Employment discrimination in a former Soviet Union Republic: Evidence from a field experiment

We provide the first experimental evidence about ethnic and gender discrimination in the labor market of a former Soviet Union country, Georgia. We randomly assign Georgian and non-Georgian, male and female, names to similar resumes and apply for jobs as advertised on help-wanted websites in Georgia. We find that gender has no effect on the probability of callback, but a job applicant who is ethnically Georgian is more than twice as likely to be called for a job interview than an equally skilled ethnic non-Georgian (Azerbaijani or Armenian). The 113% ethnic gap in callbacks (167% among males and 79% among females), which is substantially larger than the gap typically documented in the existing literature for both developed and developing countries, is statistically significant and cannot be abridged by having more experience or education. There is no evidence of gender discrimination in callbacks, both within the Georgian group and the non-Georgian group.     

Ethnic identities,public spending and political regimes

Do democracies discriminate less against minorities as compared to non-democracies? How does the dominance of an ethnic group affect discrimination under various political regimes? We build a theory to analyse such questions. In our model, political leaders (democratically elected or not) decide on the allocation of spending on different types of public goods: a general public good and an ethnically-targetable public good which benefits the majority ethnic group while imposing a cost on the other minorities. We show that, under democracy, lower ethnic dominance leads to greater provision of the general public good while higher dominance implies higher provision of the ethnically-targetable good. Interestingly, the opposite relation obtains under dictatorship. This implies that political regime changes can favour or disfavour minorities based on the ambient level of ethnic dominance. Several historical events involving regime changes can be analysed within our framework and are consistent with our results.     

主客位视角在少数民族地区研究中应用的思考

现代化进程加速,少数民族地区社会发展成为重要议题,民族学作为专门研究不同民族的学科,承担着科学、客观及准确认知各个民族并为政府提供政策性建议,推动民族地区繁荣发展的重任。而民族学一向重视研究视角的选择,因为这关系到能否获得对研究问题的可靠认识。通过选取少数民族社会研究中的四个问题予以探讨,阐释关于民族学两种传统研究视角在民族地区现实问题研究中应用的思考,希望能为正确认识少数民族社会发展中遇到的问题与困境,进而促进民族地区健康、和谐及可持续发展提供有益见解。     

民族地区民生科技需求意愿及影响因素

正确引导民族地区民众民生科技需求意愿，对提高民族地区科技配置水平、加速民族地区发展具有重要意义。以新疆为例，利用调查问卷数据构建Logit实证分析模型，发现民族地区民生科技需求意愿及影响因素不仅与非民族地区存在较大差异，而且民族地区城乡间异质性也较为明显。研究结果可为民族地区制定适宜的民生科技推广政策提供经验支撑。     

基于云计算的民族地区高校教育信息化平台建设研究——以贵州省为例

教育信息化程度成为了国家教育现代化程度的风向标,本文以"云计算"技术为抓手,从教育工作的流程出发,设计教育资源及教育管理两个平台。通过两个云平台的建设,夯实智慧教育基础,为智慧教育的应用开发提供强有力地保障。     

Ethnic patterns of returns to education in Bulgaria

It is widely accepted that disparities in education contribute to the poor labour market outcomes experienced by ethnic minority groups and consequently to their poverty. In this article, I analyse differential educational benefits in Bulgaria and compare returns to education for the Roma minority with the majority population and the Turkish minority. I show that both ethnic minority groups have lower education levels and employment rates than the majority population and that they also have lower returns to education. This result could be related to minorities' lower education quality as well as to discrimination in the labour market. Integration policies should thus aim to improve employability and labour market competence of vulnerable groups starting from school.     

Mapping mountain diversity: Ethnic minorities and land use land cover change in Vietnam's borderlands

In the complex agro-ecological conditions of Vietnam's northern borderlands, attempts by ethnic minority farmers to create sustainable livelihoods, along with the impacts of state development policies, have direct consequences for land use and land cover (LULC) change. In this paper we analyse the degree to which LULC has changed and diversified from 1999 to 2009 in Lào Cai Province and the underlying relationships with ethnic minority livelihood diversification strategies. We examine the correlation between LULC diversity and various socioeconomic and biophysical proxies using a spatial autoregressive model. Our findings indicate two major changes in LULC: an increase in closed canopy forest and substantial urban growth. LULC diversity increased between 1999 and 2009, suggesting a transition between land uses and/or a diversification of livelihood strategies. Socioeconomic proxies are significant predictors of LULC diversity in both years, while biophysical proxies are only effective predictors in 2009. In-depth interviews regarding state-led policies and ethnic minority livelihoods reveal some of the underlying mechanisms of such LULC transitions and associations.     

Social housing in France: A permanent and multifaceted challenge for public policies

This paper examines the dynamics of the overwhelmingly generous social housing in France that covers a wide spectrum of recipients. Being influenced by electoral power of rotating ruling parties and social ideals, policy formulations are often reflected by idealistic politics which tends to over-stretch the nation’s budget and restrict its scope in reaching its target groups. From the 1990s, fund availability has been further hit by economic globalization causing falling business profitability and high unemployment rates affecting notably ethnic minorities. Upcoming social crisis has been met with public response via a series of technical-led remedial acts to promote social integration in housing and by identifying social ills and polarization in sensitive and problematic urban quarters. New technical and financial measures in coping with the complexity and magnitude of social housing are expected to remain highly challenging in the French parliamentary politics.     

Millennium Development Goal shortfalls in Zimbabwe: Analysing the impact of access to water and sanitation on early childhood morbidity

ABSTRACT

An Africana feminist framework is presented that considers the ways in which inequality resulting from a historical legacy of political conflict and other dimensions intersect to impact upon the accomplishment of Millennium Development Goals with regards to environmental sustainability and child malnutrition in Zimbabwe. Demographic and Health Surveys are analysed from 1988 to 2011 to examine whether differential access to water and sanitation is predicted by ethnic differences in Zimbabwe, and is predictive of chronic malnutrition. Safe water and sanitation are in short supply, and logistic regression analyses provide evidence that residents in Shona and Ndebele-dominated provinces generally have better access to these resources. Uneven distribution of these development resources has a deleterious impact on early childhood nutrition. This work elicits results that give rise to child health-related policy recommendations that may inform post-2015 discussions of Sustainable Development Goals, namely that within-country ethnic differences must be taken into account.     

A meta-analysis of consumer ethnocentrism across 57 countries

The concept of consumer ethnocentrism was introduced more than 30 years ago, and since then it has received keen interest among academic researchers. However, empirical evidence in published studies has been inconclusive and many macro-drivers of consumer ethnocentrism received cursory attention. This study meta-analyses 240 studies from 57 countries and tries to understand the key drivers of consumer ethnocentrism. The results indicate that consumer ethnocentrism is a universal phenomenon and is driven by culture and the interaction of economic and ethnic diversity variables. Challenging popular beliefs, the findings suggest that neither globalization nor economic threats are unconditional drivers of consumer ethnocentrism. Their effects are conditional on cultural values and economic situation. Results provide evidence that multi-ethnic societies tend to be more consumer ethnocentric when the culture of a country is not strong in egalitarianism. Finally, the paper presents evidence that consumer ethnocentrism affects the imports of consumer goods in a country.