News for mid-April (NPR) U.S. Pledge to “Non-Lethal” Assistance

1. - Some essays were genuinely hard to read while others had been typed. Presentation matters sometimes.- Few Quiz #3 essays showed evidence of relying on textbook, PowerPoints, class discussion or Internet search.- If the term ‘Internet’ is currently proper, then why do (web) addresses start with ‘www’?- for the final exam preparation, consider reviewing the latest vocabulary and the “Criteria Sets for Evaluating Geography” - - both available at www.smartmap.us- Also, reference the three PP presentations (including this one)

2. News for mid-April (NPR)U.S. Pledge to “Non-Lethal” Assistance • Health services, not weapons • Capitalism – the root of all ‘good’? • Mixed societies – promoting initiative, with restraints • Theft and other crime, as forms of initiative? • **Defining what is ‘legal’, ethical, or moral • Legal – by law, ordinance, statute • Moral– personal behavior • Ethical – applying morals to community standards, as group ‘norms’ **Source http://www.wisegeek.org

3. Based on these definitions, is ‘shadow’ lending legal, ethical or moral?

4. More NPR News for April, 2013 Radio story on commemorating the 70th anniversary of the destruction of Warsaw (part of the ‘shatter zone’ but not the Balkans). Allegedly, more people died from German bombing of Warsaw in 1939-44 than in all bombings in Iraq in 2003-2009 <NPR, April 21, 2014>. Why would that comparison be drawn? <Religion, ethnicity, mode of ‘bombing’, recency. Why not Biafra, Uganda, Balkan ‘cleansing’, Darfur?>

5. Human Geography 1400Chapter 12 and Summary Chinese urban development patterns are beginning to look like ‘western suburbia’ in style, names and in creating ‘urban sprawl*.’ (p423) The classic western suburban development pattern is to maximize land use efficiency (by density) at urban nodes, with ‘distance decay’ density decline away from central places that are often called “central business districts”. More recently, in the United States, a generation of ‘flight to suburbia’ has given way to resurgent ‘re-urbanization’ of major urban centers and ‘downtowns’ (sometimes called “gentrification.” In the ‘West’ the first wave of urbanization led to post-war suburban development based on the automobile and national support for highway development. *See definitions for ‘sprawl.’ Source: www.google.com

6. More Favela(notice the swimming pools on balconies – how did the Venezuelan elections turn out? What was Chavez’ mission?)

7. More NPR News (fits the class textbook)April 19, 2013 Globalization produces a larger ‘pie’, but less fairly distributed. Western ‘mixed’ economies re-distribute income ostensibly for fairness, but also as a support to production, such as bus tokens, re-employment training, health care, etc. Trade, specialization and information services support a growing middle class in the developing world, but these same qualities make it easier for poor people to see what they do not have. In a real way, globalization raises expectations and disappointments along with hope. The textbook says that urban splintering is especially prominent in core countries, but I disagree – the United States has a well-developed social service system and public education and strongly mixed economy, helping to alleviate some of the disparities. LDCs typically show more stark contrast between rich and poor. There are no genuine favelas in the United States – they would not pass building code, health code, zoning code, etc.

8. Splintering, continued Even as globalization brings homogeneity to products, services and processes, it helps illustrate and emphasize human differences in ethnicity, demographics, religion and politics. Major world cities also show growing cleavages, particularly across ethnic and geographic lines, bringing proximity to disparities. Burgeoning world population further emphasizes differences by assigning most births to the ‘have not’ category.

9. Chinese Traffic Jam Replicating the aging American dream?

10. Soviets Copied Captured B-29 Bombers

11. American Land Use Planning(p433) • The United States pioneered the use of ‘zoning’ and other land use planning standards that tended to separate noxious industrial activities from residential. • The result, however, contributed to high cost of urban development and reliance on the automobile. Only recently has land use planning in the United States attempted to re-integrate where people live with where they work. • The conversion of the U.S. work force from heavy industrial “smoke stack” jobs to service and technology functions may eventually help re-integrate residential and employment activities. • Telecommuting is a means of allowing people to work at home, rather than commute, but has not yet caught on the United States. Instead, cars have become offices for multi-tasking, meals, sleeping, entertainment. • By comparison, in most of the world, residential and business life was never separated, providing cost savings by comparison to the United States, where community by automobile is still ubiquitous (and expensive).

12. Land Use Zoning for Pierre, South Dakota

13. Islamic Cities In contrast to western, automobile-oriented cities (mostly the United States): “The fundamentals of the layout and design of the traditional Islamic city are so closely attached to Islamic cultural values that they are to be found in the Qur’an, the holy book of Islam.” “Focus is on privacy and virtue, communal well-being and the inner essence of things rather than outward appearance.” (textbook, p436) Are both of these assertions consistent with differences between the West and Islam? In suburbia, garages ‘front’ the street and fences ‘make good neighbors.’ Besides, people are often not home, but in their cars.

