Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

The Use Of And Interest In Ancient Grains In Northeastern Institutional Kitchens, Jg Malacarne, Cheryl Bilinski, Bruce Wyatt, Kevin Leavitt

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

We report on a survey of institutional kitchens in the Northeast, seeking to better understand the extent to which institutions currently use locally produced grain products and what barriers they face in increasing their use of local grain products. We focus additional attention on local, organic grains, and ask specifically about a set of “ancient” grains: barley, einkorn, farro, rye, and spelt. Results indicate that current use of these products is extremely low. Familiarity with the grains in question, both by kitchen staff and their customers, emerges as a first-order barrier to expanding use of ancient grains in institutional kitchens. …

Long-Term Gene–Culture Coevolution And The Human Evolutionary Transition, Timothy M. Waring, Zachary T. Wood

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

It has been suggested that the human species may be undergoing an evolutionary transition in individuality (ETI). But there is disagreement about how to apply the ETI framework to our species, and whether culture is implicated as either cause or consequence. Long-term gene–culture coevolution (GCC) is also poorly understood. Some have argued that culture steers human evolution, while others proposed that genes hold culture on a leash. We review the literature and evidence on long-term GCC in humans and find a set of common themes. First, culture appears to hold greater adaptive potential than genetic inheritance and is probably driving …

A Climate Chronology, Sharon S. Tisher

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

The most challenging of all endeavors in human history will likely be that of understanding the impact of our industrial and technological enterprises on the planet’s climate and ecosystems, and responding effectively to the threats posed by that impact. I began writing this chronology while developing a climate policy course at the University of Maine. It has grown substantially during the ensuing nine years, and continues to grow.

By juxtaposing developments in climate science, U.S. policy, and international policy over the previous two centuries, I hope to give the reader new insights into where we have been, where we are …

Cooperation Across Organizational Boundaries: Experimental Evidence From A Major Sustainability Science Project, Timothy M. Waring, Sandra Hughes Goff, Julia Mcguire, Z. Dylan Moore, Abigail Sullivan

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

Engaged research emphasizes researcher–stakeholder collaborations as means of improving the relevance of research outcomes and the chances for science-based decision-making. Sustainability science, as a form of engaged research, depends on the collaborative abilities and cooperative tendencies of researchers. We use an economic experiment to measure cooperation between university faculty, local citizens, and faculty engaged in a large sustainability science project to test a set of hypotheses: (1) faculty on the sustainability project will cooperate more with local residents than non-affiliated faculty, (2) sustainability faculty will have the highest level of internal cooperation of any group, and (3) that cooperation may …

Economic Impacts Of The New England Aqua Ventus (Phases I And Ii) Offshore Wind Power Program In Maine, Todd M. Gabe

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

The purpose of this study is to examine the statewide economic impacts of the New England Aqua Ventus offshore wind power program in Maine. Phase I of this program involves the planning and construction, and ongoing operations of a 12 MW pilot project; and Phase II of Aqua Ventus involves a 500 MW offshore wind power installation along with the production of VolturnUS floating platforms & towers that could be used in other offshore wind projects.

Competitive Market Socialism: A Practical Alternative For Sectors Of The Cuban Economy, Melvin Burke

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

The focus of this paper is to test for evidence of technical and scale efficiency in the commercial banking sector in Malaysia. In this context, the study attempts to evaluate if there are any differences between the efficiency of domestic and foreign owned Malaysian banks by applying the Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA). The result indicates that Malaysian commercial banks did not efficiently combine their inputs and that technical inefficiency was attributed to scale inefficiency.

Nafta Integration: Unproductive Finance And Real Unemployment, Melvin Burke

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

NAFTA did not begin on January 1, 1994, but rather, many years earlier in 1988 with the Canadian/USA Free Trade Agreement and with President Carlos Salinas de Gortari's economic reforms. The latest Mexican crisis is but the historic continuation of its 1982 debt crisis. Both are part of the larger global stagnation crisis which began in the 1970s and continues today. NAFTA is not a free trade agreement, but rather the creation of a North American trade block, designed and implemented by American multinational corporations to obtain a greater share of a stagnant global output. It is not a "win, …

