416 Book Reviews

amenity and the other to cover commons where grazing is still important.

The final section discusses a number of important issues unrelated to the main sections. It is suggested, for example, that the 10,000 acres of commons which are at present unclaimed should be vested in appropriate local authorities. There are 2000 of these unclaimed commons, and although many are in tiny patches they can neverthe- less form important local amenities. The report is a worthwhile attempt to come to terms with the intractable issue of common land management, and formulates reasonable methods to establish the management of commons on a proper footing. The question now is whether legislation will indeed be brought forward along the lines suggested by the Forum, or whether another thirty years or more of procrastination must elapse before anything is done.

CHARLES WATKINS Centre for Rural Studies

Royal Agricultural College, Cirencester

Dynamics of Deprivation, Z.S. Ferge and S.M. Miller (eds), vi + 329 pp., 1987, Gower, Aldershot, f27.50

The Changing Face of Welfare, A. Evers, H. Nowotny and H. Wintersberger (eds), xv + 246 pp., 1987, Gower, Aldershot. f21.50

These are volumes in the Gower series ‘Studies in Social Policy and Welfare’. They both emanate from projects carried out through the European Centre for Social Welfare Training and Research in Vienna, an institution set up under United Nations auspices to study social development and policies in western and eastern Europe.

At a time when social policy is increasingly seen as subservient to economic policy, deprivation seems hardly at the forefront of either the political or the academic agenda. The rationale for contemporary study of depriv- ation is set out as follows by Nowotny in introduction to the first volume (p. 2):

While the chances of experiencing real deprivation, at least for a short period of one’s life, are increasing for many who once thought themselves to be securely removed from such risks, we are also witness to an abrupt hardening of the social structures. Their inbuilt tendencies to protect those who find themselves already inside while defending themselves against all those less fortunate who are or will be outside, are coming to the fore. In the present circumstances the study of deprivation has there- fore to achieve more than merely bringing us up to date on the descriptive level. It calls for a second, hard look at their structuring processes which tend to exclude these already highly vulnerable even further, if no countervailing measures are taken.

Contemporary Britain provides a vivid illustration. The tendency towards social polarization is clear: Nowotny sees it thus (p. 5):

in its centre, those who constitute the core society will live in secure positions, over-protected by social rights with a minimum of social obligations apart from being intensely loyal and committed to that system that assures the protection of their status. On the periphery will be the majority of the population, never totally excluded nor completely marginal-

ised, but continuously kept in a state of a precarious existence: frail in their expectation and prospects; permanently threatened by the possible relapse into greater insecurity and thereby linked to the system that guarantees a bearable amount of insecurity only.

The book adopts what is referred to as a ‘structural’ approach to elaborate the mechanism that allow the social reproduction of deprivation and explains why policies to counter deprivation so often fail, outlined in the first chapter by co-editor Ferge.

Individual contributions begin with conceptual issues concerning poverty, deprivation and marginalisation, and various aspects of ‘Reaganism’ in the United States. Then come empirical studies of recent trends in poverty and deprivation in Europe (particularly Poland) and the United States. Chapters focussed mainly on the inter- generational reproduction of deprivation follow (on Israel, Hungary, Poland and Austria). Finally, there are detailed examinations of the operation of certain agencies or policies in particular countries.

The geographical scope of case studies included reveals an interesting variety of experience. At one extreme is the United States where authors Jenkins and Miller see, ‘A deliberate policy of changing the shape of the income distribution . . . defended in terms of how to achieve growth through incentives and benefits to the private sector’ (p. 99), so that, ‘Greater inequality is the objective and the result’ (p. 111). Such words could equally have been written about Britain in the 1980s. More typical is a less deliberate structural reproduction of deprivation, which nevertheless reveals what the editors in their concluding chapter term ‘quasi-intentionality’. Even in the socialist countries studied, equalitarian aspirations are frustrated by economic and institutional practice, as well as by an element of transmission of disadvantage from one generation to another.

The second volume is more directly concerned with contemporary ‘crisis’ and change in welfare policy, in the light of past achievements (or otherwise) of the Welfare State and the growing prioritization of economic affairs in many countries. The central messages concern the urgency of reform of the Welfare State and the need to renegotiate the relationship between public and private provision. Commitment to some kind of Welfare State prevails: as Nowotny stresses in the Preface, ‘there simply can be no guarantee for the security of the self if it does not take into account the well-being of the other’ (p. xv).

The book is divided into three parts. Part I covers the ‘crisis’ of the Welfare State, in the context of contem- porary economic, political and social realities. Part II looks at specific aspects of change in selected countries. Part III considers the Welfare State in an uncertain future. Salient themes include the changing nature of work and employment (especially ‘informal’ activity), the link be- tween individual rights and. responsibilities and its re- lationship to state welfare provision, privatisation and the relevance of traditional Welfare State thinking to con- temporary conditions.

