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From villages to cities -- Village life -- Town life --Capital cities -- Connecting towns and villages -- Getting around -- Places to shop -- Places to work -- Places of worship -- Outside spaces -- Places to visit -- At home -- Amazing towns and villages -- Glossary -- Index.

Life in a small town is similar to life in a city, but it's also different in important ways. Readers discover these differences and similarities as they explore what it's like to call a small town home. Colorful photographs of small-town life introduce readers to places such as the town library and town hall. These photographs are accompanied by accessible text designed to reflect early social studies curriculum topics. A helpful picture glossary allows readers to enhance their vocabulary skills as they take a fun tour of a small town

The paper sees the urban initiatives undertaken in La Coruña and Vigo carried out under the auspices of the then Extension Legislation as falling short of what could be properly called planned undertakings and being little wore than lay-out schemes that ignored any land administering object or the need for the same. It is admitted however that in the first case the plan did use some realistic criteria when fixing the scope of the project, in its absorbing of buildings already standing within its new blocks, in its bearing in mind of the suggestions forwarded in the Reform and Extension Plan drawn up for the city in 1.874 by the engineers baron and Yanez and in the «good sense» the whole could draw upon from the city architect Juan de Ciorraga who fathered it and then carried it through. In the case of the Vigo plan, the only planning as such would be the taking in of part of one drawn up in 1837 by the engineer Augustin de Marcoartu for docks and a new district, this in itself inspired by the Bilbao Puerto de la Luz and Ferrol Magdalena District projects or similar ones for Santander. For the author, even this cannot be considered as coming within the terms of Planned City Extension thinking but rather owes its all to the previous military school of thinking. The author thus sees Galicia as offering little of note within the Planned City Extension Movement and that little as being no more than the re-hashing of earlier projects answer legislative calls rather than any thorough-going thinking out and through of genuine projects. Planned Extension in other centres of population in Galicia such as Santiago, Orense or Pontevedra was undertaken in the light of the 1924 Act and thus is to be understood as being inspired by growth and overspill requirements although, even here, there is still a debt to the major groundwork of the early years of the century with its search for an allembracing vision of the urban fact. ; El artículo pretende mostrar las intervenciones urbanas que bajo la legislación de Ensanche se producen en las ciudades de La Coruña y Vigo, no tanto como verdaderos ensanches sino, en el primer caso, como proyectos de alineaciones con ausencia de verdadera voluntad y necesidad de ordenar suelo, pero sí manejando criterios realistas en la propia dimensión del proyecto, en la integración de lo construido en las manzanas propuestas, en la aceptación de propuestas de ordenación ya sugeridas en el Proyecto de Reforma y Ensanche de la ciudad realizado en 1874 por los ingenieros Barón y Yáñez, a través de sus alineaciones y, en definitiva, en el «buen entender» la ciudad del arquitecto municipal Juan de Ciorraga, su primer instigador y su ejecutor final. En el segundo caso, el Ensanche que se materializará en Vigo, se corresponde solamente con un fragmento de una ordenación de 1837 realizada por el ingeniero Agustín de Marcoartú para los muelles y nueva población de Vigo, siguiendo las trazas de actuaciones anteriores como el Puerto de la Paz de Bilbao, el Barrio de la Magdalena en Ferrol o las actuaciones de Santander. Ahora bien, este proyecto de nueva población tampoco puede entenderse con el lenguaje del Ensanche, sino conceptualmente en el tratadismo militar previo. Por todo ello, el episodio de los Ensanches en Galicia debe entenderse desprovisto de acentos significativos y resultado más de respuestas legislativas, a las que se incorporan distintos proyectos existentes, que de verdaderas propuestas proyectuales ex-novo. El desarrollo de «los ensanches» en otras poblaciones gallegas (Santiago, Orense, Pontevedra) se produce a partir de la legislación del 24 y deben entenderse ya como planes que se plantean a través del Ensanche y extensión, pero también con los grandes trazados de principios de siglo, buscando la visión global de la forma urbana.

