Checking in on state capacity
Are victims of disasters ever satisfied with the response from the state? Are the levels of response related to physical capacity or politics? I noted that the area hardest hit by the earthquake is a Kurdish area. What do you know about Kurds in Iran?
Iran-Iraq earthquake: Rouhani vows action over collapsed buildings
Iran's President Hassan Rouhani has vowed to "find the culprits" responsible for buildings collapsing in a 7.3-magnitude earthquake on Sunday.
He suggested that government-built buildings had collapsed while privately-built ones remained standing.
As he spoke in the worst-affected city, Sarpol-e Zahab, he gestured to two buildings, one of which had collapsed while the other had not…
A photograph circulating on social media shows an unaffected private building next to a collapsed building that was part of the Mehr project, a scheme created by previous President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to build two million housing units for people on low incomes.
Mehr is Farsi for kindness, and under the scheme hundreds of homes were built…
Government's slow response criticised
Analysis by Jiyar Gol, BBC Persian
Forty-eight hours after the earthquake, thousands of people complain that still they have no tents, food or water. They complain about the lack of co-ordination between security forces and aid agencies. Although many soldiers showed up, they didn't have enough ambulances or proper machinery to move rubble.
More than 1,900 Kurdish mountain villages have been affected. The villagers say no one from the government has come to their rescue but ordinary Iranians from neighbouring cities and provinces have started sending aid.
Most of the government-sponsored affordable housing complexes for the poor were damaged severely, and many died inside…
President Rouhani brought attention to this, saying those responsible for the projects - initiated under his predecessor's presidency - must be held accountable…
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Labels: cleavages, concepts, Iran, state capacity
Earthquake in Iran
We have recent records of earthquakes in China and Mexico. Now is the time to compare the capacity of Iran to deal with an earthquake with the capacities of China and Mexico.
Iraq-Iran earthquake: Deadly tremor hits border region
A strong 7.3-magnitude earthquake has rattled the northern border region between Iran and Iraq, killing scores.
At least 61 people died in western Iran, state media said, with four more reported dead in Iraq. The death toll is likely to rise.
The earthquake sparked panic, with residents fleeing their homes for the streets.
Mosques in the Iraqi capital Baghdad have been saying prayers through loudspeakers.
Iranian news channel IRINN said rescue teams have been despatched to western parts of the country.
"Damage has been reported in at least eight villages," Morteza Salim, the head of Iran's Red Crescent Organisation, told the channel.
"Some other villages have suffered power cuts and their telecommunications system has also been disturbed."
The earthquake was felt in Turkey and Israel too.
It struck in the evening local time south of the Iraqi town of Halabja at a depth of 33.9 km (21 miles), the US Geological Survey (USGS) said.
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Labels: concepts, Iran, state capacity
Is Mexico still a nation state?
What are the characteristics of a nation state? How many of them does Mexico still have? What things are identified as obstacles to change?
Mexico’s Record Violence Is a Crisis 20 Years in the Making
The forces driving violence in Mexico, which is now on track for its worst year in decades, were first set in motion 20 years ago…
First, Colombia defeated its major drug cartels in the 1990s, driving the center of the drug trade from the country into Mexico.
Then, in 2000, Mexico transitioned to a multiparty democracy.
This meant that the drug trade moved to Mexico just as its politics and institutions were in flux, leaving them unable to address a problem they have often made worse.
Since then, a series of bad breaks, missteps and self-imposed crises have led to an explosion of violence…
In 2006, a new president and a new drug cartel both took extreme actions, the consequences of which are still unfolding.
The implosion of Colombian cartels set off a fierce competition in Mexico for control of the drug trade. A new cartel, La Familia Michoacána, broke off from a larger group, then cemented its power by deploying extreme, theatrical violence…
That same year, Felipe Calderón won the presidency by a hair... the narrow victory for Mr. Calderón left him without a strong mandate.
 |
| Mexican army on anti-cartel patrol |
Shortly after taking office, the new president declared war on the cartels and sent in the military…
Defenders say he had little alternative. Mexico had been a single-party state and, like most such states, had controlled local officials through patronage and corruption. When that system disappeared, drug cartels filled the vacuum, buying off mayors and judges. Only the military had the firepower and autonomy to take them on.
This began the drug war that has killed tens of thousands of people. But it also created a subtler set of problems now driving more and broader violence.