14. Urban Design In further contrast, Salt Lake City streets are wide and rectilinear, compared to the developing world (and Islamic cities) with narrow, twisting streets that maximize shade. SLC Main Street is sheltered, but most of central city is loud and exposed. Such designs also reflects the long history of development and re-development, mostly using animals and hand tools rather than heavy machinery powered by fossil fuel.

15. Dualism as “formal” and “informal economies “Dualism” is the juxtaposition of informal* and formal* sectors of the economy in close proximity: high rise buildings adjacent to slums and shantytowns. (textbook, p438) The informal economy contributes substantially to overall economy vitality and makes economical use of otherwise idle resources. Informal economies help many regions maintain world competitiveness. Garbage picking and other recycling helps return consumer and industrial materials to re-use. *Informal = not taxed, monitored, licensed or part of GNP. Formal economy is measured and regulated (mixed economy is regulated) (Source: textbook and Wikipedia)

16. Urban “Dualism” World “shock cities” display deplorable living conditions that are increasingly common in the developing world: Mexico City Lagos Mumbai Dhaka Jakarta Karachi Manila Sao Paulo Even as developing world embraces western social technology, the informal economy is burgeoning. Social tech = rule of law, codes, health standards, administrative and business practices, compliances.

17. The U.S. Informal Economy In the United States, can it be argued that illegal immigrant labor helps ensure economic competitiveness in world markets by providing a large fraction of the domestic economy (and exports) at costs and prices that are essentially subsidized by under-paid labor? However, the extent to which illegal economic activity is underground may include unpaid taxes, criminal activity, and social welfare obligations that constitute a burden on society in general.

18. Fiscal Problems (p427) • In the United States, only the Federal government can legally run a persistent fiscal deficit.* • States and local governments have come to rely on revenue sharing, contributing to deficits at all levels. Expectations are very high. • Urban decay and deteriorated infrastructure add greatly to city fiscal pressures at a time when re-urbanization is occurring. • As such, the United States increasingly shares the dilemmas of the developing world: cities present human opportunity, but often poor conditions and a widening gap between rich and poor (declining middle class). • Fiscal ‘sequestration’ is having an effect. **Is there an ‘ethical’ obligation to future generations as per fiscal and environmental debts?

19. Camden New Jersey Could Camden be ‘recolonized’ as an indigenous native population? Camden as a type of ‘third world’? Defined formally as ‘non-aligned’ but in this case informally defined as ‘less developed’ or poverty-stricken.

20. Source: www.thenation.com, April 2013 Camden, New Jersey, with a population of 70,390, is per capita the poorest city in the nation. It is also the most dangerous. The city's real unemployment—hard to estimate, since many residents have been severed from the formal economy for generations—is probably 30–40 percent. The median household income is $24,600. There is a 70 percent high school dropout rate, with only 13 percent of students managing to pass the state's proficiency exams in math. The city is planning $28 million in draconian budget cuts, with officials talking about cutting 25 percent from every department, including layoffs of nearly half the police force. The proposed slashing of the public library budget by almost two-thirds has left the viability of the library system in doubt.

21. Re-urbanization and Segregation Even as older cities participate in world-wide urbanization, neighborhoods often remain ‘de facto’ segregated by race and income, even if ‘de jure’ conditions (law) prohibits discrimination. In the United States, the fringes of fast-growing cities, mostly in the Southwest, such as Las Vegas & Miami, were particularly hard-hit by the recent ‘mortgage foreclosure crisis’.(p431-32) The informal processes of ‘red-lining’ and ‘block-busting’ are countervailing influences.(p430) Source: Google.com images

22. Unlike many, if not most world cities, most American cities are dominated by the automobile that allows‘suburban flight’ (both daily and long-term),resulting in uninteresting downtowns and lack of vibrant “24-7” life. People with cars can maintain defacto segregation by retreating to enclaves. Paris, France (source: Frommers.com/slideshow

23. Cities of Hope, Cities of Despair • In Mexico, more than 90 percent of wastewater treatment plants are nonfunctional. • In cities like Bogota, Buenos Aires, Mexico City and Santiago, some 50-60 million cubic meters of mostly untreated sewage is discharged every day into nearby bodies of water. • Sao Paulo has over 1,600 miles of open sewers. • In Bangkok, less than 5 percent of the population is connected to a sewer system. • <In most of> Latin America, only about 2 percent of collected sewage receives any treatment. • China is estimated to have 16 of the 20 worst cities for air quality in the world.

24. Cities of Hope, Cities of Despair The largest of the world’s polycentric metropolises have become “100-mile cities.” Is the Sandy cluster creating a bi-polar Salt Lake County? Fragmentation of land-use planning may be increasing even as urban development becomes more sophisticated and technology-based. However, regional authorities seem to be working successfully across jurisdictions. For example, in the Los Angeles ‘basin’ (Inland Empire) there are more than 1,100 political jurisdictions.