An important shift has occurred since the 1970s and this is a move from an international to a global economy. In this transition, capital has to make effective use of geographical and institutional differences in the world. This process is reshaping the inter-national system into global networks controlled from a handful of global cities in the core countries. However, studies on global (world) cities in the context of the new inter-national division of labor and industrial location have been concerned about the hierarchical position of cities in a static sense. That is the differences are viewed under fixed conditions, concentrating on global cities in core areas, and not the semi-periphery.
Because of the emergence of new regions which have comparative advantages of periphery over the semi-periphery, these seems to be an acceleration of inter-urban competition and alliance across borders. For survival in a global economy, cities which are located the semi-periphery have to make up for geographical and institutional differences with self-regulation, ensaring that global capital can be made to work more effectively through the inter-national division of labor and financial systems.
This paper, attempts to grasp how a semi-peripheral global city secures its position in global economic interactions by acquiring the particular economic activities which can disperse from the core or innovating it, the author attempted to consider the industrial restructuring and the office development in Singapore, directing particular attention to the role of the state. The following summarizes the main results:
There appeared to be growth of office workers within all industrial sectors, but especially the FIRE and business services, and a concurrent decline of production workers in the manufacturing sector since the 1980s. The reason for these trends may be explained by both external and internal factors.
The external factors are the globalization of production and finance systems. The establishment of regional headquarters in Asia can be accounted for the necessity of obtaining‘the foothold space’in the emerging market: a result of United States, European, Japanese, and NIEs trans-national corporations, especially in the electronic industry, expansion of off-shore production, as well as the globalization of the financial system brought about by advanced telecommunication and information technology and ever increasing international money flows.
The internal factors are the economic strategies that have been implemented by the Economic Development Board (EDB), a statutory board to assist survival of the city-state in a global economy. As the EDB encouraged the removal of the labor intensive manufacturing sector from Singapore and its relocation to neighboring regions since the 1980s, the above external conditions served Singapore by offering a favorable business environment for office activities. The articulation of the external and internal factors regulated by the state led to growth in the number of office workers.
In Singapore, much office space was constructed in the CBD. At the beginning, comparatively small office buildings were developed in the Cecil district which is adjacent the traditional hard-core of the CBD. Following this construction, large and smart buildings which incorporate advanced information and telecommunication technology were built in the hard-core. As for the use of this office space, there is now a spatial agglomeration of the financial industry in the hard-core concurrent with the globalization of finance. That is to say the developmental process of office space in Singapore, advanced toward the hard-core from the adjacent district and facilitated the shaping traditional financial industrial district into the global one. This process is in the opposite direction of global cities built historically in the core.

抄録全体を表示

What do tourists experience in travel? What is the meaning of contemporary tourism? These questions have been proposed since the mid 1970's by geographers, anthropologists, and psychologists of tourism in the English-speaking world. Most of the studies attempt to verify MacCanell's theory of authenticity, Turner's process of communitas or Cohen's systematic typology of tourist experience. Are these hypothesis also applicable to the Japanese contemporary tourist experience?
The popular travel monthly“Tabi”proves an indispensable source concerning Japanese tourism. Each edition contains travel essays contributed by readers. I compared 155 travel writings in“Tabi”from 1992 to 1995 with the contributors ranging from the young to the aged.
In the first analysis, I examined three hypothesis. Turner's communitas was verified only in 3 essays; MacCanell's authenticity in 25 essays; and Cohen's typology in 47 essays. These results show that the existing models are insufficient to explain the Japanese tourist experience.
In the second analysis, I tried to treat the 155 travel narratives without hypothesis. Based upon the structuralist textual analysis, I extracted six main subjects: encounter of people, perception of panorama or landscape, discovery of another world, observation of culture and history, solution of problem which arise during travel, and recognition of ones life.
The relations between the demographic category and the subjects of tourist experience are summarized as follows. The younger writers emphasize the spatial contrast: they often compare their chosen destination with their everyday environment, and the smaller places they explored with popular tourist sites. The comparison is not neutral: what is unknown or idyllic is evaluated positively, while what is popular or metropolitan is portrayed negatively. The older writers are likely to underline the spatio-temporal contrast: they frequently speak of a spiritual experience following an ordeal, e.g., reverence of a panoramic view after a painful ascent. In terms of encounter, the nuance between age-groups is also clear. The younger tend to analyze systematically the encounter: they underline the contrast between the fragile tourist from the city and the kind and tough local people. For the older, the encounter is more realistic: there exists mutual communication between the local and the tourist.
Regarding gender, more of the men observe the culture, history, and life style of the destination than women. Observation often leads to comprehension by accompanying the discourse of cultural comparison between native country and destination. On the other hand, women are more concerned with the solution of problems which may happen in their travel. In some cases, they write about the aid given by a local person in an encountered difficult situation; and in other cases they stress their sense of accomplishment after surmounting difficulties. Women are more concerned with self-presentation than men.
Under divers tourist experiences, we can find out one common structure the spatiotemporal contrast. Men seek the spatial contrast between life-space and tourist space, between famous place and little place, and so on. Women pursue temporal contrast between difficult situation and accomplishment, between assisted tourist and assisting local person, and so on.
The structure of contrast in the tourist experience resembles the system of objects proposed by Baudrillard. Both try to contrast some elements with others: goods in Baudrillard, and spatio-temporal experiences in travel writings. In this respect, we can say that travel writing is a part of a contemporary semiotic world. But we can also remark that there is a considerable difference: the contrast is symmetric in the system of goods and asymmetric in the narrative of travel. The asymmetry of the latter is the result of the real space.

