The financial crisis in South Asia: From jobless growth to jobless slump?
textabstractThis chapter explores the impact of the global financial crisis on South Asia in terms of qualitative and quantitative aspects of employment. South Asia hosts a quarter of the world’s population and a fifth of the global workforce – as well as 40 percent of the global poor (World Bank 2010). This paper therefore contributes to an assessment of the current crisis on the livelihoods of inhabitants of one of the poorest regions in the world. It also provides more general insights about how volatilities in globally increasingly integrated markets translate into opportunities for decent work – or the lack thereof.
The costs of ‘coupling’: the global crisis and the Indian economy
The view that the Indian economy would be less adversely affected by the global economic crisis because of limited integration and other inherent strengths has proved to be wrong. The economic boom in India that preceded the current downturn was dependent upon greater global integration in three ways: greater reliance on exports particularly of services; increased dependence on capital inflows, especially of the short-term variety; and the role these played in underpinning a domestic credit-fuelled consumption and investment boom. These in turn made the growth process more vulnerable to internally and externally generated crises, as is now becoming clear. Copyright The Author 2009. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Cambridge Political Economy Society. All rights reserved., Oxford University Press.
CULTURE, SUSTAINABLE URBAN DEVELOPMENT AND URBAN REGENERATION
Concerns about the conflict between economy, development on one hand and urban cultural heritage on the other hand, have made the urban development to be lately one of the most important themes at European level. Also, another issue of concern is social equity, aiming to strike a balance between economic development and equal access to culture for all generations of inhabitants of urban communities. Basically, ensuring these balances between urban cultural heritage, economy and social equity we express the essence of the concept of sustainable development from the perspective of culture. Urbanization is an ongoing process in all the cities of the world, but urban cultural heritage is a crucial element in the development of the cities and has an important impact over the quality of life of that community. Castles, churches, fortresses, squares and public buildings all contribute at the creating of the community history and of their characteristics.