VTechWorks Repository :: Browsing by Author "Knox, Paul L."

Browsing by Author "Knox, Paul L."

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Better by Design? Architecture, Urban Planning, and the Good City
Knox, Paul L. (Virginia Tech Publishing, 2020-10-09)
The design professions—architecture, city planning, landscape architecture, and urban design—share a great deal in terms of intellectual antecedents, professional ideals, and praxis. In particular, they share a commitment to creating better cities—whether at the scale of buildings, neighborhoods, or city-regions. But who decides what constitutes a “good” city, and how should such an ideal be implemented? In Better by Design? Paul Knox explores the intellectual roots of the design professions, showing how architects, planners, and other designers have traditionally interpreted their roles and implemented their ideas in cities across North America and the UK. Drawing on his long record of research and award-winning publications on the social production of the built environment, Knox offers a critical appraisal of their ultimate effectiveness in achieving the goal of creating and sustaining good cities.
A comparison of self-help lower-income housing in community-based and individualistic settlements in urban Mexico
Burnham, Richard A. (Virginia Tech, 1992-04-05)
This study compares housing in two lower-income self help settlement types -- community-based and individualistic -- in two contemporary Mexican urban settings: Mexico City and Tlalnepantla. The research investigates differences in housing design preferences of occupant-builders, reflections of these preferences in built environments, and resulting housing consolidation levels. Of seven elicited housing design preferences investigated, only one suggests statistically significant differences between settlement types in both cities. Community- based settlement respondents tend to prefer an ideology for minimal and equal housing for alIi while individualistic settlement respondents, in contrast, focus on individuals' economic problems in securing private housing. Analyses of the two built environment types show design preference differences reflected in built housing.
Does migration benefit disadvantaged workers?
Rohr-Zanker, Ruth (Virginia Tech, 1990-05-02)
Human capital theory, the dominant approach to labor migration, assumes that workers who migrate improve their economic well-being.
An examination of the role orientation of planners in Taipei
Huang, Hsien Wen (Virginia Tech, 1989-05-05)
This research project explores the professional ideology of planners in a new industrialized setting - Taipei,Taiwan. This study seeks to establish whether urban planners in a newly industrializing country (NIC) exhibit consistent sets of values, attitudes and role orientations that parallel those of Western planners. In addition, in an authoritarian party-state such as Taiwan, planning is a top-down process. Development goals are set at the top of the political bureaucracy; therefore, plans are formulated to meet predesigned objectives, especially in terms of economic development. Since economic growth is seen by some as a legitimation device for the existing authoritarian regime in Taiwan, the role of planning vis a vis the partnership between the state and capitalists is worth examining. The data used in this study are drawn from questionnaire surveys of public-sector urban planners working in Taipei city. The survey was conducted between May and August 1988. The sample size of 128 planners was determined based on estimates provided by each departmental head within Taipei Municipal Government. An overall response rate of 69%, and a valid response rate of 66% was achieved. A prominent pattern that emerged in examining the results of the survey is the strong rational and apolitical orientation of Taipei's planners. The pervasiveness of rational and apolitical leanings among planners is partly a reflection of an authoritarian state the protects its own legitimacy while promoting economic development. The prevalence of apolitical attitudes among planners in top-down decision making environments exacerbates difficulties in the implementation of plans and programs. Hence, planners working with implementation units, and carrying out plans formulated by planning units are more cognizant of the importance of public participation. In addition, they are more skeptical about planning activities in Taipei city than their counterparts working in planning units. In conclusion, it is suggested that although most planners believe in the apolitical and rational nature of planning, planners with formal planning educations tend to recognize the inherently political nature of planning to a greater extent than those without planning educations. Since planning education is obviously one of the determinants in shaping the role and value orientations of planners, especially with respect to their recognition of political influences, planning curricula that better focus on those aspects may be emphasized.