La Economía Política Del Tlc, La Crisis Global Y México, Melvin Burke

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

El Tratado de Libre Comercio (TLC)1 acordado entre Canadá, Estados Unidos y México es una extensión lógica y probablemente inevitable del Tratado de Libre Comercio entre Estados Unidos y Canadá. Ambos acuerdos son controvertidos y, con buena razón, existe una oposición pública masiva a ellos. Nunca se ha podido dar una explicación creíble sobre la necesidad del acuerdo a la población de estas tres democracias. Contrariamente a las afirma-ciones de los propulsores y de los gobiernos responsables de estos acuerdos, no existen garantías de que se consigan los beneficios netos señalados por ellos. Tampoco está claro quiénes saldrán beneficiados y …

The Political Economy Of Nafta: The Global Crisis And Mexico, Melvin Burke

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

The proposed North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)¹ between Canada, the United States of America and Mexico is a logical and perhaps inevitable extensions of the 1989 Free Trade Agreement (FTA) between Canada and the U.S.A. Both agreements are controversial and massive public opposition to them exists in all three countries² for good reasons, as we shall see. The citizens of these three democracies have never been provided with a credible explanation of the need for agreement.

The Human Costs Of Nafta, Melvin Burke

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

The proposed North American Free Trade Agreement between the United States, Canada, and Mexico is the logical and perhaps inevitable extension of the 1989 Free Trade Agreement between the United States and Canada. Both agreements are controversial, and massive public opposition exists in all three countries—for good reasons, as we shall see. The citizens of these three nations have never been provided with a credible explanation of the need for NAFTA. Contrary to the proclamations of NAFTA's proponents, there are no guarantees that the supposed benefits ofthe free trade agreement will be realized, nor is it clear who will gain …

Bolivia: The Politics Of Cocaine, Melvin Burke

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

Bolivia's sad and turbulent history continues to repeat itself. The coca boom of today has replaced the tin boom of the last century, which in turn supplanted the exploitation of silver and other precious metals during the colonial period. And as in the past, Bolivia's export-based economy continues to depend on foreigners for everything from bank loans to economic advisers.

Privatization In The Center And The Latin American Periphery, Melvin Burke

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

"Privatization" is being promoted in this decade as the ultimate economic panacea. The latest "privatization craze" began in 1980 in Britain under Margaret Thatcher and has since spread throughout the industrialized nations of the world, such as France, Japan, the United States. More recently, the policy of privatization has been introduced in Mexico, Brazil, and other Third World countries. Billions of dollars of public assets have already been sold on the market to private investors and billions more of government tax revenues have been contracted out to private firms during this decade.

What precisely is this latest economic phenomenon sweeping …

Contracting Out: A Study Of The Honduran Experience, Melvin Burke, Richard J. Moore, Donald A. Swanson, Gill Chin Lim, Jacob Greenstein, Richard A. Fehnel

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

This study was conducted by the National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration (NASPAA) at the request of USAID/Honduras under the terms of NASPAA's Technical Cooperative Agreement with USAID. The study examined the experiences of USAID/Honduras and the Government of Honduras with the contracting out of construction activities in three sectors. The purpose of the study was to document empirical evidence regarding the performance of contracting out as a policy measure to increase private sector initiatives in Honduras.

The Corporación Minera De Bolivia (Comibol) And The Triangular Plan: A Case Study In Dependency, Melvin Burke

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

This monograph is a study of a nationalized industry in an underdeveloped country. The geographical setting is Latin America and the specific case study is that of Corporacion Minera de Bolivia, better known as COMIBOL. The intent of the study is to evaluate the Triangular Plan, a $62 million financial assistance program funded 1961 to 1970 by the Inter-American Development Bank and the governments of West Germany and the United States. After less than a decade of existence (1952-1960), COMIBOL was decapitalized, de facto bankrupt, and on the verge of collapse. The objective of the Triangular Plan was to rehabilitate …

We Eat The Mines And The Mines Eat Us: Dependency And Exploitation In Bolivian Tin Mines (Book Review), Melvin Burke

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

...[t]here is much to be learned by anthropologists, economists, Bolivian scholars, socialists, and capitalists alike from this book. None of these individuals will be completely satisfied, since the work will not be sufficiently scientific or ideologically correct for specialists. Such, however, is the nature of a truly cross-disciplinary study like the one here under review. Nevertheless, virtually everyone who reads Nash's latest book should find it, as I did, enlightening, interesting, and above all emotionally moving.

