Showing papers by "London School of Economics and Political Science published in 1971"

Dissent on development

Abstract: With style and imagination, this iconoclastic work covers the major issues in development economics. In eight carefully reasoned essays, P. T. Bauer challenges most of the accepted notions and supports his views with evidence drawn from a wide range of primary sources and direct experience.The essays were selected on the basis of their interest to students and general readers from Bauer's book, "Dissent on Development: Studies and Debates in Development Economics." Reviewing the previous work, the "Wall Street Journal" wrote: "It could have a profound impact on our thinking about the entire development question... Quite simply, it is no longer possible to discuss development economics intelligently without coming to grips with the many arguments P. T. Bauer marshalled in this extraordinary work."

Sources of Growth in Less Developed Countries: A Cross-Section Study

Abstract: I. Introduction, 391. — II. Notation and data, 392. — III. Growth models, 393. — IV. Regression results, 400.—V. Sources of growth, 402.—VI. Conclusion, 408.

Office communications and office location: A review of current research

Abstract: Goddard J. B. (1970) Office communications and office location: A review of current research, Reg. Studies 5, 263–280. The paper first establishes the growing importance of office type activities, the role of communications in office location and the problem of assessing the likely impact of future telecommunication systems on location. Three basic research questions are suggested. First, what forms of personal contact could be satisfactorily maintained by future telecommunication systems? Second, what are the patterns of communication within and between existing organizations and do these reveal characteristics that suggest strong locational constraints or substantial volumes of contact that might be transferred to telecommunications, so enhancing locational flexibility? Third, how with knowledge of existing communications patterns and of substitutability, can decisions about location be made to take account of communications characteristics? Finally, how can knowledge about contact systems be used by pl...

Retaining Units aFter Changing Strata and Probabilities

Abstract: Survey samples are often based on primary sampling units selected from initial strata with probabilities pj proportional to initial measures. However, later samples can be better served with new strata and new probabilities, Pj, based on new information. The differences between the initial and new strata and measures may be due to changes either in population distributions or in survey objectives. It is efficient to retain in the new sample the maximum permissible number of initial selections. Procedures are presented first for changing measures within fixed strata, then for strata with changed units. Modifications, improvements and simplifications are also introduced.

Some Methods of Producing Approximate Solutions to Travelling Salesman Problems with Hundreds or Thousands of Cities

Abstract: Many large practical combinatorial problems await methods of solution, especially those involving the scheduling of hundreds or thousands of activities. The travelling salesman problem is archetypal and has attracted much attention, yet published rigorous methods can only be applied to problems encompassing tens of cities and approximate methods appear only to have been applied to problems of up to 105 cities. None of these methods offers scope for extension to much larger problems because of rapidly increasing computing requirements.

Interval Estimates for Linear Combinations of Means

Abstract: If x Q(i = 1,..., k; i = 1, ..., ni) are independent normal random variables with mean ,ti and variance gr2, then interval estimates for linear combinations of the ,t4's based on a simple normal approximation to Student's t-distribution, are shown to be adequate approximations to the available alternative intervals for values of ox near 0 05. The approximate intervals can be regarded either as conservative confidence intervals or as posterior probability intervals and do not require the use of special tables such as those for the Behrens-Fisher or Welch solutions of the two means problems. The approximation holds good for k>2 for which no tables of the alternative solutions exist.

The national survey of health and development: 1. educational attainment

Abstract: Summary. The National Survey of Health and Development is a longitudinal study of 5,000 boys and girls. This paper describes the sample of 3,465 with full information on two measures of educational success which summarise their progress and achievement at school: (a) a combination of 15 year test scores; and (b) a scale of attainment at 18, based on examinations, leaving age and type of employment. A series of discriminant analyses of the 15 year test scores against the attainment scale shows mathematics and reading to be the best predictors of school progress both for each social class considered separately and for the population as a whole.

Adolescent and adult authoritarianism reexamined: Its organisation and stability over time

Abstract: This paper, which draws on follow-up data collected from English subjects first tested as adolescents and then, 1I years later, as young inen of 24–25, falls into three parts Part I examines the structuring of responses to authoritarian statements No general authoritarian factor could be isolated in either adolescence or in adult life Instead, four separate authoritarian response tendencies, each with its own antecedents, significance and predictive value, were obtained Only the adolescent measures correlated significantly with ability level This, together with the greater stability across time of the responses of the more able 13–14 year olds, led us to hypothesize that some of the variance in adolescent scores was cognitively, not motivationally, determined Part II reports a series of experimental studies (using additional data from the follow-up investigation) testing the cognitive and developmental hypothesis, which received support Part III proposes a general model for the consideration of attitudes, in which any given attitudinal response is located in a three-dimensional space of cognitive complexity, personality needs and social structure

The Sociology of the Opposition to Science and Technology: With Special Reference to the Work of Jacques Ellul

Abstract: The history, philosophy, sociology and even the science of science are by now thriving activities. This is in no way surprising; indeed if one examines the development of each of these approaches to the study of sciences, the surprising thing is that it emerged so comparatively recently. The history of science as an academic discipline tends to begin with a reference to Comte's grand scheme of the mid-nineteenth century, passing through Sarton's great pioneering work of the first half of the present century, largely embodied in the volumes of Isis (1913- ), founded, edited and in no small part written by Sarton himself. At present, so far as one can see, many historians of science are rethinking the great and fairly continuously progressive features of Sarton's account, and the emphasis is turning more and more to the discontinuities.