Mr. Calderón adopted the so-called kingpin strategy, in which troops captured or killed cartel leaders. This generated headlines, pleased the United States and could be accomplished top-down, with little input from corrupt or weak local law enforcement…
In bypassing mayors and governors because Mexico’s pre-democratic practices had left them systemically corrupt and unaccountable, the government further reduced their accountability…
“In the process of that fragmentation, we didn’t do the job of structuring the institutions of the police forces,” said Mr. Valdés, who ran the civil national security intelligence service as this was unfolding. “So we have the worst of the worst.”
Joy Langston, a political scientist at the Center for Research and Teaching in Economics in Mexico City, traces many of the country’s woes to a seemingly minor quirk in its political system.
All candidates are selected by the party, and officials serve one term before being shuffled off to another post.
During the one-party era, this was meant to impose accountability, which flowed from party leadership. Oversight institutions, seen as superfluous, never fully developed…
For example, voters have little opportunity to kick out bad leaders or reward good ones, giving officials little incentive to push through difficult reforms. And criminal groups are able to fill the pockets of notoriously underpaid policemen and other civil servants — often providing the wrong kind of incentives.
“At the end of the day, this is all an issue of accountability,” Alejandro Hope, a security analyst, said. “That is the key point of failure in Mexico.”
“Nothing happens if a police officer does not do their work,” he added. “Nothing happens if a mayor fails to transform local law enforcement. Nothing happens if a governor fails to invest in prosecutorial services. Nothing happens.”…
This is leading communities to do, at the grass-roots level, what Mr. Calderón did a decade earlier: bypass distrusted institutions, worsening the underlying problem.
Businesses and middle-class Mexicans are hiring private security in record numbers…
Rural communities, which are more vulnerable, have formed “self-defense” militias to run off gangs and mayors alike…
Mexicans seem keenly aware that their government is growing less responsive just as streets are becoming more dangerous. Polls show growing dissatisfaction, particularly over corruption.
“We have this political class that totally forgets why they are there,” said Armando Torjes, a community activist in Guadalupe, a working-class city in the northeast.
Each election, he said, brings a new official with a new three-year plan. Most, he added, leave office conspicuously wealthier…
“We wanted to improve the institutions, the judges, the jails, the police,” Mr. Valdés, the former head of the intelligence service, said. “We spent years trying to convince the political class.”
But he found those institutions — dominated by parties rather than technocrats and subject to the whims of officials who are required by law to cycle out every term — unresponsive…
“What’s happening in Guadalupe is what’s happening in all of Mexico,” Mr. Torjes said. “There was a political demand for change, but nothing really changed for us.”
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Labels: change, corruption, Mexico, state, state capacity
More specifics on the political results of disaster
A few days after the previous article appeared in the Los Angeles Times, this article was published in the New York Times. The authors agree that Mexicans might be making political decisions based on their experiences after the earthquakes. Are political memories long enough to affect the next presidential election?
Mexico City’s People Power
When the earthquake rattled this mountain capital on Tuesday, a five-story office and apartment block round the corner from my home collapsed into a mountain of rubble, burying computer programmers, salesmen, secretaries. Right away, a handful of neighbors approached the wreckage, calling to see if anyone was alive and removing debris. Within hours, the group had swelled into the hundreds, joined by volunteers from across the city arriving by foot, truck and bicycle…
 |
| Rescuing earthquake victims |
This immense human effort, shown in the pictures of ordinary men and women sweating with spades, running with wheelbarrows, passing stretchers over their heads will surely be the lasting image of the 7.1 magnitude tremor that struck Mexico less than two weeks after a more distant 8.1 earthquake. It is a story of tragedy, but also of solidarity and hope…
Similar scenes were repeated at dozens of collapsed buildings across the battered capital as thousands of volunteers worked nonstop. Their efforts paid off, with more than 50 people rescued by the end of Wednesday…
The brigades of 1985 had an impact on Mexican politics, Dr. Lorenzo Meyer, a politics professor and author,said. Angry with a government they saw as uncaring, these empowered volunteers sought change. Many became activists fighting to end the hegemonic rule of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or P.R.I. The capital became a bastion of opposition, and the P.R.I. lost political control of it in 1997, before losing the presidency in 2000, after seven decades.
The latest mass mobilization may also have a lasting political effect. The country now has multiparty democracy, and more open media and civil society. But people are angry about officials embezzling millions of dollars… The P.R.I. returned to power in 2012 under President Enrique Peña Nieto, but he has suffered his own corruption scandals…
A heightened awareness of people power could favor the presidential hopeful Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who trumpets a populist anti-establishment discourse from the left. A former Mexico City mayor, he already leads many opinion polls for the 2018 election as he calls for “el pueblo” to defeat a “mafia of power.”…
It could also strengthen Mexico’s resolve against the aggressive stance of the Trump administration, Dr. Meyer said. Around the rubble, the armies of volunteers often raise their fists and shout in unison, “Viva México.” “When we shout this, there is an implication that we are standing up to the hostile policies of the United States,” Dr. Meyer said. “After all of the recent insults, the humiliations, it is a way of reaffirming our pride.”
