The continent's booming new economic zones are outstripping the ability of weak central governments to retain their hold on them.

In view of the present serious threat of famine in rural areas throughout India, the Atlantic feels it is of first importance to determine whether this plight which has stirred wide American sympathy is susceptible of more than temporary relief. W. H. FORBES,Lecturer at the School of Public Health at Harvard University, has made two extended visits to India since 1949 in furtherance of a joint public health project undertaken by the School and the Ludlow Tate Co. Ltd. His sobering conclusions are the result of close study, far travel, and many consultations.

Associate Professor of History at Harvard, OSCAR HANDLIN seeks to answer a question which is fundamental in any blueprint of our economy. Will American labor, some of whose leaders once flirted dangerously with Communism, follow the line toward Socialism? Or will they prove to be a property-minded conservative force in the years ahead? Mr. Handlin is the author of Boston’s Immigrants and This Is America, studies of the new blood streams in this country; and his latest book, The Uprooted, won the Pulitzer Prize for History in 1951.