抄録全体を表示

The purpose of this study is to review studies on the urban retailing system. The development of a systematic classification of retail systems was based to a large extent on the pioneering set of Berry's works on American cities during 1958-63. Berry (1963) identified that the urban retailing system is composed of three basic elements; nucleated centers, ribbon developments and specialized functional areas. He suggested that nucleated centers represent a hierarchy of business centers, these being either planned or unplanned. Berry (1963) also focused attention on changes in urban retailing system. An examination was undertaken of the relationship between population movements and the subsequent decline or expansion of the retail system.
After Berry's works, there were many studies on the identification and description of the urban retail hierarchy. But there were few studies which attempted to distinguish between systematic variations in the three elements of the urban retailing system. Though Davies (1974) and Potter (1982) identified nucleated centers and ribbons in British cities, they pointed out clearly not to be able to distinguish them. It has long been argued that ribbon and specialized areas are not separate components of the retailing system but merely modifications of nucleated centers.
In the USA since the 1960s, then in the UK since the 1970s, the organization of retailing and urban systems have been changing remarkably. Many works have been undertaken to update the Berry's framework through the incorporation of contemporary forms of shopping development, such as superstores, regional shopping centers and convenience stores. Dawson and Sparks (1980), by contrast, announced that hierarchical models are no longer adequate representations of the urban retailing system. Recently, Brown (1991) presented a non-hierarchical model of urban retail location. It is necessary to rethink urban hierarchical structures and build another model.
Studies of the changes in urban retailing systems are divided into three basic categories: process studies, cross-sectional studies and stage type studies (Shaw, 1978). This study considers process studies and stage type studies.
In stage type studies, the suburbanization or decentralization processes of retailing are divided into several stages. In American cities, retail decentralization involved the decline of the CBD and the development of shopping malls in the fast growing suburban areas. Now, the CBD is one of several regional shopping centers and no longer at the top of the retail hierarchy. Because Britain has experienced strong planning restrictions against urban sprawl and decentralization, there is little evidence of retail decline at the CBD.
Process studies of the urban retailing system are directed to the processes of the natural dynamics of retailing-the unending sequence of shop openings, closures and relocations. Shaw (1978) and Brown (1990) examined the changes in central shopping districts in the UK, and Lord (1992) examined suburban automobile rows in the USA. Each of them examined the dynamics of retailing in one shopping districts. The changes of a shopping district are not only made by the accumulation of the change of shops within that district but also influenced by other retailing facilities within the urban area. Therefore, it is necessary to examine the dynamics of retail areas in the whole urban area.
Planning restriction is closely associated with the location of retail activities. Public policy control aimed directly at retail development in the USA traditionally has been minimal. In many cities, large-scale investment in the CBD redevelopment has been undertaken to present better opportunities for the central area retailers. But, in many cases, inner-city ribbons have been left in an impoverished state. In British cities, the development of new retailing in a declining shopping district hastened the decline of remainder of that district.

抄録全体を表示

A lot of research on reclamation settlements has been done by Japanese geographers. Most of it has been the studies developing statistical data and not focusing on the consciousness of the settlers who actually built the settlements. The culture, especially ritual, transplanted from their homeland to their new settlement has a significance as a symbol in the process of settling. The purpose of this study is to consider the relationship between the formation of reclaimed settlements and ‘revived’ ritual in terms of the settlers.
The field of the study, ‘Miyuki-cho’, is formally divided into Nishimiyuki and Higashimiyuki-cho in Toyohashi-shi. It was settled immediately after the Second World War. In 1945, a group of people from Toyone village, the north-eastern part of Aichi Prefecture, started to settle in this area. That was a policy of Toyone village because of its lack of land for cultivation. As reclamation was conducted by Iwanishi agricultural cooperative association, this settlement became a highly united one in comparison with other settlements. In 1949, the Miyuki shrine was established as a result of transplanting a part of their original settlements' shrines. This provided the necessary setting for the settlers to start a ritual, Hanamatsuri, in 1956.
There were two contexts in reviving Hanamatsuri. First, the tools for Hanamatsuri were transferred from the people of the Bunchi settlement in Toyone village, who had to move from their original site because of the construction of the Sakuma dam. Among the tools Onimen (mask of gods) is the most crucial one and is the object of worship by the people. Secondly, the cognition of the people concerning Hanamatsuri is significant. They used to learn Hanamatsuri customs in their youth in their home village. It was natural for the people to practice Hanamatsuri and they never questioned its meaning.
In conclusion, the settlers started Hanamatsuri as it was indispensable for their life. It was important to revive Hanamatsuri in the process of developing settlements as it meant a final success of their reclamation for the settlers. In sum, in considering the formation of the reclamation settlements, not only physical and economic points of view, but also socio-cultural and subjective viewpoints are necessary.

抄録全体を表示