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GCI Working Paper Series - 2009
Structure Is Space: 63-66, a mosaic installation at the Hilliard Apartments.
Olivia Gude
July 2009
Creating a safe space for expression through art can forge immense opportunity for meaningful communication and sharing of space between diverse inhabitants of a specific location. This account of the making of a community-based public artwork for the newly renovated Hilliard Apartments documents through pictures and stories how this mosaic installation facilitated the building of connections among old, new and newly returned inhabitants of this housing complex. The project explores space-remembered, internalized spaces, psychological and social spaces, and the actual spaces in which we live, learn and work by way of inhabitant participation and exploration of the architectural design history of the Hilliard Apartment complex, namely Bauhaus-education artist Bertrand Goldberg. In this way, the creation and installation of a series of mosiac pieces resulted in an intergenerational and multicultural common appreciation of the meaning of these themes.
Prague, Tourism and the Post-Industrial City
Lily M. Hoffman and Jiri Musil
May 2009
GCP-09-05
Although urban tourism has been one of the important forces shaping cities during the past few decades, most studies on the transition from the industrial to the post-industrial city focus on the shift to financial and professional services. There are still few studies of the role of tourism in the transformation of urban political economy, social structure and culture (Hoffman, Fainstein, Judd, Cities and Visitors, Blackwell 2003). In an earlier article on post-communist Prague, we examined the emergence of tourism as a byproduct of democratization and marketization (Hoffman and Musil in The Tourist City, Judd & Fainstein (eds) Yale U Press 1999). This present article takes a broader more contextual view of the role of tourism in the development of contemporary Prague. Looking beyond tourism per se, we argue that the exponential growth of tourism in post 1989 Prague helps explain its relatively smooth (and rapid) transition from industrial to post-industrial or service center city. The specifics of this case address some of the lacunae in the discussion of transition from industrialization. First, much of the “de-industrialization” literature refers primarily to industrial cities. Many cities however, are mixed. Second, there is little or no discussion of the role of tourism in the transition. Third, where tourism is discussed, it is usually, as an urban development stratagem; here it has emerged spontaneously. Fourth, by taking a developmental perspective, we hope to provide a more analytic account of tourism’s impact on social and spatial structure--both regulatory and representational aspects.
Joint Environmental and Cost Efficiency Analysis of the Electricity Production Industry: Applying the Materials Balance Condition
Eric Welch and Darold T. Barnum
February 2009
GCP-09-03
The electricity generation industry produces a substantial proportion of the greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change in the United States and globally. Yet, little research has been done to examine what the economic and environmental tradeoffs currently are for electric power plants. This paper demonstrates a new method, developed by Coelli, Lauwers, and Van Huylenbroeck [4,1,3], to calculate the optimal allocation of carbon containing fuel inputs and consideration of economic costs of electricity production. Using EIA 906 and FERC 423 data, the paper estimates cost/carbon tradeoffs facing two sets of plants: those that use coal and gas inputs and those that use coal, gas and oil inputs. Findings show that for the three input case, there is a 78.9% percent increase in cost for moving from the cost efficient point to the carbon efficient point, while there is a 38% increase in carbon to move from the carbon efficient point to the cost efficient point. These findings, while based only on a subset of electric power plants, indicates that the policy gap between efficient cost and environmental production is wide and will require substantial government and market incentives, as well as restructuring of the industry before it can be narrowed. The paper also identifies some plants that are super inefficient: they can improve both cost and carbon efficiency by changing their mixture of carbon inputs.
Making Sense of Renaissance 2010 School Policy in Chicago:
Race, Class, and the Cultural Politics of Neoliberal Urban Restructuring
Pauline Lipman
January 2009
GCP-09-02
Chicago has long been a focus of national attention on urban education policy, and its latest plan to remake public education is no exception. In 2004, Chicago's mayor announced Renaissance 2010 (Ren2010), a plan to close 60-70 schools and reopen 100 new schools, at least two-thirds as charter or contract schools. Charter schools are public schools chartered by the state to be rum by private group. They have greater autonomy in operation and curriculum than CPS schools. Renaissance 2010 is perhaps the most significant experiment in the US to reinvent an urban public school system on neoliberal lines. Part of the Ren2010 agenda is to create new mixed-income schools in mixed-income communities created in the wake of the demolition of public housing.
My focus in this paper is the cultural politics of this policy, how it "makes sense" on the ground and how neoliberalism is materialized through the actions of social movements and social actors. Here, I am interested in a) the discourse of racial pathology underpinning mixed-income schools/housing and b) rearticulation of discourses of equity and self-determination to the market and individual choice through charter schools. I am especially interested in how the "good sense" in these policies connects with people's lived experiences to further a hegemonic neoliberal agenda and the implications for constructing a counter-hegemonic movement.
Latino adolescents in the U.S. endure health and social inequities such that they are less likely to complete high school and less likely to have access to health care than their non-Latino white counterparts. These disparities can compromise chances for health and social advancement over the life course.
The purpose of this paper is to present a participatory evaluation using an empowerment framework to demonstrate how a local, urban cultural center for youth fosters (1) Latino Unity and positive youth development among participants; (2) youth led action and organizational empowerment, (3) positive community connectedness and community-building and (4) broader societal connectedness and social justice
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