During the last quarter of the 20th Century, Latin America experienced transitions to democracy putting an end to a long cycle of military dictatorships. Likewise, as the UNDP 2021 Report underscores, the region's 1980-2020 rate of economic growth is only half of what was before 1980. Latin America is still the world's most unequal region in terms of per capita income. This article explores the failure of political democracy to escape the economic doldrums of the recent four decades. It analyzes the democratic and hyperpresidentialist panaceas that prevail since 1980 and their decline. Democracy failed to implement effective responses to the transformations Latin American societies were experiencing beginning in the 1970's in the context of the metamorphosis of capitalism, i.e. (1) the gradual breakdown of state regulation, (2) the novel challenges encountered by democracies, and (3) the weakening of social cohesion. Democratic transitions brought about the end of military dictatorships indeed. However, and turning over the known adage -i.e. that democracy became the only game in town- it is apparent that problems grew worse with the transitions. ; Durante el último cuarto del siglo XX las transiciones a la democracia en América Latina clausuraron el ciclo de dictaduras militares. El PNUD, en su informe para 2021, señala que la tasa de crecimiento económico se redujo a la mitad de lo que era en las décadas previas a 1980. Asimismo, América Latina continúa siendo la región de mayor desigualdad de ingresos en el mundo y la pobreza ha vuelto a crecer recientemente. Este artículo analiza el fracaso de la política en democracia en evitar el curso económico de las recientes cuatro décadas; el foco se pone en las panaceas democrática e hiperpresidencialista, que predominaron entre 1980 y 2014-2015 y el vacío político producido posteriormente. La política democrática no ha contribuido a implementar respuestas eficaces a las transformaciones producidas en el contexto de la metamorfosis del capitalismo mundial a partir de la década de 1970 ni de los procesos resultantes, es decir la (1) la desintegración de la regulación estatal, (2) los novedosos desafíos que se le plantearon a las democracias, y (3) el debilitamiento de la cohesión social. Durante las transiciones se produjo el definitivo ocaso de las diferentes variantes de dictaduras del siglo XX.

La formación y vida de la población afrodescendiente de Palmarito ubicada en la región sur del Lago de Maracaibo del estado Mérida en Venezuela, es el área a trabajar en la siguiente investigación. Palmarito a lo largo del tiempo ha desarrollado ciertos parámetros sociales, económicos, políticos y culturales propios dentro de la diversidad cultural existente en el país. Nuestro objetivo en esta contribución es exponer mediante el método de análisis histórico-crítico y etnográfi co -por medio de la tradición oral e historia oral-, una historia general del pequeño poblado costero. ; The topic of this research is the formation and life of the African descendents´s town of Palmarito, located in the southern region of Lake Maracaibo in Mérida State, Venezuela. Palmarito has over time developed distinctive social, economic, political and cultural parameters, as part of the country´s diversity. Our goal is to present a general history of this small coastal town through its oral tradition and oral history, using the method of historical-critical and ethnographic analysis ; 157-173 ; bernkathe@gmail.com ; semestral

In spite of all the good news about the economy and the swift confirmation of Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court, the headlines this stormy week have been dominated by town hall brawls. As congressional representatives went home to their districts for their August recess, they were greeted by a volatile mixture of high temperatures, monsoon-like storms and furious mobs who stormed town hall meetings to protest against health reform. Several politicians, terrorized by the voters, suspended the meetings and ran past the mobs and into their getaway cars. They later announced they would take phone calls or meet voters individually in scheduled appointments. Journalists and TV talk show personalities were left wondering as to the origin of this new movement of storm troopers: were they real people, from the grassroots, fed up with the way Washington is dealing with health care reform, or was this manufactured, "Astroturf" mobilization, organized by the health insurance and drug companies, scared of losing a large share of their profits if a government-run plan is included on the final bill? Most likely it is a mixture of both. But whether fabricated or not, the tone of the debate and the images of scuffles and fist fights shocked the nation and left many asking what happened to American civility. More importantly, where was the President's leadership?Granted, it is difficult to defend a bill that is not even ready, and Obama has avoided giving bottom lines that may come back to haunt him: his larger political purpose is to pass some kind of health care reform, even if serious compromises have to be made. Having taken the 1994 