From craft to flexibility: linkages and industrial governance systems in the development of a capital-goods industry in Mendoza, Argentina, 1895-1990
Borello, José Antonio (Virginia Tech, 1993-04-01)
This thesis examines the development of a capital goods industry in Mendoza Argentina through an analysis of linkages and industrial governance systems. Linkages are material, informational, and financial flows among firms. Industrial governance systems are the social practices that cement linkages. Hence, linkages are understood as socially embedded and not as market transactions governed solely by price considerations. The study has two major arguments. First, it claims that contrary to conventional industrial location theory firms do not locate in view of the previous existence of certain favorable factors, but rather construct these factors as they grow. This argument is operationalized by asking how firms generate in time their own linkages. Examples taken from the 1895-1990 period include labor and subcontractors, clientele, services, and the emergence of economic groups. Second, this study argues that the capital-goods industry in Mendoza is undergoing a Substantial (and unprecedented) transition in the way production is organized. The transition is part of the larger shift taking place at both the national and global scales. The analysis focuses on the historical pattern of linkages and governance systems in the industry, and contrasts that pattern with that of the recent decade. Implicit in the previous two arguments are two territorial dimensions. First, the development of “industry produces regions" (Storper and Walker 1989). Second, at the intra-city level this means that the evolution of the industry (and specifically its linkage structure and governance systems) has a direct bearing on the direction and nature of the city’s growth. These two arguments are illustrated through empirical work in Mendoza, a city of close to a million people in western Argentina. Over 100 interviews gathered over ten months reveal the origins, evolution, and current form of linkages in the capital-goods industry. These interviews are complemented by data from a variety of sources. The main conclusions of the study are three. First, the study illustrates the richness and depth that emerges from a project based on substantial fieldwork. Second, it shows the advantages of conceiving industrialization not as the location of plants in response to favorable conditions, but as a process initiated by the firms themselves. Third, the dissertation shows that the capital-goods industry of Mendoza iS in a transitional phase towards new ways of organizing production. The transition is expressed in new linkage structures, new governance systems, and the emergence of new types of firms and institutional arrangements.
Home-Body-Shopping: Reconstructing Fitness Environments
McCormack, Derek (Virginia Tech, 1997-06-13)
This thesis attempts to problematize and rethink the inter-related construction of the categories of "environment" and "fitness". It argues that environments are materially and discursively constructed through the mutually constitutive mobilization of networks of human and non-human actors by particularly powerful centers of translation, and that these processes increasingly involve the construction of environments configured to the requirements of an ideal of fitness - a fitness defined in terms of risk, flexibility, response-ability, responsibility, mobility, and consumption. In developing this argument particular attention is given to the relations between bodies and technologies as actors constitutive of the networks from which environments are constructed. As a specific illustrative example of this, the efforts of the fitness equipment manufacturer NordicTrack to mobilize and translate diverse networks of actors in the space of the home and then represent these hybrid networks as ontologically purified, meaningful and marketable environments are examined. The ontological and spatial ambiguity of the types of environments constructed by corporations such as NordicTrack is then discussed, this ambiguity being registered in the difficulty of positioning the boundaries between categories such as subject and object, nature and culture, human and machine, real and virtual. Finally, having illustrated that these ambiguous environments are perhaps constituted by communities of human and non-human actors, this thesis then suggests that such a recognition might open up space for critical geographical imaginations that are responsive to the possibility that political, ethical, and moral community and agency are co-constructions of humans and non-humans.