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Labels: Mexico, politics, state capacity
State capacity and legitimacy
How much does the ability (capacity) of the state contribute to legitimacy of a regime or a government?
Mexicans aren't counting on the government to rescue them. They're saving themselves
In the moments after the earthquake, they didn’t cower, they mobilized.
 |
| Seeking donations on a street corner |
By the tens of thousands, volunteers streamed toward the Mexico City neighborhoods most damaged by Tuesday’s violent temblor. Some carried shovels, others hauled donations of food and water. Many simply offered up two good hands.
They weren’t public authorities or professionals. They were ordinary Mexicans who knew from experience that during a crisis such as an earthquake, it’s better to do things yourself than to rely on the government for help…
Many Mexicans remember the 1985 earthquake not only for its destruction but also for the government’s lackluster response…
“The government pretty much disappeared for the first 24 hours,” said Alejandro Hope, a political and security analyst…
With scores trapped beneath the rubble and many more in need of other assistance, “the army was just blocking the streets, not helping particularly,” he said. It was days before then-President Miguel de la Madrid visited a rescue site, he said…
If ordinary Mexicans learned a lesson from the disaster, so too did Mexico’s politicians. Anger about the government’s response — it refused to accept international aid for several days, and it suppressed estimates of the number of dead — helped turn opinion against De la Madrid’s Institutional Revolutionary Party [PRI].
The response of current President Enrique Peña Nieto, who deployed more than 3,000 soldiers to help and visited a rescue site the first day of the earthquake, shows that politicians learned “that the only thing you cannot do during a disaster is hide,” Hope said.
Despite quick government action, volunteers showed up, in many areas forming human chains to deliver aid supplies or move rubble, or warn pedestrians against getting near dangerous sites…
“We’re normally so divided,” said Jose Funcia, 32, who was waiting in line with a shovel. Those divisions are across economic and cultural lines, he said. “But when it's an emergency, we come together.”
The signs of generosity appeared in more subtle ways too: Restaurants advertised free lunches, while neighbors set up power strips in their windows to allow responders to charge their phones. On Facebook, messages spread inviting the newly homeless to sleep in guest rooms and on couches. Even those directly affected purchased supplies to donate to others in need…
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Labels: concepts, legitimacy, Mexico, politics, state capacity
Threatened journalists and information
Information and a free press are usually seen as vital to the existence of a free state. What happens if the press is discredited or if journalists are killed off? Is controlling the press necessary for an authoritarian system?
Is this a case of limited state capacity? Or is the state actively suppressing journalism? Maybe the title question should be "Does Mexico want to save its journalists?"
Can Mexico save its journalists?
Journalists are being murdered in Mexico and this is nothing new. This is one of the most dangerous countries for reporters, rights groups say, and more die here than in any other nation at peace.
But even for a place so used to drugs-related violence and organised crime, the recent bloodshed has been shocking.
Seven journalists have been killed in the country so far this year, most shot by gunmen in broad daylight. Yet virtually all cases of attacks on the press end up unsolved and, in many, corrupt officials are suspected of partnering with criminals…
Since 2000, at least 106 journalists have been killed across Mexico, according to rights group Article 19. Exact numbers are hard to come by as investigations often get nowhere and different studies apply different criteria in counting the dead…
In 2010, pressure from campaigners led to the creation of a special office of the federal prosecutor for crimes against freedom of expression, known as the Feadle, which investigates attacks on journalists.
But the authorities have often ruled that the victims themselves are not journalists or that the incidents have no connection to their work, according to critics.
Like last month. When the charred remains of Salvador Adame, the head of a TV station in the western state of Michoacán, were found, state prosecutors said that the case had to do with personal disputes, possibly a love affair, angering relatives and campaigners…
[Journalist Ismael Bolorquez said,] "The [Feadle] doesn't have resources or teams to investigate. Our system of protection of journalists doesn't work... The government's policies to protect us are a failure."
The result is that journalism itself has become a victim. "Investigative journalism in many places in Mexico is just impossible to be exercised," said Carlos Luria, CPJ's senior programme co-ordinator for the Americas.
"There are no guarantees, no condition, no protection, there is an absence of the state. This is decimating journalism in Mexico."…
Ana Cristina Ruelas, Article 19's director for Mexico and Central America [asserted that]… Corruption is rife in Mexico, and rogue police and politicians were the suspects in more than half of the incidents against the media in the last six years… And most cases were never looked into.