While neither of these volumes gives anything other than passing reference to specifically rural matters, they do provide thoughtful, well researched and accessible (jargon-free) reviews of central issues in social inequality and welfare policy in ‘advanced’ nations. They crystallise

Book Reviews 417

questions which all too often are submerged in coming to terms with ideological-driven change in specific realms of public provision. In particular, they highlight the dilemma faced no more clearly and critically than in Britain, where inadequacies in the design and operation of the Welfare State makes it hard to defend the poor from new policies which are bound to exacerbate inequality. With the ‘new right’ rampant, fresh thinking is needed to bring social ju$tice back into the political discourse of increasingly individualistic and hedonistic societies, where partially self-serving public welfare bureaucracies are losing their legitimacy as guardians of the weak and vulnerable.

Technology and the pressures associated with its continual change create a persisting series of choices one might make, ranging from personal and family goals to extension teaching methods, and the evolving framework surround- ing the policies, social and economic means through which to do extension education.

DAVID M. SMITH Department of Geography, Queen Mary College

University of London, U.K.

A@icultural Extension Worldwide, William M. Rivera and Susan G. Schram (eds), 1987, Series in International Adult Education, Croom Helm, London, $25.00

The third section concentrates on emerging issues and attempts to focus on priority items within the broad field of extension’s role in agricultural development. It points to the great need for managerial training in the adminis- tration and construction of extension programming, as well as providing the technical training updates required for relevant teaching. The delicate balance between the extent of public versus private involvement in research and extension is discussed. Recognition is made again, for the need to reward educational creativity by risk-takers whether they are extension administrators, policy-makers or field workers. Finally, this section also recognizes the great and different roles played by women in agricultural development, whether they are on their own farms or in informal partnership with their families.

This excellent text comes at a critical juncture, a time when many United States extension personnel foresee a decline in the acceptance, belief in and traditional practice ofi the land grant philosophy. The situation confronting US. extension and applied research appears in contrast to the situation in many other nations which still query pebple in cooperative extension about how to enhance its emergence and use abroad.

The three major sections in the text (Issues, Practices and Emerging Priorities) do their job well of attempting to mhke the reader aware of the practical challenges and potential payoffs for extension education efforts, even when allowing for differences in specific extension sy terns,

1 their linkages to other economic development

ef ,orts and domestic support commitments. These sections are followed by an Epilogue, written by the editors, which summarizes the major issues raised by the contributing authors, and ties them firmly together into a constructive policy-oriented final analysis.

The book provides a very good review of the extension education processes involved in many systems of agricul- tural development. If there is a criticism, it might be that there appears a lack of exploring two things: (1) the need to prepare an audience (students, farmers, etc.) for responsible learning - following through on their part is critical for the independent progress element that makes for development; and (2) the possible effects of the current push for a broad gauge agricultural market orientation to extension rather than continued, and perhaps increased, reliance on government markets and market subsidies.

L. TIM WALLACE Universiv of California

Cooperative Extension, U.S.A.

Arabian Moons: Passages in Time Through Yemen, M. Marechaux, P. Marechaux and D. Champault, 168 pp., 1988, Kegan Paul International, London, f3.5.00

The first section outlines several perspectives of issues found in adult extension programs encountered by ad- ministrators and field workers in agricultural development worldwide. It indicates the need to recognize the diversity and pervasiveness of agricultural and extension education systems. The system linkages are outlined in several ways. Readers are again made aware of the critical role personal (individual) responsibility plays in both learning and teaching within these systems. After all, extension edu- cation whether in agriculture or some other multi-disci- phired effort, is really about exploring a responsible expression of need, a commitment to learning and to teaching and to implementing what is learned. Inevitably, the learning and teaching are tied to the risks associated with progress; individual recognition and promotion, organizational support and user adoption and respect. The risks of educational extension leadership and of being a ‘student’ are broadly defined.

What westerners ‘know’ about Arabs is more myth than fact, more popular media images than informed under- standing. This is even more true of Yemenis than other Arabs. This handsome book, romantic though it is, shows westerners what life in Yemen (or, at least, North Yemen) is really like. The authors concentrate on rural folk, following them sympathetically and gaining access to their culture and mores. They capture a sense of place and sense of people. Arabian Moons is largely a feminine book, concentrating heavily on women. Though the book champions traditional culture, subtly it is a feminist book, showing how the deviations from tradition that charac- terize contemporary Yemeni culture increase the burdens on women relative to those on men. The book is also a Moslem book, treating the message of Mohammed as divine while dismissing biblical tales (such as the one about the Queen of Sheba and King Solomon) as myth.

The second section proceeds with exploring what makes a sucoessful extension program in agricultural development.

The photographs in Arabian Moons are the work of Maria and Pascal Marechaux, French architects who lived with

It igets at the necessary and sufficient conditions for mountain tribes in Yemen over an extensive period. The effective extension work, and continually reinforces the text is by their close friend and frequent collaborator, need for inventiveness and flexible adaptability in com- Dominique Champault, an ethnologist with the Museum bining teaching methods with applied research of all kinds. of Man in Paris. Their product is a beautiful, hardbound