The Internationalization of Higher Education: A US Perspective
Whitaker, Aliana Marie (Virginia Tech, 2004-05-04)
Globalization affects many sectors of society. Higher education is no exception. Universities worldwide respond to challenges presented by globalization in various ways. One response is the internationalization of the university campus. This paper argues that many US higher education research institutions engage in processes of internationalization. This study examines the geography of international education programs associated with US research institutions and shows that world cities emerge as popular places for US institutions to interact with other universities. The paper contributes to both educational and globalization literature by examining on a macro-scale the internationalization programs associated with US research institutions. This research shows that Paris, Tokyo, Seoul, London, and Melbourne emerge as the top five locations for US abroad activities among the universities studied. While in many instances US abroad programs displayed characteristics that allowed students and researchers the opportunity to gain exposure to another language and culture, some abroad programs expanded the opportunities for participants by including the opportunity to work and interact with international firms and pursue degrees (international business, masters of economics, and international law) that make individuals competitive in the global employment market. Finally, this research shows that many US universities locate abroad programs in world cities. Although no clear reason or relationship for this phenomenon emerged during the course of this research, it illustrates and area for potential further study in a variety of fields.
Lifestyle Neighborhoods: The Semi-Exclusive World of Rental Gated Communities
Danielsen-Lang, Karen A. (Virginia Tech, 2008-04-14)
This study looks at characteristics of rental gated communities in the United States from a national perspective and based on a case study of four Southwestern Counties, Riverside County and San Bernardino County in California, Maricopa County in Arizona, and Clark County, Nevada. Tenure differences between owned and rental gated communities are compared. The study also debates who actually benefits from rental gated communities and what that effect that has upon the community. This analysis is done by assessing whether minorities experience higher housing opportunities in rental gated communities newer, fast growing areas as the study area. Descriptive statistics of rental gated community characteristics are presented and neighborhood diversity indices are analyzed. The study finds that rental gated communities are much like their owned gated community counterparts and that new housing markets do not present better housing opportunities (at the neighborhood level)for minorities, particularly those neighborhoods with more rental gated properties present. Policy implications are discussed.
Location Choice, Linkages and the Spatial Economy: Essays on Theory, Evidence and Heterodox Assessment
Bieri, David S. (Virginia Tech, 2010-08-12)
The essays in this dissertation represent theoretical and empirical contributions to urban economics and regional science, focusing on the growing importance of nonmarket interactions. There is increasing evidence that the process of globalization is rendering the world "spiky" rather than "flat". Nonmarket interactions, such as knowledge spillovers, innovation or amenity-based externalities, play a central role in this process. As economic activity is not evenly spread across space, a detailed understanding of the economic linkages between regions is key to the design of effective public policy. This is particularly important in the context of economic linkages between regions or cities, highlighting the key adjustment mechanisms -- via both market and nonmarket transactions -- and their long-run implications for incomes, the cost of living, and the spatial distribution of population. Both the neoclassically-grounded field of urban economics and the rapidly expanding New Economic Geography (NEG) literature pioneered by Krugman offer a variety of models and (not infrequently competing) predictions about the factors and processes that shape the spatial structure of the economy. At the same time, the dialogue between qualitative and quantitative discourses in regional science has been marred by an increasingly embittered dispute over methodology. While acutely pronounced in economics, this development has re-shaped large parts of its sister disciplines as well, particularly sociology and geography. Across the board, proponents of quantitative science methodology increasingly likened themselves to their natural science counterparts, whereas qualitative methods had become the last bastion of "true social scientists". Today, these so-called "science wars" have rendered "qualitative" and "quantitative" analysis into almost mutually exclusive concepts.
Locational Distribution of Global Advanced Producer Service Firms in the Polycentric US Metropolis
Oner, Asli Ceylan (Virginia Tech, 2008-01-30)
This study is generally concerned with the assumption that the contemporary global flows of people, capital, and commodities, which accelerated dramatically in the age of globalization, have significant impacts on the land use patterns of global cities. With this assumption, the study further questions in the context of polycentric US metropolis, whether or not the distribution of transnational advanced producer service firms define a new form of centrality, in which the traditional central business districts and suburban centers differ from each other in terms of spatial clustering patterns and sectoral distributions of transnational advanced producer service firms. Spatial clustering patterns of advanced producer service firms are evaluated according to high-rise and high-density criteria. In ten selected cities, clusters of advanced producer service firms and high-rise office buildings are identified through the Nearest Neighbor Hierarchical Clustering Method in CrimeStat. To define the polycentric US metropolis, the research employs Lang et al's (2006) classification of metropolitan office space. The results show significant differences between former manufacturing belt cities and Sunbelt cities.