"The state doesn't investigate itself. There is a direct link between the level of impunity and corruption," Ms Ruelas said. "This impunity allows the aggressors to continue attacking the press in broad daylight."…
Distrust grew even further last month, after the New York Times accused the Mexican government of spying on several top journalists, lawyers and human rights defenders by hacking their phones with spyware meant to be used against criminals and terrorists - a claim the Mexican presidency denied.
 |
| No silence |
"It's very hard to connect the words of the presidency with actions because until now we haven't found a clear reflection of these words in actions that provide results," said Ms Ruelas, from Article 19.
Reporters, however, say the latest killings prove that their work is more urgent than ever: "No to silence".
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Labels: democracies, freedom of the press, journalism, Mexico, state capacity
States within the state
How powerful are the states (in Mexico's case, narco gangs) within the state?
Mexico violence: 28 dead in prison fight in Acapulco
A fight between rival gangs in a prison in south-western Mexico has left at least 28 inmates dead, officials say.
The pre-dawn fight broke out in the maximum security wing of Las Cruces prison in the city of Acapulco…
Acapulco is the largest city in Guerrero state, one of Mexico's most violent areas and a big centre for drug production…
"The incident was triggered by a permanent feud between rival groups within the prison," [Roberto Álvarez, a state security spokesman] said…
This is the latest in a series of violent incidents across Mexico this year. May was the deadliest month in the country since 1997, when official statistics began, with 2,186 homicides.
From December 2006 until May this year, there were 188,567 murders, according to government records.
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Labels: concepts, Mexico, state, state capacity
National pride at satellite launch
It might not sound like a big deal to countries that have inhabited space stations orbiting the earth, but the announcement of the Nigerian Federal University of Technology, Akure (FUTA)'s first satellite was the most popular topic in Friday's Nigerian press.
Edusat-1 Satellite Goes Into Orbit Today
The federal University of Technology, Akure (FUTA) has said that… the Nigerian CubeSat, code-named Nigeria Edusat-1, would be released from the International Space Station 1SS KIBO (Japan Cubicle) into the orbit today…
The Nigerian CubeSat is designed, built and owned by FUTA in collaboration with National Space Research and Development Agency (NASRDA), Abuja and Kyushu Institute of Technology Japan…
[Mr. Adebanjo Adegbenro, head of the university's Information Unit] said that with the deployment, the satellites would go round the earth taking images and other critical data, which could be viewed and analysed at the ground stations one of which would be based at the FUTA…
Mr. Ibukun Adebolu from FUTA's Department of Mechanical Engineering… stated… "First, we aim to take low and high resolution pictures of each home country of the participating members of the constellation. Each satellite is equipped with a 0.3 megapixel camera as well as a 5 megapixel camera.
"We hope to capture distinct features of each target country, including borderline images, major rivers etc. The second mission on board each satellite is aimed at space education and outreach. Popular songs and poems are converted into digital format and uplinked to the satellite.
"The satellite stores the uplink file, re-assembles it through an onboard digi-singer synthesiser and retransmits the file as an audio file that can be received on ground by amateur radio operators."
Adebolu noted that the "mission is aimed at promoting interest in satellite technology and space careers among children and youths, who can participate by coding the songs to be re-transmitted during major outreach events…
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Labels: legitimacy, Nigeria, state capacity
University security in Nigeria
Many universities (outside of the USA) build fences around the main part of their campuses. The University of Maiduguri is digging a trench. Is this a sign of vitality or a sign of limited state capacity? Or both?
Nigerian university builds trench to stop Boko Haram attacks
Authorities in north-eastern Nigeria have begun digging a 27km (17 mile) trench around the University of Maiduguri to prevent attacks by Boko Haram Islamist militants…
 |
| Borno trench |
Boko Haram, who want an Islamic state, loosely translates from Hausa as "Western education is forbidden"…
The trenches are designed to make it impossible for the militants to drive into the university as well as making it harder for them to access the campus on foot.
Borno state governor Kashim Shettima is financing the trench and has asked the Nigerian government for money to fund a permanent barrier.
Mr Shettima is also releasing money to pay allowances to guards drawn from local vigilante groups, who are working with the police to patrol the area.
He said that while the university was a federal institution, it was the Borno state government's responsibility to stop the militants from achieving their aim of forcing the university's closure…
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Labels: cleavages, Nigeria, state capacity
Limitations on state capacity
When officials and military officers collect salaries for non-existent workers and soldiers, that's one kind of corruption. Stealing and selling food meant for starving people is another kind. The authorities in Nigeria don't seem to be able to do much about either kind of theft.
