Crisis and Innovation in Asian Technology or In the Barrios

Crisis and Innovation in Asian Technology

Author: Richard J Samuels

The economic crises in Asia at the turn of the millennium changed the innovation and business production systems of China, Malaysia, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, Thailand, and Taiwan. This investigation follows several different industries, including semiconductors, automobiles, and hard disk drives. It explores the approaches that Asian nations have taken to building a strong technological and economic base for their respective industries from technonationalism to technoglobalism. It asks if the Asian economic miracle is over, or whether these countries are reinventing their economies.

Table of Contents:

	Figures and Tables
	Contributors
	Acknowledgments
1	Innovation and the Asian Economies	1
2	Japanese Production Networks in Asia: Extending the Status Quo	23
3	Crisis and Innovation in Japan: A New Future through Technoentrepreneurship?	57
4	Crisis, Reform, and National Innovation in South Korea	86
5	From National Champions to Global Partners: Crisis, Globalization, and the Korean Auto Industry	108
6	Crisis and Adaptation in Taiwan and South Korea: The Political Economy of Semiconductors	137
7	China in Search of a Workable Model: Technology Development in the New Millennium	160
8	Economic Crisis and Technological Trajectories: Hard Disk Drive Production in Southeast Asia	187
9	Continuity and Change in Asian Innovation	226
	Index	243

Go to: Player Manager or Knowledge Management

In the Barrios: Latinos and the Underclass Debate

Author: Joan W Moor

The image of the "underclass" framed by persistent poverty, long-term joblessness, school dropout, teenage pregnancy, and drug use, has become synonymous with urban poverty. But does this image tell us enough about how the diverse minorities among the urban poor actually experience and cope with poverty? No, say the contributors to In the Barrios. Their portraits of eight Latino communities - in New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Houston, Chicago, Albuquerque, Laredo, and Tucson - reveal a far more complex reality. In the Barrios responds directly to current debates on the origins of the "underclass" and depicts the cultural, demographic, and historical forces that have shaped poor Latino communities. These neighborhoods share many hardships, yet they manifest no "typical" form of poverty. Instead, each group adapts its own cultural and social resources to the difficult economic circumstances of American urban life. Mexican Americans in Tucson are among the poorest people in the country, yet bolstered by strong extended families and affordable local housing, many own their own homes. In a Puerto Rican neighborhood in Brooklyn, displaced workers are suffering severely, but they live side by side with working-class homeowners who are contributing substantially to the institutional viability of the community. In the Barrios challenges the image of isolation and decay that is so often portrayed in theories of urban poverty. The contributors explore the network of economic and emotional support that many Latino neighborhoods share across families and borders, strengthening their collective ability to cope. While underclass theories stress the loss of manufacturing jobs as a cause of persistent hardship, In the Barrios illustrates the importance of Latino employment in small community-serving businesses and in off-the-books enterprises such as street vending. New immigrants concentrate in definable areas, building a local economy that provides affordable amenities and at

Booknews

Responding directly to current debates on the origins of the "underclass," portraits of eight Latino communities--in New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Houston, Chicago, Albuquerque, Laredo, and Tucson--depict the cultural, demographic, and historical forces that have shaped poor Latino communities. Paper edition (unseen), $16.95. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)