The Making of a Place: "Appeal to an Architectural Order"
Kebede, Samson (Virginia Tech, 1997-10-14)
This thesis project stems from the need of an architectural order, which will understand the historical genesis of the site and also help convey a clear meaning of its transformation process. At the same time, an attempt will be made to explore traditional Ethiopian design motifs and bring them into a modern reality.
A mixed income housing community
Lukowsky, Tania Ruth (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1994)
“It would be something if everything we made encouraged people to become more closely acquainted with their surroundings, with each other and with themselves… so that the world, in so far as it is amenable to our influence, becomes less alien, less hard and abstract, a warmer, friendlier, more welcoming and appropriate place; in short a world that is relevant to its inhabitants.” Herman Hertzberger The purpose of this thesis is to create a mixed income housing community in Old Town Alexandria. While people who share similar lifestyles tend to cluster together, this project encourages people of difference to find a common ground. The community will be the size of a residential Old Town block to encourage a fulfilling amount of human interaction. The interior of the block will be subdivided into a variety of places: places that provide the opportunity for people to sit in quiet contemplation, another place for children to play, other places that encourage people to interact with one another, and places where one can passively observe the surrounding activity with the option to participate or not. The houses have a variety of living spaces in response to the diverse social groups that will inhabit the blocks. These houses follow the language of Old Town in terms of materials, details, rhythm, and the way in which they meet the street, and so connect this community with the larger order of the town. This project maintains the privacy of the individual houses, encourages human interaction in the public areas, and at the same time recognizes the responsibility of designing these houses using the same structure and patterns that are inherent in Old Town.
Neighborhood change in metropolitan America
Wei, Fang (Virginia Tech, 2013-01-24)
This dissertation presents an integrated framework that was developed to examine trajectories of neighborhood change, mechanisms of suburban diversity, and the relationships between neighborhood change and employment accessibility. First, this dissertation extends the study of neighborhood change to a greater time and spatial span, systematically examining the trajectories of neighborhood change at the census tract level. The results show that neighborhood change is complicated and exhibits various trajectories. The dominant patterns do not always conform to classical models of neighborhood change, providing counterpoints to some long-established assumptions. This dissertation also provides evidence of the mechanisms through which metropolitan and suburban characteristics influence suburban diversity. Most importantly, it highlights a remarkable increase in suburban diversity with respect to neighborhood composition. Finally, this dissertation investigates the relationships between neighborhood change, spatial transformation, and employment accessibility in the North Carolina Piedmont region during the last three decades. Spatial patterns of the neighborhood distributions suggest that job accessibility varies by neighborhood typology. A detailed analysis of the trajectories of neighborhood change shows interesting patterns in both central city and suburban ecological succession and transformation. These geographical shifts of neighborhoods were shown to be associated with changes in job accessibility to a certain extent. In sum, by introducing an integrated framework including social, spatial, and employment factors, this dissertation develops a more balanced understanding of neighborhood change in the United States.
