Undermining Impasse: The Role of Architecture in the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

Undermining Impasse: The Role of Architecture in the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict Abstract Laura Ondrich Architecture is political, in that it can be used to further an authority’s agenda, and the relationship between peoples under that authority can be affected by it. As the political tool of a ruling power, architecture in a place of ongoing conflict may propel the conflict and submit to its perpetuity at the detriment of participating peoples. Though politics are often considered intangible, certain conflicts exist in real space, thus there is an opportunity for architecture to create an influence. In this case where architecture - concrete facts on the ground - aggravates the situation, a new interpretation of the space of conflict can allow for architecture to be used in order to subvert its own existing effects. Since the fall of the Berlin Wall, international society has been completely transformed from a world divided along ideological and political lines to one of unprecedented physical and electronic mobility. Nevertheless, since 1990, over 21 barriers have been built across the globe, dividing people, cultures, and territories. One of the most controversial separation barriers is being built between Israel and the Palestinian territories. The building strategies in the West Bank, culminating in the construction of the separation barrier, are politically aimed at temporary separation, but their built reality is resulting in a continuing and unbalanced coexistence. This research investigation sought to understand the social implications and hostile perceptions arising from these patterns of government-imposed political architecture with the ambition of responding through critical intervention. The implications of building in this area of conflict, which generates hatred and hostility, require study of a new type of building that exists in the political realm and yet addresses the civilian populations in a state of perpetuating coexistence and need for mutual understanding. Therefore the proposal was to address the Israeli and Palestinian civilian populations in a state of perpetuating coexistence through a reinterpretation of the space of the separation barrier, such that it could become a space of interaction and cooperation between the two peoples. The intent is to thereby undermine the inherent function of the divisive qualities of the structure to emphasize the importance of “seeing the other” over the importance of “surveillance.” In generating interventions for the barrier, it was important to take into account that, while at certain points this barrier looks to be almost sacred in its impermeability, there are in fact numerous and frequent occasions where the concrete condition disintegrates into materials much more permeable, This justified the move to co-opt these more permeable conditions for the purposes of intervention, to further disintegrate the continuous concrete line, confuse the hierarchy of power, and encourage visual, auditory, and tactile permeability between the two sides of the barrier. Ultimately this design project tests the integration of permeable conditions and physical connections between the two sides of the barrier to raise awareness of the current situation through a push beyond the standard tools of one-way surveillance and into the realm of mutual awareness. The goal is to call into question the effectiveness of the barrier as a move toward permanent resolution and instead propose a more interactive system of acknowledgement between the two groups which trends toward a different resolution process. The intervention manifests as five prototypical installations that in some way disintegrate the opacity of the concrete wall. These five pieces can be organized and combined to address specific issues at any site that meets the specifications of being divided by the existing separation barrier. These prototypes include a seating-and-sunshading system, a parking area, a community garden space, market stalls, and the surveillance tower redesigned and redefined in order to serve either side of the barrier through various programs. As the concrete line is repeatedly broken, the impasse that it represents becomes affected by architecture in an entirely new way

The Effect of Maternity Leave on Women's Pay in Germany 1984-1994

In 1986 German federal parental leave and benefit policy was expanded in several ways, extending the potential duration of leave from six to ten months and paying child-rearing benefits to all new mothers regardless of their employment status before childbirth. The potential duration has increased four times since 1986 and stood at 18 months in 1991 and three years starting in 1992. This study uses log-wage difference regressions to examine the effect of leave taken by the mother on wage growth for two 5-year periods, 1984-1989 and 1989-1994. In each of the fiveyear periods, taking maternity leave was found to have a significant negative effect on wage growth. Point estimates imply that each month of maternity leave reduced wage growth by 1.5 percent over five years. In addition, for the second five-year period only, mothers experienced lower wage growth if they chose to stay at home rather than return to work when the allowable leave period expired: from 1989 to 1994, a half-year out of the labor force after the end of the leave period lowered wage growth by an additional 15 percent over five years.

Cox-McFadden Partial and Marginal Likelihoods for the Proportional Hazard Model with Random Effects

In survival analysis, Cox\u27s name is associated with the partial likelihood technique that allows consistent estimation of proportional hazard scale parameters without specifying a duration dependence baseline. In discrete choice analysis, McFadden\u27s name is associated with the generalized extreme-value (GEV) class of logistic choice models that relax the independence of irrelevant alternatives assumption. This paper shows that the mixed class of proportional hazard specifications allowing consistent estimation of scale and mixing parameters using partial likelihood is isomorphic to the GEV class. Independent censoring is allowed and I discuss approximations to the partial likelihood in the presence of ties. Finally, the partial likelihood score vector can be used to construct log-rank tests that do not require the independence of observations involved