'Half' Nigeria food aid for Boko Haram victims not delivered
Up to half the food aid meant for people who have fled Nigeria's Islamist insurgency has reportedly not been delivered, the government says.
 |
| Food aid in Nigeria |
It described it as a "diversion of relief materials", which correspondents say is a euphemism for theft.
A statement from the acting president's office added that security was being beefed up to protect the deliveries.
As a result of Boko Haram violence some 8.5 million Nigerians in the north-east need life-saving aid, officials say.
Poor rains have exacerbated a problem caused by fighting with Boko Haram Islamist militants, which has forced hundreds of thousands of people to flee their homes…
The statement from acting President Yemi Osinbajo said aid going missing had "dogged food delivery" and then cited reports saying that more than 50 lorries out of every 100 sent to the north-east never reach their destination.
It does not say what has happened to the diverted food, but in May two Nigerian officials were jailed for selling food aid.
Last week, Nigeria apologised to Saudi Arabia after 200 tonnes of dates the kingdom sent as a Ramadan gift were found on sale in local markets.
Mr Osinbajo said that the latest consignment of aid which is making its way to the north-east is being protected by more than a thousand soldiers.
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Labels: corruption, Nigeria, state capacity
Sinking Mexican city
Here's an environmental issue that illustrates the capacity of the state. Will Mexico lose its capital and its government?
Climate change is threatening to push a crowded capital toward a breaking point.
Mexico City, a mile and a half above sea level, [is] sinking, collapsing in on itself…
Always short of water, Mexico City keeps drilling deeper for more, weakening the ancient clay lake beds on which the Aztecs first built much of the city, causing it to crumble even further…
It is a cycle made worse by climate change. More heat and drought mean more evaporation and yet more demand for water, adding pressure to tap distant reservoirs at staggering costs or further drain underground aquifers and hasten the city’s collapse…
 |
| Props for tilted buildings |
The effects of climate change are varied and opportunistic, but one thing is consistent: They are like sparks in the tinder. They expose cities’ biggest vulnerabilities, inflaming troubles that politicians and city planners often ignore or try to paper over. And they spread outward, defying borders…
For many cities around the world, adapting to climate change is a route to long-term prosperity. That’s the good news, where societies are willing to listen. But adaptation can also be costly and slow. It can run counter to the rhythms of political campaigns and headlong into powerful, entrenched interests, confounding business as usual…
Unlike traffic jams or crime, climate change isn’t something most people easily feel or see. It is certainly not what residents in Mexico City talk about every day. But it is like an approaching storm, straining an already precarious social fabric and threatening to push a great city toward a breaking point…
Overseeing the city’s water supply is a thin, patient man with the war-weary air of an old general: Ramón Aguirre Díaz, director of the Water System of Mexico City, is unusually frank about the perils ahead…
If it stops raining in the reservoirs where the city gets its water, “we’re facing a potential disaster,” he said. “There is no way we can provide enough trucks of water to deal with that scenario.”
“If we have the problems that California and São Paulo have had,” he added, “there is the serious possibility of unrest.”…
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Labels: environment, Mexico, policy, state capacity
Violence and governance in Mexico
Is the Mexican government capable of governing? The wars among drug gangs suggest not. Can the government and/or the regime survive?
Mexico Grapples With a Surge in Violence
By the end of October, at least 96 people had been killed in the border city of Ciudad Juárez. It was the highest monthly tally since 2012…
In the last year, the number of homicides around Mexico has soared to levels not seen in several years…
The relapse in security has unnerved Mexico and led many to wonder whether the country is on the brink of a bloody, all-out war between criminal groups…
The surge in violence around Mexico reflects an increasingly volatile criminal landscape and the limitations of North America’s counternarcotics strategy, and it has contributed to the plummeting approval ratings of President Enrique Peña Nieto.
A longstanding cornerstone of the Mexican government’s fight against organized crime — backed by hundreds of millions of dollars in American aid — has been to aim at the kingpins, on the theory that cutting off the head will wither the body. But the tactic has helped to fragment monolithic, hierarchical criminal enterprises into an array of groups that are more violent and uncontrollable, analysts said.
Though the clashes between remnant drug groups are widely thought to be a significant cause in the rising violence, analysts and government officials also point to other factors, including changes in political control of state and municipal governments after recent elections.
