Editorial: China’s impacts on Africa’s development

Much has been made of China’s economic ascendency in Africa, most notably its overtaking of the US in 2009 to become the continent’s largest trading partner. Beyond trade, the broader contours of Chinese loans, export credits, investment, and aid have changed Africa’s economic landscape since 2000 when the first Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) meetings were held. In the extensive discussions – in government meetings, the media, public fora, and academic settings – that have ensued, China has been portrayed in distinctly contrasting terms; on the one hand, as a responsible partner of the global south, creating new markets for African products and supplying affordable goods to African consumers, while on the other as a rapacious superpower plundering the continent’s resources and flooding its markets with cheap manufactures that further undermine local production. Consequently, the impacts of China on African economies and Africa’s development have become one of the most controversial topics in the wider and rapidly expanding field of Sino-African relations

Introduction to Special Issue on the Material Cultures of Financialisation

This paper offers a wide-ranging introduction to the symposium on the material culture of financialisation. It begins by addressing the nature of financialisation itself, drawing on a tight definition in order to distinguish the phenomenon of financialisation from its effects and from the looser associations prevalent within much of the literature such as the presence of credit or even simply (more extensive) monetary relations. In order to locate financialisation within economic and social reproduction, of which material culture is a part, close attention is paid to the distinctive forms of financialisation arising from commodification, commodity form and commodity calculation. The differences in the extent to which, and how, these prevail are addressed through the system of provision approach and its framing of material culture through its use of 10 distinctive attributes of such cultures, known as the 10Cs (Constructed, Construed, Conforming, Commodified, Contextual, Contradictory, Closed, Contested, Collective and Chaotic). The analysis is then illustrated by reference to the papers that follow in this volume which demonstrate the diverse ways in which shifting cultures have served to embed financialisation in our daily lives. The first is on the material culture of financialisation itself and this is followed by a number of case studies that include the promotion of financial literacy and financial inclusion, well-being, the media and finally two sector examples are provided on housing and water

The Productivity Consequences of Two Ergonomic Interventions

Pre- and post-intervention data on health outcomes, absenteeism, and productivity from a longitudinal, quasi-experimental design field study of office workers was used to evaluate the economic consequences of two ergonomic interventions. Researchers assigned individuals in the study to three groups: a group that received an ergonomically designed chair and office ergonomics training; a group that received office ergonomics training only; and a control group. The results show that while training alone has neither a statistically significant effect on health nor productivity, the chair-with-training intervention substantially reduced pain and improved productivity. Neither intervention affected sick leave hours.ergonomics, chair, pain, DeRango, Upjohn

Editorial

China's impact on Africa's developmen