Clinton-care defeat lesson to heart, President Obama decided from the beginning that he could not dictate to Congress and therefore stated the general principles of health care reform (universal coverage and cost control) and then gave Congress leeway in writing the detailed legislation. But from the beginning, there was a deep chasm between progressives, who insist that a public-plan option is the best way to meet both goals, and conservatives, who adamantly oppose the government-run plan claiming it would bankrupt private insurance companies, and see this and the mandate of universal coverage as "socialized medicine". The Blue Dog Democrats, fiscally conservative, have joined ranks with the opposition and effectively killed the public option in some versions of the bill, replacing it with a vague alternative of co-ops (mutual care).The result so far has been a confusion of bills and versions that no regular voter can understand. Indeed, not even those that are following the debate closely can tell with clarity what each version entails. But because health care is close and personal, it is easy to whip up a frenzy over it just by letting out a few misleading judgments, half truths and exaggerations, and hammering at them until they have the ring of truth. Corporate interest groups from the health insurance and pharmaceutical industries are fiercely organizing fringe elements on the right, mainly instructing them to be disruptive of town hall meetings and to interrupt any serious discourse. And most of the average, less-educated voters use "easy" sources of information such as radio talk commentators (read: Rush Limbaugh) or TV news shows which are anything but "fair and balanced", instead of hard sources (newspaper editorials, op-ed and factual news articles). In the end, when topics are complex and conflicting information saturates the media, people believe what they want to believe, what confirms their feelings and their ideological bent, what reassures them they are correct in their assumptions and emotions.It is this state of confusion that has allowed the crazy mobs, aided and abetted by the likes of Rush Limbaugh and Sarah Palin, to make the most outlandish claims, from accusing the government of Socialism and Nazism in one voice, to vociferously asserting the Democrats' plan includes euthanasia (of course it does not; it includes a voluntary option for terminal patients to get "counseling on end-of-life options"). But these are the same kind of people that kill abortion-clinic doctors and nurses in their crusade to "save innocent lives". And exactly of the same kind as the "birthers", those who do not believe President Obama was born in the United States, a fact very easily verifiable, since the White House has made his birth certificate available!The point is, extremists are taking over that national scene and are attacking a bill that is not yet ready, based on false claims and preposterous characterizations. The left is now mobilizing union representatives to counteract the right wing crazies. Perhaps it would be better to cancel all town hall meetings, since it is expected that a bill will be passed by the end of the month. It will be most likely be a watered down version of what Obama initially wanted, but it will allow him to claim yet another victory, another check mark on his campaign promises.The debate over health care has accomplished something that seemed unfathomable only a month ago: it has united Republicans. Economic conservatives, libertarians and extreme right social conservatives are all against the public plan option. However, even if they were successful in defeating this bill, as long as they continue on this course of adamant opposition, they will not be well-positioned for the 2010 elections. They will have no other policy initiatives or legislative accomplishments to boast of and they will still be easily characterized as the "party of no." Their political calculations made them oppose a highly qualified Supreme Court nominee in a futile exercise that has put them on the wrong side of history and set them back at least for a decade in getting electoral support from the Latino community, the largest and fastest- growing minority group in the country. The void of Republican political leadership has been filled by extremist groups and irresponsible radio talk commentators, reducing the party's appeal to moderates and independents.This dramatic realization is one incentive to get Republicans to work harder in passing health care reform in some bipartisan shape or form. But this is not likely, since their preference so far has been to deny Obama any chance of bipartisanship. Another motivation to bring them to the table should be the awareness that, if the rising cost curve of health care is not brought under control, the economic recovery that is starting to show will only be temporary, the deficit will continue to grow and other countries will not be so accommodating in holding US debt. But political expedience on their part may overtake even this fundamental concern about the future economic stability of the country.On his part, Obama will have the problem