The national survey of health and development: 2. rate of school progress between 8 and 15 years and between 15 and 18 years

Abstract: Summary. This second paper, on the boys and girls in the National Survey of Health and Development, uses the two measures of school attainment described in the first paper. The relative rate of the educational development of pupils was assessed during the two periods 8–15and 15–18, using an analysis of variance method involving the fitting of constants. Although the major part of the differences in ability and attainment associated with parents' education and family size may be traced to the years before 8, these two factors continue to influence rate of progress over the two periods studied. Pupils are considerably affected by their parents' educational background, and those from large families are also retarded to a significant extent in both of the periods studied. Fathers' education was found to be slightly more important than the mothers' during the first, though not during the second period, and especially so with the boys.

Consumption-investment Frontier, Wage-profit Frontier and the Von Neumann Growth Equilibrium

Abstract: We extend Bruno’s fundamental duality theorem into the general case of decomposable von Neumann model and find, by the use of it, all equilibrium rates of profits and growth.

The Implications of Marriage Rules and Descent: Categories for Merina Social Structures

Abstract: Contrary to previous accounts, the Merina have cognatic, endogamous descent categories. As a result of Merina imperialism and French colonialism they are now dispersed all over Madagascar. Those of free descent still prefer to marry endogamously, although embarrassed at the taint of incest attaching to it, and to be buried in the tombs of the original villages around Tananarive which they consider home. The equally numerous population of slave descent has no such ties. They pride themselves on marrying exogamously and establish tombs in the villages where they have settled. The free not only thus maintain attachment to their traditional groupings but derive benefit from them for social and spatial mobility.

United States Economic Policy and the "Dollar Gap" of the 1920's

Abstract: PRINCIPAL weakness of the international economy during the I 920's was the persistent imbalance in international payments. Numerous countries in central and eastern Europe, and among non-European primary producers, had serious merchandise trade deficits which were not compensated for (and were often aggravated) by current invisible transactions. The United States was by far the most important of the surplus nations, both on trade and on total current account. It is well known that the current account deficits were sustained only by the continuing flow of international investment, from the United States above all, and to a lesser extent from Britain, France, and a few other countries. This flow added to the interest debts of borrowing nations and was not accompanied by a sufficient expansion of their exports; it enabled delay in adjustinginternational accounts but probably made the adjustment, when it came, more drastic. Disequilibrium was the product of many forces, some rooted in structural changes in the international economy that had occurred during, and even before, the war. Such changes included the relative over-supply of certain primary products, especially foodstuffs, and of some of the traditional industrial goods; the imposition of huge reparations and war debt obligations at the end of the war; and the creation of new national barriers with concomitant hindrances to international trade and specialization. These and other factors placed a severe strain on the economies of many countries, some of which had in any case suffered from the war and its disturbed aftermath. The result was a gap between the current account incomes and expenditures of numerous countries, a gap which was rarely closed, and was frequently enhanced by the high level of borrowing by debtor nations. Given the "structural" problems of the international economy after the First World War and the existence of the huge volume of international debt, was any solution to the problem of disequilibrium in international payments possible? Economic historians have sometimes argued that economic policies pursued during the I920's, especially monetary policy and measures associated with "economic nationalism" such as trade restrictions, played an important part in retarding the growth of world trade and in perpetuating the imbalance in the world's accounts.2 The United States, the world's major creditor as well as the nation

Social maturity, training, experience and recidivism amongst british borstal boys

Abstract: The dual trend in present-day society towards increased criminality amongst young people, and towards an apparent emphasis on reformative rather than punitive treatment in the penal system, has had at least two major consequences. First, it has led to greater differentiation in the types of training available; secondly, it has underlined the need for adequate classification and allocation procedures. Varied and complex methods of allocation have recently been devised, including the use of " prediction " or " experience " tables as described in Mannheim and Wilkins (1955) ; and a number of writers (Trasler, 1962; Eysenck, 1962; Wilkins, 1965) argue that differentiation and allocation procedures should be based on detailed psychological or social-psychological theory and on a coherent body of knowledge gained from research.

Micro-simulation of Markets

Abstract: This paper attempts to give an integrated presentation of the application of micro-simulation to the study of markets, based on the purchase behaviour of individual consumers. We emphasize the methodological considerations which should govern the use of the approach, and in particular the need for evolutionary model-building; the technical problems which are only rarely specified in the literature; and the need to be eclectic in the selection of sub-model formulations. Case-studies are reported, and information is given on the scale of resources required for such projects. The presentation is backed with full references to relevant published work, to provide a practical aid to workers in the field. Much of the discussion is also relevant to the simulation of social systems other than markets.