As old political power structures make way for new ones, cooperation between the corrupt authorities and criminal groups fall apart, analysts said…
Even while acknowledging the increase in homicides, officials have apparently sought to play it down…
Officials have also denied that the problem is widespread…
The responses have left many analysts to conclude that the administration lacks a coherent strategy to address the problem…
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Labels: corruption, Mexico, state capacity
Another burden
Nigeria may be the richest country in Africa, but it hardly seems capable of dealing with its challenges.
A famine unlike any we have ever seen
They survived Boko Haram. Now many of them are on the brink of starvation.
Across the northeastern corner of this country, more than 3 million people displaced and isolated by the militants are facing one of the world’s biggest humanitarian disasters. Every day, more children are dying because there isn’t enough food. Curable illnesses are killing others. Even polio has returned…
The staggering hunger crisis created by the insurgents has been largely hidden from view, partly because it has been extremely dangerous for aid groups and journalists to visit the area…
In 2014, after years of guerrilla attacks, Boko Haram fighters swept across Borno… Less well-known was the insurgents’ destruction of the agricultural output of Borno, a Belgium-size state that was once a breadbasket for the region.
The Nigerian military, working with the armies of neighboring countries, launched an offensive in 2015 that reclaimed major cities across Borno. But Boko Haram fighters still moved freely throughout much of the vast countryside. Often, humanitarian workers say, it was too dangerous to send food to those areas…
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| Refugee camp near Monguno, Nigeria |
The Nigerian military has formulated its own strategy to end the war: starve the enemy. It is now blocking all food, including from regional markets, from entering parts of Borno where Boko Haram might be lurking.
That has contributed to the possibility that hundreds of thousands of civilians held or isolated by insurgents could starve alongside fighters…
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The Comparative Government and Politics Review Checklist.
Two pages summarizing the course requirements to help you review and study for the final and for the big exam in May. . It contains a description of comparative methods, a list of commonly used theories
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Labels: Nigeria, state capacity, terrorism
Basic example of China's economic dilemmas
So, why is that the booming Chinese economy is slowing down? What's happening to production? Here's a most basic explanation.
Bleak times in bra town
A PYRAMID of bras stands beside each worker at the Honji Underwear factory in Gurao, a town in the southern province of Guangdong… Gurao produces 350m bras and 430m vests and pairs of knickers a year for sale at home and abroad. Undies account for 80% of its industrial output…
[M]any people in Gurao and other underwear-factory clusters around Shantou, a coastal city, worry about the future. Costs are rising, but customers are unwilling to pay more, says June Liu of Pengsheng Underwear, which makes lingerie and swimwear. Last year several factory-owners fled from Gurao, leaving debts and unpaid wages…
During the past three decades of rapid economic growth, one-industry towns like Gurao… sprang up along China’s eastern seaboard… they fuelled the country’s export boom. There are now more than 500 such towns, making products such as buttons, ties, plastic shoes, car tyres, toys, Christmas decorations and toilets…
Niche towns in China produce 63% of the world’s shoes, 70% of its spectacles and 90% of its energy-saving lamps…
China’s consumer goods grabbed a huge share of global markets thanks to their low prices. That advantage is fading. Since 2001 wages have risen by 12% a year. Thailand and Vietnam, where labour is cheaper and taxes lower, now make lingerie for global brands such as Victoria’s Secret and La Senza. China’s biggest underwear firm, Regina Miracle, will open two factories in Vietnam…
Gurao still has advantages, such as excellent supply chains. Several factories there make components for undergarments: dyed textiles, lace and the tough foam used to upholster push-up bras. Every form of elastic waistband used for boxer shorts is produced locally…
Officials in Gurao insist that the town can overcome its difficulties by upgrading its technology and using machines instead of people. But attracting the capital and skill to transform Gurao may be more difficult than [it once was]…
In 2013 migrant workers made up nearly half of Gurao’s 161,000 people. Many are low-skilled, moving from one job to another… Most did not complete high school and are ill-equipped to retrain for jobs in service industries, which the Chinese government hopes will replace manufacturing ones…
Some of the one-product boomtowns could fade away, leaving little behind but the concrete shells of empty factories and polluted soil…
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The Comparative Government and Politics Review Checklist.
Two pages summarizing the course requirements to help you review and study for the final and for the big exam in May. . It contains a description of comparative methods, a list of commonly used theories
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Labels: China, economics, state capacity
Increasing state capacity
Outside investment is a common way to expand the capacity of a state. President Buhari did that in Beijing.
China, Nigeria pledge to further promote strategic relations
China and Nigeria has pledged to further promote their strategic partnership during the state visit of Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari.