of dealing with the liberal wing of his party: the left will be furious if, with a majority in both Houses, their version of health care reform does not pass, and the President settles for a weaker, watered down version. Indeed, in general terms, the biggest and most immediate test for Obama will be how far he allows the left in Congress to go before he decides to rein them in. In order to regain control of the health care debate, the President held his own town hall meeting in New Hampshire this past Tuesday. His message was clearer and more focused as he answered genuine concerns and questions from the audience. But to what extent he was able to calm down the prevailing anxiety in the country at large still remains to be seen. Outside the town hall, two groups of irate citizens on the opposite ends of the political spectrum confronted each other, yelled and shook their fists, but the police were able to restrain them without much effort.In spite of the turbulent TV images that have inundated the airways this week, the majority of the electorate in this country is still moderate, rational and centrist. They want health care reform and they want it to include a government-run option, which they may or may not buy into, but which they see as an important way to spur competition, in the understanding that it is competition and not monopolies that help control costs. They also want reform of the way private insurance companies ration care, for example, by denying coverage to those with pre-existing conditions. They are appalled at the crazies on the right, with their false claims about a bill they have not read, and their outrageous claims of Socialism and Nazism, which they merge into one demonic ideology. They are tired of their pseudo-religious zeal and self-righteousness, their insistence on rejecting Darwin's theory of evolution along with global warming, climate change and stem cell research, their violent outbursts, and their tendency to speak in terms of Good (themselves) and Evil (the rest). And they are embarrassed at the subtext of racism that underlies most of the extremists' demented claims, and which becomes crystal clear in their assertion that President Obama is not an American citizen.On the other hand, most citizens are also wary of ultra-liberals on the left, who want to use the Democrats' prevalence to entrench new vast social programs, over-regulate the financial system and corporate pay, and raise taxes to levels that would choke growth and productivity; they are afraid they will forever bankrupt the government and the country.Six months into his presidency, Obama faces sinking approval numbers and the possibility of a major defeat. After a string of solid successes that included, among others, passing an 800 billion dollar economic stimulus plan, expanding children's health insurance, and rescuing the banking system, his agenda may get bogged down in the politics- as- usual Washington culture he promised to change. It will take all his will power and discipline to stay focused, get back on message and resist the blows. His ambition will have to be tempered by patience, caution and political skill. As his aura wears off, the coming battles will be the final test of his courage and determination to succeed. Senior Lecturer, Department of Political Science and Geography Director, ODU Model United Nations Program Old Dominion University, Norfolk, Virginia

La ponencia tiene dos argumentos centrales: la descripción de la actual estructura del segundo ciclo de estudios de la carrera en Urbanística y Planeamiento, Hauptstudiurn Stadtebau/Stadtplanung, en el ejemplo de la Universidad técnica de Hamburgo-Harburg, y un cuadro de los actuales problemas estructurales que sufren las ciudades alemanas, con algunos rasgos comunes con los otros países europeos y con otros especificos: las exigencias derivadas del proceso de la reunificación nacional y la demanda política de un nuevo tipo de planeamiento, junto al rechazo y a la dificultad de la discipllina para adaptarse a estos cambios.El profesor Dirk Schubert desarrolla estos temas refiriéndose a los problemas centrales de la disciplina urbanística alemana y europea, como marco de las consideraciones apoyadas sobre la afirmación de la actualidad de la cultura urbanística espacial, la consideración del valor del proyecto como centro de su metodología educacional y profesional, junto con la confirmación de la validez del planeamiento como medio para la compensación y la democratización social. Empieza con una rápida reconstrucción del desarrollo histórico de la identidad disciplinar, académica y profesional de la urbanística en Alemania, hasta llegar a la reciente afirmación de su autonomía. El urbanismo ha sido materia opcional en las carreras de arquitectos e ingenieros civiles, y, en los años veinte, una especialización dentro de éstas. Sólo al final de los años sesenta se superaron los prejuicios hacia el planeamiento, considerado colectivista y dictatorial, por la confianza en su utilidad para proveer las estructuras espaciales de apoyo a los cambios planteados según la política económica de inspiración keynesiana, lo que