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In this chapter the development of new sugarcane varieties in Florida and Louisiana is examined, along with the accompanying advancement in mechanization technology through the widespread adoption of sugarcane harvesters. An econometric analysis is carried out to determine the impact of the price of raw sugar on raw-sugar yields in Louisiana and Florida. This study found that in the case of Louisiana, the 3-year lagged US raw-sugar price had a positive and significant impact on sugar yields. The change in raw-sugar prices did not have a significant impact on sugar yields for the Florida industry. Sugar production has increased over time, in part, due to the development of new sugarcane varieties accompanied by modern sugarcane harvesters. Given the relationship between price and yield, particularly in Louisiana, policy makers and producers must be mindful of the potential impact of policy-induced research and development (R&D) on the competitiveness of their industry.

This article evaluates contemporary Cuban economic policy and development prospects after a decade of market experimentation in a socialist context. An introductory historical review assesses the successes and failures of Cuban development policy in the 1970s and 1980s and describes the staggering dimensions of the economic crisis triggered by the abrupt disruption of Cuba's relations with the Soviet bloc in 1989–1991. The next section, “To the market in the 1990s,” examines Cuban efforts to stabilize the economy in the early 1990s while maintaining a strong social safety net. The historic policy shift toward limited market liberalization within a state-dominated economy is analyzed and the key market concessions described. The economic turnaround of the late 1990s and Cuban macroeconomic and industrial performance over the past decade are then examined. The final part of the article evaluates the coherence and sustainability of Cuba's emerging economic model and assesses prospects for the survival of some form of Cuban socialism.

In the periods, following the First and Second World Wars, colonial states across the British empire underwent waves of reforms that were geared toward improving human well-being, from enhancing social conditions, such as health and education, to expanding opportunities for economic and political engagement. The literature on the colonial state typically traces these state-building efforts to the agency of European colonial officials. However, evidence from a historical analysis of Trinidad and Tobago reveals a different agent driving state reform: the colonized. A local labor movement during colonialism forced the colonial state to construct a number of state agencies to ameliorate the economic, political, and social conditions in the colony, thereby resulting in an increase in state capacity. This study, therefore, provides critical intervention into the colonial state literature by showing that the agency of the colonized, as opposed to just the colonizers, is key to state-building, and specifying the mechanisms by which the subaltern constrained colonial officials and forced them to enact policies that improved colonial state capacity.

The events surrounding the financial crisis of 2008 are well known, and subject to a broad level of agreement. Less accepted are theories regarding the larger context within which this crisis was able to unfold. Much has been made of the financialization of the American economy and the lax regulation of new financial instruments, both of which stem from the trend toward a laissez-faire economic policy that has characterized the United States since the late 1970s. I do not take issue with these claims. Instead, I argue that these developments have an earlier and deeper source: a breakdown in the ability of large American corporations to provide collective solutions to economic and social problems, a phenomenon that I term “the decline of the American corporate elite.” From a group with a relatively moderate political perspective and a pragmatic strategic orientation, this elite, through a series of historical developments, became a fragmented, largely ineffectual group, with a high degree of societal legitimacy but a paradoxical lack of power. I trace the history of this group, from its origins in the early 1900s, through its heyday in the post-World War II period, to its decline beginning in the 1970s and escalating in the 1980s. I argue that the lack of coordination within the American business community created the conditions for the crises of the post-1980 period – including the massive breakdown of 2008 – to occur.

We present a critical literature review debating Brazilian research on social and environmental accounting (SEA). The aim of this study is to understand the role of politics in the construction of hegemonies in SEA research in Brazil. In particular, we examine the role of hegemony in relation to the co-option of SEA literature and sustainability in the Brazilian context by the logic of development for economic growth in emerging economies. The methodological approach adopts a post-structural perspective that reflects Laclau and Mouffe’s discourse theory. The study employs a hermeneutical, rhetorical approach to understand and classify 352 Brazilian research articles on SEA. We employ Brown and Fraser’s (2006) categorizations of SEA literature to help in our analysis: the business case, the stakeholder–accountability approach, and the critical case. We argue that the business case is prominent in Brazilian studies. Second-stage analysis suggests that the major themes under discussion include measurement, consulting, and descriptive approach. We argue that these themes illustrate the degree of influence of the hegemonic politics relevant to emerging economics, as these themes predominantly concern economic growth and a capitalist context. This paper discusses trends and practices in the Brazilian literature on SEA and argues that the focus means that SEA avoids critical debates of the role of capitalist logics in an emerging economy concerning sustainability. We urge the Brazilian academy to understand the implications of its reifying agenda and engage, counter-hegemonically, in a social and political agenda beyond the hegemonic support of a particular set of capitalist interests.

While scholars have commonly inquired into how capital structures the material world, far less attention has been paid to how the material world has structured the historical relations of the capitalist world economy. This chapter is concerned with the expansion of Caribbean sugar industry in the world economic conjuncture of the first half of the nineteenth century. It examines the relation of the material requirements of sugar production, regional geography, and productive space. The ability of planters in particular locations to respond to world economic conditions was subject to material and spatial constraints. Increased output and technological innovation were dependent on the creation of new productive spaces – including both the formation of new commodity frontiers and the reconstitution the sugar plantation – that conformed to the changing requirements of sugar manufacture. Thus, the spatial and material conditions of staple production shaped the pattern of accumulation and political economic development.

While genetically modified (GM) crops have provided tremendous agricultural productivity gains, many consumers oppose GM products and maintain they are unsafe. We use the case of GM sugar beets and their adoption by the US producers to examine the implications of GM technology on food security. A partial equilibrium framework is used to examine the implications of GM technology on food security. This analysis provides a unique opportunity to examine the impact of GM adoption in one product (sugar beets) relative to non-GM adoption in a substitute product (sugarcane). This analysis examines the potential gains to food security through the adoption of biotechnology versus consumer fear of GM technology. Research and development (R&D) has potential implications not only through its impact on supply, but also on demand as well. This study shows that demand impacts can negate the supply-induced food security gains of R&D. Regulations such as mandatory labeling requirements can impact this outcome.