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| Xi and Buhari |
To further deepen the two countries' friendship and reciprocal cooperation is in the long-term interests of the two countries and peoples, and conducive to the peace, stability and development of Africa and the world, said Chinese President Xi Jinping, in his talks with Buhari at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing.. .
Xi said the two sides should maintain high-level engagement, increase exchanges in all areas, give each other understanding and support on issues of their core interests and major concern, and strengthen strategic mutual trust.
China is ready to expand bilateral cooperation in such areas as agriculture, fisheries, oil refining, mineral exploitation, mechatronics, light industry, textile and processing. China is also willing to help Nigeria solve the bottleneck of infrastructure, professionals and funds in developing industry and modern agriculture, Xi said…
Xi also pledged to give more support to Africa's development. He said China will implement the outcome of the latest Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) summit held in Johannesburg last December to give more assistance to Africa to realize reciprocity and common development.
Buhari thanked China for its long-term assistance to Nigeria's infrastructure construction…
Teaching Comparative blog entries are indexed. Use the search box to look for country names or concept labels attached to each entry.
What You Need to Know 7th edition is ready to help.
Order the book
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Amazon's customers gave this book a 4-star rating.
Just The Facts! 2nd edition is a concise guide to concepts, terminology, and examples that will appear on May's exam.
Just The Facts! is available. Order HERE.
Amazon's customers gave this book a 5-star rating.
The Comparative Government and Politics Review Checklist.
Two pages summarizing the course requirements to help you review and study for the final and for the big exam in May. . It contains a description of comparative methods, a list of commonly used theories
, a list of vital concepts, thumbnail descriptions of the AP6,
and
a description of the AP exam format
. $2.00.
Order HERE.
What You Need to Know: Teaching Tools, the original version and v2.0 are available to help curriculum planning.
Labels: China, state capacity, UK
History of Boko Haram
This article is probably a good addition to your textbook's account of Boko Haram in Nigeria.
The brutal toll of Boko Haram’s attacks on civilians
As the Islamic State’s attacks in Europe have captured the world’s attention, an ISIS-affiliated group has been waging an even deadlier campaign in Africa…
The group’s rise, some experts say, is attributable to government corruption and economic differences between the Muslim northern areas and more populous and prosperous Christian South…
Last year was the group’s deadliest yet, according to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project, which tracks civil unrest and political violence in Africa and Asia.
Researchers recorded more than 6,000 fatalities resulting from Boko Haram attacks aimed at civilians…
Stopping the insurgency is not the only crisis Nigeria faces. More than 2 million Nigerians have been forced to leave their homes to escape the violence…
While it may not draw the attention of the West as frequently as the Islamic State, Boko Haram is one of the most devastating terrorist organizations in the world. Regaining territory from the group will only be the first step in a long process of healing the deep wounds it has inflicted.
Teaching Comparative blog entries are indexed. Use the search box to look for country names or concept labels attached to each entry.
What You Need to Know 7th edition is ready to help.
Order the book
HERE
Amazon's customers gave this book a 4-star rating.
Just The Facts! 2nd edition is a concise guide to concepts, terminology, and examples that will appear on May's exam.
Just The Facts! is available. Order HERE.
Amazon's customers gave this book a 5-star rating.
The Comparative Government and Politics Review Checklist.
Two pages summarizing the course requirements to help you review and study for the final and for the big exam in May. . It contains a description of comparative methods, a list of commonly used theories
, a list of vital concepts, thumbnail descriptions of the AP6,
and
a description of the AP exam format
. $2.00.
Order HERE.
What You Need to Know: Teaching Tools, the original version and v2.0 are available to help curriculum planning.
Labels: cleavages, Nigeria, state capacity, terrorism
Water and state capacity
Not capacity for water, but capacity to provide the constitutionally guaranteed safe water to citizens. It's a challenge in Mexico.
Leaking pipes mean Mexico City, flush with water, has to truck it in
The cinder block homes lining the hillsides on the edge of this metropolis are connected to the municipal network of water pipes.
But the water doesn't arrive that way. It comes on tanker trucks…
In a city built on a lake bed where it rains all summer, the problem isn't exactly a shortage of water. Rather the infrastructure of pipes is so riddled with cracks that a third of the water the city puts into the system leaks into the ground…
Making matters worse, the city's population is growing fastest in the places where the water supply is the most unreliable. Home to about 2 million people, Iztapalapa is a common destination for people relocating in search of work.
Wealthier areas of the city, in contrast, usually have enough water to fill their swimming pools, wash their SUVs and water their golf courses…
Efforts to extend the water infrastructure failed to keep pace with the city's expansion…
About a million residents — more than a tenth of the city's population — rely on the trucks for their water…
The water is usually not potable — residents throughout the city buy bottled water for drinking — but without it, even basic sanitation is impossible…
[T]he chief of the city's water system, called rainwater collection a "provisional measure" at best.