apoyó el nacimiento de cursos de grado y postgrado en Urbanística y Planeamiento, concretados en los años setenta, y que han ido evolucionando hast la estructura presente. Las carreras en Alemania no están estandarizadas y el plan de estudios es personal. lA repartición de la estructura de los estudios en dos secciones es general La primera es de aprendizaje básico, con carácter sistemático, y es llamada Vordiplom, según el nombre del título logrado a su cumplimento; su valor es simplemente el acceso al ciclo sucesivo. La graduación en un politécnico tiene una equivalencia con este nivel de titulación, pero que difiere en cada caso. La segunda sección, Hauptstudium, es de tres años, con asignaturas, de corte teórico y metodológico y carácter problemático, y da acceso a la graduación. El plan de estudios de esta segunda sección -ver la ilustración- es abierto, con una cuota de asignaturas optativas, Wahlfach, creciente cada año y, según el profesor Schubert, su elemento central es la asignatura de Projekt, study proyect en inglés. Ésta se diferencia de la asignatura tradicional de las escuelas de arquitectura porque está enfocada como ejercicio sobre problemas prácticos construidos a través de una fase analítica y de una conceptual, y con una componente teórica caracterizada por la conjunción de distintas disciplinas a lo largo de todo el trabajo. Su papel es, por un lado, la orientación sobre la complejidad y dificultad del proceso del proyecto, la necesidad de organización y el futuro entorno de trahajo; y por otro el ejercicio sobre las correspondientes necesidades de acercamiento multidisciplinar, la necesidad de organización conceptual y la obligación del trabajo en equipo. El estudiante tiene un gran margen de responsabilidad en la elección del "tema" de proyecto, con un profesor titular de coordinador de cada uno, aunque no siempre se consiga un seguimiento constante. Pero el problema subrayado es la sobrecarga del plan de estudios con asignaturas sin integración y sin una organización por prioridades. El otro argumento sobresaliente del articulo está en el diagnóstico de los problemas que pesan sobre la enseñanza actual de la urbanística. Subraya algunos problemas individuales: el alargarse de la carrera real, el empleo a tiempo parcial de un número creciente de estudiantes (sea para auto financiarse los estudios -un rasgo típico del perfil del estudiante del norte de Europa que marca una importante diferencia respecto a españoles o italianos- o porque esta titulación es considerada una ulterior especialización después de la graduación). Además, la oferta de empleo es, cada vez más a menudo, de tipo temporal. Pero el profesor Schubert se centra especialmente en cuestiones más generales, como los problemas económicos, sociales, físicos y administrativos de las ciudades -interesante la referencia a la interpretación tripartita de la ciudad hecha por Hausermann y Siebel- que en sus rasgos generales son comunes a las tendencias de otros países europeos, pero con la particularidad del impacto de los procesos consecuentes a la reunificación alemana. Después del "boom" y de la crisis sucesiva, la situación actual presenta un fenómeno general de diferenciación de los instrumentos: nuevas culturas urbanísticas en formación que consideran la necesidad de trabajar con objetivos dependientes de la perspectiva y de ofrecer soluciones alternativas -en armonía con el desarrollo de modelos abiertos de participación y cooperación-, de detectar tempranamente los conflictos para evitar tener que parar y luego repetir el costoso trabajo de redacción del planeamiento, tan cuestionado también su naturaleza como actividad exclusivamente pública. El profesor Schubert se pregunta entonces sobre la capacidad del planeamiento fundada en la visión espacial- de enfrentarse a procesos de polarización cuyo origen es el estado de las relaciones sociales y económicas; y si la falta de solidaridad no será una consecuencia obligada de los actuales planteamientos políticos en materia fiscal y económica, producidos por la debilidad de referencias ideológicas desarrolladas en el presente. Las críticas al refugio en el planeamiento de las ciudades patrimonio artístico, en el pragmatismo o en la descarga de las responsabilidades sobre los políticos y economistas, son interpretadas como renuncias al papel activo propio de la urbanística. Otra cómoda y brillante coartada intelectual -que oculta una actitud de resignación e impotencia- es, por ejemplo, la instrumentalización, banal y fuera de su contexto, realizada sobre el pensamiento de Habermas. Etiquetadas como "Nueva complejidad", las paradojas del desarrollo presente, la no simultaneidad, la coexistencia de ámbitos sociales, estilos de vida y redes informales, los fenómenos de modernización y aparente atraso, pueden subsistir sin más explicaciones y sin comprometer a la intervención quien las observe. La reacción a estas actitudes es necesaria, y el papel de las universidades es fundamental en la reflexión sobre el ejercicio de la profesión del urbanista, evitando caer, concluye el profesor Schubert, en el antiguo y superado debate entre generalistas y especialistas.

