The Cabin in the Woods

This is a film review of The Cabin the Woods (2011), directed by Drew Goddard

The Turin Horse

This is a film review of The Turin Horse (2011), directed by Bela Tarr

African Industrialisation: Is global value chain development the answer?

Industrialisation and industrial policy have been recently returned to policy debate in sub-Saharan Africa following a hiatus for some three decades since the implementation of Structural Adjustment Programmes in the wake of the debt crisis. However, the nature of the current debate, and the perceived role and form of industrialisation and industrial policy differs greatly from thinking that informed industrial policy in the post-liberation period of the 1960s and 70s that were rooted in classical political economy, the (structuralist) development economics of the 1950s and 60s. At the level of the international financial institutions and development agencies, Justin Lin’s New Structural Economics (NSE) has come to the fore as orthodox (neoclassical) theoretical justification for industrial policy in the 21st century. At the same time, Global Value Chain Development (GVCD) as the process of entry into and upgrading along transnational supply chains, has emerged in recent debates on African industrialisation. This paper investigates the conjuncture of these two approaches both in terms of their theoretical underpinnings as well as the policy conclusions that develop out of these lines of thinking. We compare both the explicit and implicit understanding of industrial development in economic growth within GVCD and NSE approaches with those from classical political economy and heterodox economics in order to assess the extent to which these approaches inform industrial strategies that can result in employment creating, self-reinforcing and rapid inclusive economic growth through the growth of manufacturing. We then draw upon the notion of the Minerals Energy Complex (MEC) as a historical political economy approach to industrial development in South Africa to assess the scope and limitations of resource based industrialisation in delivering broad-based and equitable growth in African economies today

The emperor’s new clothes - A political economy study of the South African textiles and clothing industry

AbstractThe decline of South African textiles and clothing has been explained as the outcome of different influences depending on various ideological and methodological inclinations as well as theoretical traditions. For example, the rise in labour inflexibility or costs, or increased import and cost competition, are perceived to explain both South African and global textiles and clothing trends. Though these are important features of the decline, other factors precede and contribute to the poor production, trade, or employment trends, suggesting that it is misleading to focus on a few dominant factors. Instead, exploring the nature, evolution and the background to multiple, shifting, and interconnected causes, enables the emergence of new research questions concerned with the importance of situating the industry decline within a political, historical and structural setting. The findings point to the need to reconceptualise industry evolution as an outcome of a specific labour process in South African textiles and clothing, moving away from a homogenous or cost-based categorisation of labour. It is also argued that the particular developments be seen as the outcome and an integral (albeit marginalised) part of the SA economy, rooting explanations for sector trends within a unique set of industry processes and tensions. These lead the study to challenge the relevance of existing policy and production remedies, and to argue that prominent theoretical debates around sector development, such as the GVC or the information imperfection approach, are limited in their explanatory power and in their ability to generate appropriate research questions. The research concludes that a case-driven understanding of the complexities of the industry decline opens the space for new insights in theoretical and methodological approaches to exploring and explaining textiles and clothing industry development in South Africa, with relevance for broader debates on industrialisation.Key words: textiles, clothing, South Africa, industrialisation, industrial policy, labour process, global value chain, trade liberalisatio

Acquisition and analysis of cutting forces of surgical instruments for haptic simulation

Current research has focused on visual feedback for the development of virtual surgery. However, little is known about the haptic feedback required for realistic simulation. The forces necessary for the cutting of anatomical tissues were investigated for three surgical scissors: the Mayo dissection scissor, the Metzenbaum dissection scissor and the Iris scissor. Several experiments were completed in conjunction with a surgical doctor to acquire force data for analysis. This work aimed to establish the force-position relationship, find any invariant properties for tissues or scissors, and determine the frequency components present in the force signal as well as the significance of the cutting rate. General trends in the data were discovered, and necessary improvements to the experimental method for the determination of more exact quantitative measures were identified.In general, both the measurable force magnitude and "texture" differences contribute to the difference in tactile perception between a blank run and a tissue cutting run. This is a low frequency texture, as 99% of the frequency components of the signal are below 5Hz. The force measurements were determined to be independent of the cutting speed for the Mayo and Metzenbaum scissor runs, whereas results for the Iris scissors were inconclusive. The scissor sensitivity while cutting the tissue longitudinally or transversally appears to be a function of both the tissue and the scissor. To further determine the tactile feedback required for simulation, future experiments should account for the "user grip", tissue thickness, tissue moisture content, hand orientation, and innate scissor dynamics.A database of the collected force and position data has been created on the Internet (Site:http://www.cim.mcgill.ca/∼haptic/tissue/data.html). This data allows current force feedback devices, such as the Freedom-7, to determine the feasibility of realistic haptic simulation