The Transformation of Urban Space in Post-Soviet Russia

In the years since 1989, the societies of Russia and Eastern Europe have undergone a remarkable transformation from socialism to democracy and free market capitalism. Making an important contribution to the theoretical literature of urbanism and post-communist transition, this significant book considers the change in the spatial structure of post-Soviet urban spaces since the period of transition began. It argues that the era of transformation can be considered as largely complete, and that this has given way to a new stage of development as part of the global urban and economic system: post-transformation. The authors examine the modern trends in the urban development of western and post-socialist countries, and explore the theories of the transformation and post-transformation of urban space. Providing a wealth of detailed qualitative research on the Russian city of St. Petersburg, the study examines the changing structure of its retail trade and services sector. Overall, this book is an important step forward in the study of the spatial dynamics of urban transformation in the former communist world

Texas Law Review

Journal containing articles, notes, book reviews, and other analyses of law and legal cases

Exploited Edens: paradise discourse in colonial and postcolonial literature

This thesis examines the relation between figures of paradise and the ideologies and economies of colonialism, imperialism, and global capitalism, arguing that paradise myth is the product of a value-laden discourse related to profit, labour, and exploitation of resources, both human and environmental, which evolves in response to differing material conditions and discursive agendas. The literature of imperialism and conquest abounds with representations of colonies as potential gold-lands to be mined materially or discursively: from the EI Dorado of the New World and the 'infernal paradise' of Mexico, to the 'Golden Ophir' of Africa and the 'paradise of dharma' of Ceylon. Most postcolonial analyses of paradise discourse have focused exclusively on the Caribbean or the South Pacific, failing to acknowledge the appearance of fantasies of paradise in association with Africa and Asia. Therefore, my thesis not only performs a comparative reading of marginalized paradisal topoi and tropes related to Mexico, Zanzibar, and Ceylon, but also uncovers literature from these regions which has been overlooked in mainstream postcolonial .criticism, mapping the circulations, continuities, and reconfigurations of the paradise myth as it travels across colonie{and continents, empires and ideologies. My analysis of these three regions is divided into six chapters, the first of each section excavating colonial uses ofthe paradise myth and constructing its genealogy for that particular region, the second investigating revisionary uses of the motif by postcolonial writers including Malcolm Lowry, Wilson Harris, Abdulrazak Gurnah, and Romesh Gunesekera. I address imperialist discourse from outside the country in conjunction with discourse from within the independent nation in order to demonstrate how paradise begins as a literal topos motivating European exploration and colonization, develops into an ideological myth justifying imperial praxis and economic exploitation, and [mally becomes a literary motif used by contemporary postcolonial writers to challenge colonial representations and criticize neocolonial conditions

Occupational health and safety for informal sector workers: the case of street traders in Nigeria

This study examined two important types of occupational hazards in the street trading activities in Nigeria which are (i) injuries sustained from road traffic accident and (ii) harassment of traders through indiscriminate arrest, seizure and confiscation of merchandise and occasional incarceration of sellers in police cells without trials. The data for the study was generated from a 2011 national survey of 3,873 street traders in Nigeria which was made possible through a research grant provided by the Covenant University’s Centre for Research and Development. In addition to the descriptive statistics used in profiling the street traders, the binary logistic regression approach was also used to estimate the log of odds of experiencing occupational hazards in street trading activities. The study found out that 25% of the traders have suffered injury, while 49.1% have experienced harassment from public authority officials. Given these findings, policy measures that are capable of enhancing the safety of street traders, and stem urban-ward migration have been proposed