“Going natural”: Black women’s identity project shifts in hair care practices

Hair care, a seemingly mundane consumption practice, is packed with sociocultural meanings and constitutes an important realm of identity work for consumers. Drawing upon existing literature on consumer identity projects, this paper investigates the experiences of urban, Black women in Kenya as they disengage from the normative practice of altering their natural hair texture using chemical straighteners (a practice that conforms to Eurocentric beauty ideals of straight, flowing hair), and adopt the non-normative hair care practice of “going natural,” in which they embrace their natural hair texture and hairstyles. This paper traces the historical, sociocultural, and political events that underpin the normative ideology associated with the identity marker of natural Black hair, and how this ideology influences the women’s “going natural” experience. Findings reveal tensions that emerge in the women’s identity project disengagement and reconstruction process, and how the women navigate their position as they reimagine their embodied identity quest.     

Policy‐related implementational fluidity in subsistence marketplaces

This paper sheds light on policy‐related implementational fluidity—a context‐dependent adaptation of policies—adopted by policy implementers to address heterogeneous needs of subsistence consumer‐merchants (SCMs). In subsistence research, despite the emphasis on bottom‐up policymaking, implementational fluidity persists because of institutional and sociocultural factors that hinder policy implementers’ from effectively and accurately implementing the policies. To enrich the current bottom‐up policy process, this paper shares insights from an ethnographic study of Fijian market traders and marketplace personnel (policy implementers) and shares insights on how implementational fluidity manifests in subsistence marketplaces. Analysis reveals the interplay amongst sociohistorical context, marketplace relational dynamics and policies leading to policy adjustments and re‐negotiation by marketplace personnel and perceived injustices amongst the SCMs. The paper provides policy recommendations and practice ideas for subsistence researchers and policy practitioners to examine policy implementation gaps and the role of policy implementers in subsistence marketplaces.     

Grain price stabilization in India: Evaluation of policy alternatives

Stabilization of prices is an important element of food policy in India as in most other countries — both developing and eveloped. However, since the magnitude of grain stocks held for this purpose as well as the costs of physical storage have become prohibitively high, there is now a need for finding cost-effective alternatives including non interventionist and market-oriented methods for price stabilization. In this paper we consider the case of rice and wheat which are staple foodgrains in India. We make a comparison between alternative price stabilization policies including that of holding buffer stocks in terms of their impact on domestic price stability, producer and consumer welfare and government costs. A multi-market equilibrium framework is used where private storage, consumption, supply and prices of rice and wheat are determined simultaneously. Indian exports and imports are assumed to affect world prices. The alternative price stabilizing mechanisms are ranked according to both the criteria, welfare and price stability achieved. The main findings are as follows. The ranking of alternatives varies with the criterion used. Greater price stability need not necessarily imply greater welfare. The option of variable levies on private external trade turns out to be the most inexpensive and that of domestic buffer stocks the costliest in achieving price stability. Further, the efficacy of buffer stocks and subsidy to private storage in stabilizing prices is lower under free trade as compared to the case where the economy is closed to private external trade.     

Diabetic peripheral neuropathy: resource utilization and burden of illness

Introduction:

Diabetic peripheral neuropathy (DPN) is a debilitating complication of diabetes and accounts for significant morbidity by pre-disposing the foot to ulceration and lower extremity amputation. Using a large US commercial claims database, this study analyzes the drug class usage and co-morbidities associated with DPN as well as estimates the associated economic burden.

Methods:

Patients older than 18 and diagnosed with DPN were followed longitudinally for 2 years pre- and post-diagnosis date. Patients were analyzed for age, gender, hospital visits, ER and doctor’s office visits, pharmacy claims, co-morbidities, and drug classes prescribed pre- and post-DPN diagnosis. The economic impact post-diagnosis of DPN was compared to the patients’ pre-diagnosis resource use.

Results:

In total, 10,982 incident DPN patients were identified, with a median age of 61 years, and an equal gender distribution. Post-DPN diagnosis, there was a 20% increase in the number of patients visiting hospitals and a 46% increase in the number of visits to hospitals. Further, there was a 46% increase in the annual cost per patient associated with visits to the hospitals, emergency room (ER), doctor’s office, and pharmacy claims. As per the analysis presented in this study, increase in the number of visits, cost per visit, and number of patients visiting hospitals, ER and doctor’s offices added up to a 46% increase in aggregated cost associated with Medical Resource Utilization (MRU) owing to DPN, with the highest increase (60%) in costs associated with hospitalization of patients with DPN.

Conclusion:

This study highlights the high economic burden associated with DPN. The results indicate that resource use significantly increases post-diagnosis of DPN, which leads to an increase in costs for payers. A noticeable proportion of patients with DPN had a pain co-diagnosis signifying the need for treatments that can effectively manage painful DPN.     

印度潘查亚特制:职能、事权和资源

印度于1992年通过第73号宪法修正案，规定邦政府将职能下放给各级潘查亚特。本文旨在检验宪法修正案后转移给潘查亚特的职能在当前的执行状况，并考察转移给潘查亚特的资源是否足以让它们执行其职能和履行其职责，最后提出了改善其财政状况的建议。     

Valuing less and guarding more: Consumption stewardship in restricted contexts

This paper advances the conceptual understanding of consumption stewardship, defined here as a moral commitment to safeguard, nurture and use consumption resources to create consumer value. We delineate consumption stewardship from related consumption variables and articulate its underlying assumptions, conceptual distinctiveness and application areas. To create new theoretical and practical insights, the paper explores how consumption stewardship unfolds when a person enters into and lives in restricted consumption. A 2-year qualitative study, which included observation, casual conversations, and interviews, was implemented. Findings illustrate the nature and trajectory of consumption stewardship across latent, vigilant, submissive and shared modes. Our conceptual development of consumption stewardship and empirical evidence of the homeless experiences makes two main contributions. First, we show how the demands of stewarding material objects operate as a powerful determinant for individual (re)valuation of various possessions. Second, we identify how consumption stewardship drives different ways of consumption for value seeking. Findings offer insights for debates in the marketplace about protecting one's possessions, policies around consumption adequacy and social services' role for addressing space-related needs of vulnerable consumers.     

Time varying dynamics of globalization effect in India

Portuguese Economic Journal - The link between globalization and economic growth is getting complex as the propagators of globalization are opting protectionism. The paper attempts to identify the...