On the Land, Territory, and Crisis Triad: Enclosure and Capitalist Appropriation of the Russian Land Commune
Smirnova, Vera (Virginia Tech, 2018-11-13)
My research provides a historical, geographical reading of land enclosure in the context of economic and agrarian crises in late imperial Russia. Using original records of Russian land deals that I obtained in the federal and provincial archives, I explore how the coalitions of landed nobility, land surveyors, landless serfs, and peasant proprietors used land enclosure as a conduit for coercive governance, accumulation of landed capital, or, in contrary, as a means of resistance. Through critical discourse analysis, I illustrate how the Russian imperial state and territories in the periphery were dialectically co-produced not only through institutional manipulations, resettlement plans, and husbandry manuals, but also through political and public discourses. I argue that land enclosure exploited practices of autonomous land management in the commune and furthered growing agrarian and economic crises in the countryside. The urban periphery became a strategic territory used for the accumulation of new wealth and displacement of two million peasant households, which accommodated capitalist development under the Russian Tsarist and, later, Soviet political regimes. Through this example, my research reexamines predominant assumptions about the land, territory, and crisis triad in Russia by positioning the rural politics of the late imperial period within the global context of land enclosure. At the same time, by focusing on the historical reading of territory from the Russian perspective, this study introduces a more nuanced alternative to the traditional colonial territory discourse often found in Western interpretations.
Perspectives on health care choices: women users, service providers, and community leaders in Appalachia
Garvin, Theresa D. (Virginia Tech, 1994-05-05)
National health care reform proposals advocate Primary Health Care (PHC) and preventive medicine as an efficacious way to control health care costs in the United States. This study examined a community in rural, southwest Virginia and evaluated the potential for PHC success. The study used focus groups to determine how Women Users, as consumers of health care, view their health and health care problems and potential solutions. Views of Community Leaders and Service Providers, as controllers of services, were obtained using semi-structured interviews. The results were compared using the PRECEDE framework of predisposing, enabling, and reinforcing factors influencing health behavior. This study was a component of a larger project - The Dickenson County Women's Health Project. The premise of that project was that women in Dickenson County would respond to a health education intervention program and the goal was to develop such a program. This study shows that Women Users fully comprehend the health behaviors and available services that would make themselves more healthy, but feel constrained by enabling and reinforcing factors that prevent healthy lifestyles. By contrast, Service Providers and Community Leaders focus on predisposing factors and remain convinced that women in Dickenson County need more education about healthy lifestyles and available health services. The study concludes that the women of Dickenson County are valuable resources for health program development. The success of PHC in Dickenson County is wholly dependent upon developing a mechanism whereby women are given a greater voice in program development and implementation.
Prioritizing Residential High-Performance Resilient Building Technologies for Immediate and Future Climate Induced Natural Disaster Risks
Ladipo, Oluwateniola Eniola (Virginia Tech, 2016-06-14)
Climate change is exacerbating natural disasters, and extreme weather events increase with intensity and frequency. This requires an in-depth evaluation of locations across the various U.S. climates where natural hazards, vulnerabilities, and potentially damaging impacts will vary. At the local building level within the built environment, private residences are crucial shelter systems to protect against natural disasters, and are a central component in the greater effort of creating comprehensive disaster resilient environments. In light of recent disasters such as Superstorm Sandy, there is an increased awareness that residential buildings and communities need to become more resilient for the changing climates they are located in, or will face devastating consequences. There is a great potential for specific high-performance building technologies to play a vital role in achieving disaster resilience on a local scale. The application of these technologies can not only provide immediate protection and reduced risk for buildings and its occupants, but can additionally alleviate disaster recovery stressors to critical infrastructure and livelihoods by absorbing, adapting, and rapidly recovering from extreme weather events, all while simultaneously promoting sustainable building development. However, few have evaluated the link between residential high-performance building technologies and natural disaster resilience in regards to identifying and prioritizing viable technologies to assist decision-makers with effective implementation. This research developed a framework for a process that prioritizes residential building technologies that encompass both high-performance and resilience qualities that can be implemented for a variety of housing contexts to mitigate risks associated with climate induced natural hazards. Decision-makers can utilize this process to evaluate a residential building for natural disaster risks, and communicate strategies to improve building performance and resilience in response to such risks.
