume examines two regions representing two dramatically different outcomes. In West Africa (Liberia and Sierra Leone), capital cities became economic targets for rebels, who posed dire threats to the survival of the state. In Maoist India, despite an insurgent ideology aiming to overthrow the state via a strategy of progressive city capture, the combat frontier effectively firewalls cities from Maoist violence. This book argues that trade networks underpinning the economic relationship between rural and urban areas - termed 'interstitial economies' - may differ dramatically in their impact on (and response to) the combat frontier. It explains rebel predatory tendencies towards cities as a function of transport networks allowing monopoly profits to be made by urban-based traders. It explains combat frontier delineation as a function of the social structure of the trade networks: hierarchical networks permit elite-elite bargains that cohere the frontier. These factors represent what might be termed respectively the 'hardware' and 'software' of the rural-urban economic relationship. Of interest to any student of political economy and violence, this book presents new arguments and insights about the relationships between violence and the economy, predation and production, core and periphery.

Cities, Change, and Conflict

Cities, Change, and Conflict PDF Author: NANCY. KLENIEWSKI
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 9781032565996
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
This sixth edition of Cities, Change, and Conflict features a new, groundbreaking chapter on the relationship between the physical environment and human settlements, including the urban-rural nexus.

Development and the Rural-Urban Divide

Development and the Rural-Urban Divide PDF Author: John Harriss
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1351714899
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 270

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Book Description
First published in 1984. It is widely acknowledged that rural-urban differences and interrelationships play an important role in the development process. Some theorists believe they are a primary cause of continuing poverty in poor nations. This volume of essays summarises and appraises theories of rural-urban relations and economic development and explores, mainly on the basis of country case studies, the conceptual and theoretical problems to which they give rise, and the extent to which they correspond to recent experiences in the Third World.

Why Cities Lose

Why Cities Lose PDF Author: Jonathan A. Rodden
Publisher: Basic Books
ISBN: 1541644255
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 336

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Book Description
A prizewinning political scientist traces the origins of urban-rural political conflict and shows how geography shapes elections in America and beyond Why is it so much easier for the Democratic Party to win the national popular vote than to build and maintain a majority in Congress? Why can Democrats sweep statewide offices in places like Pennsylvania and Michigan yet fail to take control of the same states' legislatures? Many place exclusive blame on partisan gerrymandering and voter suppression. But as political scientist Jonathan A. Rodden demonstrates in Why Cities Lose, the left's electoral challenges have deeper roots in economic and political geography. In the late nineteenth century, support for the left began to cluster in cities among the industrial working class. Today, left-wing parties have become coalitions of diverse urban interest groups, from racial minorities to the creative class. These parties win big in urban districts but struggle to capture the suburban and rural seats necessary for legislative majorities. A bold new interpretation of today's urban-rural political conflict, Why Cities Lose also points to electoral reforms that could address the left's under-representation while reducing urban-rural polarization.

Cities, Change, and Conflict

Cities, Change, and Conflict PDF Author: Nancy Kleniewski
Publisher: Cengage Learning
ISBN:
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 410

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Book Description
Kleniewski s text discusses the importance of cities for the economic, cultural, and political life of modern societies. The author consistently uses the political economy perspective to introduce students to the basic concepts and research in urban sociology, while also acknowledging the contributions of the human ecology perspective. Through the use of case studies, the presentation remains accessible and down-to-earth.

Cities of Peasants

Cities of Peasants PDF Author: Bryan R. Roberts
Publisher: London : Edward Arnold, July 1978.
ISBN:
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 224

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Book Description
Monograph examining economic implications and social implications of capitalist urbanization in Latin America - discusses trends in urban development and underdevelopment during historical colonialism, industrialization, rural migration and change in the agrarian structure, etc., and analyses social stratification and social mobility, interdependence between the modern industrial sector and the informal sector (small scale industry), poverty and working class marginality, etc. Bibliography pp. 178 to 199 and statistical tables.

Essays on the Political Economy of Rural Africa

Essays on the Political Economy of Rural Africa PDF Author: Robert H. Bates
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 9780520060142
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 200

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Book Description
The essays in this volume represent a dialogue between theory and data. The theory is drawn from a branch of contemporary political economy which can also be labeled the collective-choice school. The data are drawn from Africa. The book extends the methods of reasoning developed in collective choice from their original base-the advanced industrial democracies-to new territory; the literature on rural Africa. Such as extension challenges the power of this form of political economy. It also enriches it, for the central questions which motivate the contemporary study of political economy are often addressed with unique clarity in the scholarship on rural Africa.

A Rural-urban Conflict Series

A Rural-urban Conflict Series PDF Author: Edmund de Schweinitz Brunner
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Cities and towns
Languages : en
Pages : 64

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Book Description