Suchergebnisse

AbstractIn the drama of negotiation of state boundaries, the role of local administrators as mediators is indispensable. They mediate between state demands for more discipline and societal demands for more liberties. Their ability and willingness to enforce determines the extent of state power. They are a particular type of elites chosen by the state to administer; yet often they have an irrational and morally corrupt relationship with their subjects. The questions that arise then are: When do the local administrators decide to or not to enforce the rules? What considerations do they hold in the face of contradicting demands for their loyalties? This paper seeks answers to the above questions by examining state enforcement of its construction rules in Hanoi after 1975, in which the ward, a level of local administrators in the urban administration landscape, plays an important role in holding up (or letting down) the fences. I will examine the irrationality of the housing regime that led to widespread offences against construction rules, and then show why and how local administrators may or may not enforce rules. This paper comprises two parts. The first part outlines the nature and history of the housing regime in Vietnam and the situation of state provision of housing to the people. These provide the context in which illegal construction arises. Part Two looks at illegal construction in Hanoi chronologically, and focuses on important episodes. The theme that runs through this paper is the role of local administrators in the reality of illegal construction.

'Virtual Reality' (VR) is a terminological umbrella for an assortment of technologies that are lumped together under one broad label. Internet Relay Chat (IRC) is a text-based VR that does not involve the use of data gloves and 3-D objects. IRC communication takes place via strings of text typed in by its users. Unlike face-to-face communication, IRC conversations lack the nonverbal component of language. This lack is, to some extent, rectified by the use of paralanguage techniques. Despite the paucity of nonverbal and social cues, IRC users are able to engage in a variety of activities. IRC culture is essentially a culture of play and imagination, as the users take advantage of the lack of information about other users to fill in idealised details and images of their own. However, IRC is not merely about play. Data on identity experimentation illustrate that some users leave IRC with newfound knowledge about their self-identities, and about the social world and its workings. With the IRC experience, boundaries between the 'real' and the 'virtual' are sometimes blurred, and some participants are no longer able to view the world in terms of binary divisions of 'real' and 'unreal' and 'human' and 'machine'.

The two most important domestic political events in Vietnam in 2001, the Ninth Party National Congress and the Central Highlands unrest, reveal to observers a divided Vietnamese Communist Party (VCP), and a Parkinson's diseased state. Political struggel among the leadership has bred incohesiveness within the VCP and the state. It has diverted attention and recources away from the task of good governance. The first part of this article maps the political struggle among the key leaders at the Ninth Congress and examines its major implications. The second part examines the Central Highlands unrest and argues that the fundamental problems associated with it are the lack of a practical land regime as well as the inability of the party-state to control its bureaucracy. (Contemp Southeast Asia/DÜI)