Amma n Movies: An Introduction

Although Amma n movies, a special genre of Tamil cinema (Amma n means mother and is a term which addresses village Goddesses all over Tamil Nadu) have originated in the 70´s until nowadays they have not been recognised outside Tamil Nadu. These movies use a special language. It is a necessity to know the vocabulary as in the case of every language. A basic vocabulary is essential to understand the religious symbolism inherent in these films. The following article shall provide the reader a short introduction to the main religious themes of the movie and shall enable her/him to understand the basic meanings of the rituals and symbols presented in the movie

Foreign Direct Investment in the United States: Issues, Magnitudes, and Location Choice of New Manufacturing Plants

What effect does foreign direct investment (FDI) have on job creation, wages, and productivity in the U.S.? How does FDI impact the budget deficit? How do changes in states\u27 fiscal policy affect plant location choices? Ondrych and Wasylenko address these and other politically-charged questions concerning FDI. Provided is empirical evidence drawn from a pooled cross-section and time-series data set that identifies the criteria foreigners use to make location decisions. The authors also develop a model, against which they compare their findings, and review policy options available at the state and federal levels. Information provided will help states shape, focus, and refine their recruitment strategies for attracting foreign plants.https://research.upjohn.org/up_press/1082/thumbnail.jp

Now You See It, Now You Don\u27t: Why Do Real Estate Agents Withhold Available Houses from Black Customers?

This paper develops a new approach to testing hypotheses about the causes of discrimination in housing sales. We follow previous research by using data from fair housing audits, a matched-pair technique for comparing the treatment of equally qualified black and white home buyers. Our contribution is to shift the focus from differences in the treatment of teammates during an audit to agent decisions concerning an individual housing unit. Our sample consists of all units seen by either a black of a white auditor in the 1989 national Housing Discrimination Study. We estimate a multinomial logit model to explain a real estate agent\u27s joint decisions concerning whether to show each unit to a white auditor and to a black auditor. We find evidence that real estate agents make and act upon inferences about a customer\u27s preferences on the basis of the customer\u27s initial inequity and that agents practice redlining, defined as the withholding of units in integrated neighborhoods. We find little evidence to support the conclusion that agents discriminate because of their own prejudice, but some evidence that they discriminate because of the prejudice of their white customers. More importantly, we find strong evidence of statistical discrimination; agents withhold houses from blacks when the probability of a successful transaction is perceived to be low

Undermining Impasse: The Role of Architecture in the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

The building strategies in the West Bank, culminating in the construction of the separation barrier, are politically aimed at temporary separation, but their built reality is resulting in a continuing and unbalanced coexistence. This investigation seeks to understand the social implications and hostile perceptions arising from these patterns of government-imposed political architecture with the ambition of responding though critical intervention

Discrimination in Qualitative Actions by Real Estate Brokers

Discrimination occurs when people in a particular class are systematically treated less favorably than other equally qualified people. This study focuses on racial and ethnic discrimination in qualitative actions by real estate brokers, such as showing a customer a housing unit that was advertised in the newspaper. The data come from the Housing Discrimination Study, which conducted over 2,000 fair housing audits of real estate brokers in 25 metropolitan areas in 1989. Each audit consists of a visit to a real estate agency by a white person and either a black or Hispanic person with similar socio-economic characteristics. Using Chamberlain’s fixed-effects logit estimation, we develop a nationally representative measure of the incidence of discrimination in broker behavior and conduct hypothesis tests on the incidence and causes of discrimination. The results indicate widespread discrimination and support the hypotheses that brokers discriminate both out of personal prejudice and in response to the prejudice of present and future white clients

Transitions Between Child Care Arrangements for German Pre-Schoolers

This study uses a descriptive statistical approach to analyze the dynamics of child care for German pre-schoolers of all ages. Age-specific and duration-specific hazard rates for leaving informal care and for leaving formal care are calculated for various risk groups. Differences in the hazard rates across risk groups indicate the presence of important factors affecting transitions. The factors that we examine relate to household characteristics, the employment status of the mother, and regional supply. We find strong support for the hypotheses that households with fewer pre-schoolers and working mothers have greater demand for pre-school formal care. This demand also appears to be supply driven. The hazard rates of subsequent children does not differ significantly from those of the first child

Why Do Real Estate Brokers Continue to Discriminate? Evidence from the 2000 Housing Discrimination Study

This paper studies racial and ethnic discrimination in discrete choices by real estate brokers using national audit data from the 2000 Housing Discrimination Study. It uses a fixed effects logit model to estimate the probability that discrimination occurs and to study the causes of discrimination. The data set makes it possible to control for auditors\u27 actual demographic and socioeconomic characteristics, along with the characteristics assigned for the purposes of the audit. The study finds that discrimination continues to be strong but also documents a downward trend in both the scope and incidence of discrimination since 1989. The estimations also identify both brokers\u27 prejudice and white customers\u27 prejudice as causes of discrimination