As a longer-term solution, he said, the city plans to start construction this year of 22 water recycling plants, which will clean sewage and send the water back to homes, an increasingly common practice in cities around the world. The project is part of a plan to provide water to all residents by 2018.
The city also aims to repair all of its cracked pipes over the next seven years.
But as leaks are patched, new ones are likely to spring open. And if the population keeps growing, it will require even more water to sustain itself.
Teaching Comparative blog entries are indexed. Use the search box to look for country names or concept labels attached to each entry.
What You Need to Know 7th edition is ready to help.
Order the book
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Amazon's customers gave this book a 4-star rating.
Just The Facts! 2nd edition is a concise guide to concepts, terminology, and examples that will appear on May's exam.
Just The Facts! is available. Order HERE.
Amazon's customers gave this book a 5-star rating.
The Comparative Government and Politics Review Checklist.
Two pages summarizing the course requirements to help you review and study for the final and for the big exam in May. . It contains a description of comparative methods, a list of commonly used theories
, a list of vital concepts, thumbnail descriptions of the AP6,
and
a description of the AP exam format
. $2.00.
Order HERE.
What You Need to Know: Teaching Tools, the original version and v2.0 are available to help curriculum planning.
Labels: Mexico, politics, state capacity
Go-slows in Nigeria
Can you hypothesize reasons for the inability of the government (state capacity) to act in the face of such huge problems on the streets of Lagos?
Beatings and bribes: the corruption behind Lagos's traffic jams
The activity at Oshodi motor park (bus station) is almost dizzying. The
yellow Danfo buses have no queues – just crowds… in the thick congestion of people, demand far outweighs supply.
But it’s not just bus drivers and passengers here. Lagos motor parks are also the staging grounds for a carefully calibrated hierarchy of officials – some more official than others.
At the top are the Lagos State Traffic Management Authority (LASTMA), the city’s road conductors. Wearing their uniforms of bright cream shirts and red trousers, they brandish long sticks, beating the sides of the buses to encourage them to move out…
Simultaneously, however, the National Union of Rail Transport Workers (NURTW) parades the area, its men charging drivers a levy for passengers… Many are “area boys” – Lagos slang for hoodlums.
The management of traffic is an almost overwhelming challenge in Lagos. Poor road quality, overpopulation and a lack of alternatives have made the city’s car traffic legendary for being among the world’s worst… As well as the Danfo buses, the roads are jammed with Maruwas (three-wheelers) and Okadas (motorbike taxis)…
Bus rapid transit (BRT) has been operational since 2008. The coaches are cheaper than their smaller counterparts and drive in a separate designated lane – but other motorists frequently intrude if there’s gridlock. Enforcing traffic rules is a key challenge…
The area boys of the NURTW, however, remain entirely unregulated. The union enjoys a murky relationship with the state government. Though the levies they charge are theoretically meant to maintain motor parks, the majority of those motor parks remain squalid…
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| NURTW at "work" |
The NURTW’s shady autonomy is protected by politics – some groups of the organisation are loyal to the current All Progressives Congress government, others to the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) or other parties. Fights between rival factions are common…
“During election periods the NURTW acts as a kind of support base for political parties,” says Temi Templar, a journalist from the Guardian Nigeria…
In other words, they help bring in votes. They embezzle the money from levies to pay young men to be particularly zealous at election time: canvasing for votes, attending rallies, tampering with election procedures and outright intimidation…
Teaching Comparative blog entries are indexed. Use the search box to look for country names or concept labels attached to each entry.
What You Need to Know 7th edition is ready to help.
Order the book
HERE
Amazon's customers gave this book a 4-star rating.
Just The Facts! 2nd edition is a concise guide to concepts, terminology, and examples that will appear on May's exam.
Just The Facts! is available. Order HERE.
Amazon's customers gave this book a 5-star rating.
The Comparative Government and Politics Review Checklist.
Two pages summarizing the course requirements to help you review and study for the final and for the big exam in May. . It contains a description of comparative methods, a list of commonly used theories
, a list of vital concepts, thumbnail descriptions of the AP6,
and
a description of the AP exam format
. $2.00.
Order HERE.
What You Need to Know: Teaching Tools, the original version and v2.0 are available to help curriculum planning.
Labels: Nigeria, rule of law, state capacity
Just The Facts! 2nd edition is a concise guide to concepts, terminology, and examples that will appear on May's exam.