Professional attitudes in urban planning and management: an exploratory study of the professional culture of Third World planners and planning consultants
Masilela, Calvin Onias (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1989)
This research is concerned with the professional culture of planners and planning consultants working on aspects of urban planning and management in Third World settings. Research on planners' professional culture is of intrinsic value in development studies, where little is known about the socio-economic background, values, attitudes, and role orientations of either group despite the key roles both groups play in the management of human settlements. The particular point of departure here, however, is the significance of such research to planning studies. Of particular relevance, in this context, are the critical notions in the current literature on Third World urbanization and planning that the skills and attitudes of planning professionals are not attuned to the economic, social, and environmental questions which lie behind the material aspects of human habitat in Third World countries. This, it is contended, is in part due to the socialization of Third World planners to Western attitudes, standards, and values during their professional training in industrialized countries. The research reported here represents an attempt to explore these issues, drawing on samples of planning practitioners in several Third World countries (Barbados, Jamaica, India, Zambia, and Zimbabwe) and of planning consultants and academics working regularly on urban problems in Third World settings. The results were derived from a questionnaire survey designed to elicit information on respondents’ role orientations and values, and on their attitudes toward specific issues that relate to the theory and practice of urban planning and management. These include attitudes toward rural-urban migration, the informal sector, squatter settlements, self-help service provision, the use of Western versus indigenous methods and solutions, and receptiveness to current ideas about project replicability and cost recovery. Findings revealed that Third World planners and planning consultants do share some important professional traits as well as elements of a common culture, with a core of shared ideology, similar to that found among developed-world planners despite the differences in contextual detail. Nonetheless, the study findings point to significant overall differences in the attitudes of Third World planners and planning consultants toward planning issues and professional role orientations. The typical Third World planner is a middle-class male of mid-career age who attaches a good deal of importance to his profession and supports the notion of success via technical competence, and administrative and managerial skills, and yet at the same time pragmatic and grassroots oriented. Furthermore, Third World planners as a group do not see the profession as elitist, nor do they regard Western concepts, methods, or training in developed-world institutions as inappropriate to their professional roles. The typical planning consultant, on the other hand, though also male is somewhat older, is more likely to have a social science than a planning, architecture, or engineering background is more likely to have a higher degree and is rather skeptical about professional effectiveness and egalitarianism. It is suggested here that the difference between these actors emanates from the differences in the modus operandi of each group. In short, whereas planning consultants have the luxury to conceptualize problems and solutions in stable environments, insulated from the cut and thrust of local practice, Third World planners operating in environments afflicted with rapid change, uncertainty, and instability are of necessity compelled to adopt a more pragmatic outlook. Thus despite the seeming overpowering circumstances, Third World planners were found to be guardedly optimistic, quietly confident, and resiliently content to pursue their ideals. lt was thus concluded that contextual factors to which planners are exposed to are major determinant of planners' professional role orientations and world-views.
The role of institutional autonomy in telecommunications planning and development: a comparative case study
Kavanaugh, Andrea L. (Virginia Tech, 1990-12-01)
This is a comparative case study of the relationship between telecommunications decision-making and sector development. It employs a resource dependence model of organizational decision making (Pfeffer and Salancik 1978; Cohen, Grindle and Walker 1985) to explain the development of voice communications (telephony) in North Africa (Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia) from the early 1970s to late 1980s. The study finds that the autonomy of the telecommunication operating entity from domestic political organizations (for financial resources) and from technological organizations (for equipment and services) is associated with the supply and quality of telephone services. Dependence on external financial and technological organizations influences the decisions of the telecommunications operating entity in terms of the levels and priorities of investment, the level and role of technical expertise and choices of technology. The findings of the study confirm preliminary research by Hirschman (1967), Saunders, Warford and Wellenius (1983), Israel (1987), and Roth (1987), among others, that the autonomy of the telecommunications entity is associated with improved supply and quality of telecommunications services. It is inconsistent with the expectations of earlier studies insofar as it finds that greater autonomy is not always associated with higher levels of investment in the sector. Greater autonomy is associated with higher quality, wider distribution and a comparable provision of services. This occurs (in Algeria) where investment in telecommunications was lower as percentage of GDP than Tunisia. The entities of Tunisia and Morocco (until 1984) were less autonomous, and showed lower levels of technical expertise, and lower quality and supply of services. Given the tendency of a technical organization to function more effectively than a non-technical organization, this study concludes that organizational autonomy is more important to the supply and quality of services than the amount of funds handled by the entity.