We Eat The Mines And The Mines Eat Us: Dependency And Exploitation In Bolivian Tin Mines (Book Review), Melvin Burke

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

This book is about the high human cost of producing tin and other minerals. June Nash vividly describes the arduous physical labor and life of Bolivian miners in the physically inhospitable Andean mountains. More than an anthropological account of indigenous miners in far-off Bolivia, the book is a serious rendering of the contemporary social, economic, and political reality at the industrial world periphery. It is a unique blend of disciplines, paradigms, and philosophies which moves one back and forth in time and space and thought. Nash is able to tie this all together by permitting the miners to speak for …

The Stabilization Programs Of The International Monetary Fund: The Case Of Bolivia, Melvin Burke

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

The ubiquitous, much studied but little understood, stabilization programs of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) exist today throughout the so-called Third World. The IMF's stated objective is to facilitate the expansion of international trade as a step toward the promotion and maintenance of high levels of employment and real income and the development of the productive resources of all members. It employs vast financial resources and political power to promote the free flow of international trade and finance.

El Sistema De Plantación Y Ia Proletarización Del Trabajo Agrícola En El Salvador, Melvin Burke

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

La concentración de la tierra en El Salvador data de la Conquita Española. Antes de 1900 existía un número significante de 4 tipos de unidades agrícolas: minifundio, tierras comunitarias, latifundio y plantaciones. Esta incómoda coexistencia gradualmente cedió a las fuerzas de la modernización cuando la demanda extranjera de café, azúcar y más tarde de algondón aumentaron. La transformación agrícola que result no dejó ni un semento de la economía intact. Los ranchos colonials se convirtieron en su mayor parte en plantaciones; las plantaciones antiquas de añil cambiaron su mezcla de productos; las tierras comunales fueron abolidas por la ley de …

From National Populism To National Corporatism: The Case Of Bolivia (1952-1970), Melvin Burke, James M. Malloy

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

Analyzes the experience of Bolivia with an experiment in a populist resolution of its socioeconomic problems from 1952 to 1970. Objectives of national populist ideology; Factors that lead to the failure of Movimiento Nacionalista Revolucionario in Bolivia to achieve its revolutionary goals: Resurgence of private sector in mining and petroleum.

Estudios Críticos Sobre La Economía Boliviana, Melvin Burke

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

Land reform and its effect on production and productivity in the region of Lake Titicaca. Land reform in the region of Lake Titicaca. The private sector in the Bolivian economy and the need for credit. From national corporatism national populism (the case of Bolivia, 1952-1970).

Does "Food For Peace" Assistance Damage The Bolivian Economy?, Melvin Burke

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

Do commodity surplus shipments in fact "encourage economic development in the developing countries ... that are determined to improve their own agricultural production ... "?¹ Or conversely, is it true that "food aid is damaging to the countries which receive it, and they should be helped to increase the productivity of their own farmers"?² The former Bolivian Minister of Petroleum, Marcelo Quiroga, who was largely responsible for the nationalization of the Gulf Oil subsidiary in his country, apparently believes "Food for Peace" aid is damaging to the Bolivian economy.

Land Reform In The Lake Titicaca Region, Melvin Burke

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

Bolivia's National Revolutionary party (MNR) seized power in April 1952 and a year and a half later in August 1953 promulgated the agrarian reform law, which redistributed the land of the haciendas to the former Indian tenants and others. This comparative economic study of the haciendas and ex-haciendas in the Lake Titicaca region of Bolivia and Peru was undertaken to answer three important, but largely unresolved, questions about land reform: (1 ) Which land-tenure system-large estates or small peasant farms-affords the agriculture laborers and cultivators the greater freedom of mobility, opportunity, income, and education? (2) Did the Land-tenancy conditions of …

An Analysis Of The Bolivian Land Reform By Means Of A Comparison Between Peruvian Haciendas And Bolivian Ex-Haciendas, Melvin Burke

School of Economics Faculty Scholarship

In April of 1952, the Movimiento Nacionalista Revolucionario, seized power in Bolivia and in August of the following year passed the Decreto de la Reforma Agraria and proceeded to redistribute the land of the latifundios to the former Indian laborers. This paper intends to analyze the economic and socio-economic consequences of this Bolivian revolutionary land redistribution by means of a comparative study of Peruvian haciendas and Bolivian ex-haciendas in the Lake Titicaca region.

The present study will follow the plan thus indicated. The first section introduces the subject of land reform with a review of the literature and the …