Company towns on the Baja California peninsula can be considered an instrument for urbanization in the area from the late nineteenth to the early twentieth century. The Mexican government took advantage of the early industrialization in northern Mexico to use an unprecedented strategy: to try to occupy that long, narrow, sparsely populated peninsula with urban development. Major territorial concessions were granted to foreign capital to colonize the region via large industries that designed towns and industrial cities. This article reviews the initial industrialization of the states of Baja California and Baja California Sur based on ten case studies in which companies mapped cities in this territory. The text defends the hypothesis that these urban layouts contain rich industrial patrimony, so that in the future they can support intervention strategies by reassessing their urban identity, in order to reinforce their territorial structure. ; Las company towns o "ciudades de las compañías" en la península de Baja California pueden considerarse el instrumento de urbanización de ese territorio a finales del siglo XIX y principios del XX. El gobierno mexicano aprovechó la industrialización temprana en esa parte del país al usar una estrategia económica sin precedentes: intentar ocupar urbanísticamente esa larga y angosta península que estaba muy poco poblada. Se otorgaron grandes concesiones territoriales a capitales, en su mayoría extranjeros, para colonizar la región mediante grandes industrias que trazaron poblados y ciudades industriales. En este artículo se aborda la primera industrialización de los estados de Baja California y Baja California Sur con base en 10 casos donde las compañías trazaron poblaciones allí, y se defiende la hipótesis de que sus trazas originales contienen un rico patrimonio industrial, por lo que en un futuro podrían soportar estrategias de intervención al revalorar su identidad urbana, con el objetivo de reforzar su estructura territorial.

Los resultados en los municipios valencianos de las elecciones legislativas del 1 de marzo de 1979 se estudian, mediante la técnica de análisis de correspondencias, para obtener los factores fundamentales de diferenciación de los comportamientos electorales constatados. Se obtienen e interpretan tres factores fundamentales asociados, respectivamente, a las alternativas izquierda-derecha, moderación-extremismo y a la abstención. Se obtienen también dos factores de menor importancia, uno de ellos claramente asociado a las opciones nacionalistas. Se detecta la existencia de una relación no lineal entre los dos primeros factores, que es utilizada para derivar uno nuevo que mide el grado de heterogeneidad intra-municipal del voto. Por último los resultados obtenidos son analizados a nivel comarcal. ; The legislative election results of lst March 1979, in Valencia's municipal constituencies are analysed by means of the correspondence analysis technique in order to obtain the fundamental factors of differentiation in the observed electoral patterns. Three fundamental factors are obtained and explained, which are associated respectively to the following three alternatives: left-right wing, moderation-radicalism, and poll turnout. Two other less important factors are also obtained, one of them clearly associated to the nationalistic option. The existence is shown of a nonlinear relation among the two first factors wich is used to deduce a new one wich measures the degree of heterogeneity among constituencies. Lastly the results obtained are analysed on a district basis.

Los resultados en los municipios valencianos de las elecciones legislativas del 1 de marzo de 1979 se estudian, mediante la técnica de análisis de correspondencias, para obtener los factores fundamentales de diferenciación de los comportamientos electorales constatados. Se obtienen e interpretan tres factores fundamentales asociados, respectivamente, a las alternativas izquierda-derecha, moderación-extremismo y a la abstención. Se obtienen también dos factores de menor importancia, uno de ellos claramente asociado a las opciones nacionalistas. Se detecta la existencia de una relación no lineal entre los dos primeros factores, que es utilizada para derivar uno nuevo que mide el grado de heterogeneidad intra-municipal del voto. Por último los resultados obtenidos son analizados a nivel comarcal. ; The legislative election results of lst March 1979, in Valencia's municipal constituencies are analysed by means of the correspondence analysis technique in order to obtain the fundamental factors of differentiation in the observed electoral patterns. Three fundamental factors are obtained and explained, which are associated respectively to the following three alternatives: left-right wing, moderation-radicalism, and poll turnout. Two other less important factors are also obtained, one of them clearly associated to the nationalistic option. The existence is shown of a nonlinear relation among the two first factors wich is used to deduce a new one wich measures the degree of heterogeneity among constituencies. Lastly the results obtained are analysed on a district basis.