The social construction of the family: family values and the Los Angeles riots
Hernandez, Jennifer J. (Virginia Tech, 1994-08-15)
The issue of "family values" was at the of political debate during 1992 president campaign. In this debate conflicting views over the conceptualization and understanding of just what constitutes a "family" were presented. This thesis examines how the "traditional family" model is used by the majority of Americans to marginalize and ignore the lives and needs of those whose family life does not conform to normative definitions of family. More specifically, it examines how the lives of inner-city racial and ethnic families have become a site around which a variety of discourses of danger about the erosion of "family values" are generated. In this analysis, relationship among space, race, gender and power in contemporary American is discussed. A major will be the representation and construction of racial and gendered identities. Using the Los Angeles riots and Dan Quayle's response, I will review the political discourse employed by Bush-Quayle administration on traditional family values to discuss how family is constructed by the dominant political culture group in U.S. Following an examination of these issues, I will then focus on community responses to Quayle's speech and discuss how these discursive practices are the process by which dominant scripts of the family are contested and resisted.
The Social Production of the Built Environment: the Case of the Townhouse in Harare, Zimbabwe
Jogi, Shasekant (Virginia Tech, 1992)
This research is concerned with the social creation of built environments in the Third World. The absence of appropriate theoretical frameworks has hampered the research of Third World cities. Recently, however, the opportunity for applying concepts, that have to date been largely confined to the study of western cities, has increased provided they are organized in a suitable way. Drawing on concepts such as built environment, socio-spatial dialectic, and structure and agency, this research outlines and applies a framework for the study of Third World urbanization. In order to explore the interdependence between space and society this study "unpacks" the urban landscape of Harare, Zimbabwe. Working in the context of the culture of capitalism, the study traces the development of the southern African zonal urban system before establishing a typology of landscape ensembles through successive stages of the evolution of Zimbabwe's political economy. Within the current global epoch, the study focuses on a specific type of built environment -- the townhouse. As a repository of contested cultural ideas and practices, the townhouse stands at the center of often conflicting socio-economic groups defined collectively as a "structure of provision". Using interviews, archival research, and a survey questionnaire, an analysis of these groups which focuses on the production and consumption of the townhouse drew the following conclusions: On the production side, realtors have assumed a central co-ordinating role in the production of townhouses. Prior to the development of townhouses, the realtor played a more limited role in real estate market. With the emergence of the entrepreneurial developer and with the assistance of the architect, realtors have assumed a central co-ordinating role in the initiation, management, and marketing of the townhouse. Built within specific zones within the city and its suburbs, garden flats and townhouses occupy the wealthy areas of the city. On the consumption side, garden flats and townhouses are occupied by the "managerial bourgeoisie" who comprise wealthy Zimbabweans and expatriates who are predominantly White, managers and professionals. While they share some important similarities they can nevertheless, based on their consumption patterns, be divided into identifiable groups that are geographically distributed within Harare's wealthier areas. It was suggested that production and consumption are ultimately part of the same process that produces status symbols that drive the demand for consumer goods. Ultimately, however, garden flats and townhouses stand testimony not only to the wealth of their occupants, but to patterns of lifestyle reminiscent of the consumption ethic of their counterparts in the First World. In the context of a Third World city, however, their lifestyle with its show of wealth has, not surprisingly, generated concerns about safety and security among the community of garden flats and townhouse dwellers. These concerns are historically deeply imbedded not only in the region but in the culture of capitalism. It was ultimately concluded that, within the context of late capitalism, the southern African city shares similarities with its First World counterpart.

Browsing by Author "Knox, Paul L."

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