Wood procurement in the pressure of change.

Linear optimization model was used to calculate seven wood procurement scenarios for years 1990, 2000 and 2010. Productivity and cost functions for seven cutting, five terrain transport, three long distance transport and various work supervision and scaling methods were calculated from available work study reports. All method's base on Nordic cut to length system. Finland was divided in three parts for description of harvesting conditions. Twenty imaginary wood processing points and their wood procurement areas were created for these areas. The procurement systems, which consist of the harvesting conditions and work productivity functions, were described as a simulation model. In the LP-model the wood procurement system has to fulfil the volume and wood assortment requirements of processing points by minimizing the procurement cost. The model consists of 862 variables and 560 restrictions. Results show that it is economical to increase the mechanical work in harvesting. Cost increment alternatives effect only little on profitability of manual work. The areas of later thinnings and seed tree- and shelter wood cuttings increase on cost of first thinnings. In mechanized work one method, 10-tonne one grip harvester and forwarder, is gaining advantage among other methods. Working hours of forwarder are decreasing opposite to the harvester. There is only little need to increase the number of harvesters and trucks or their drivers from today's level. Quite large fluctuations in level of procurement and cost can be handled by constant number of machines, by alternating the number of season workers and by driving machines in two shifts. It is possible, if some environmental problems of large scale summer time harvesting can be solved.

Therapeutic change in interaction

A process of change within a single case of cognitive-constructivist therapy is analyzed by means of conversation analysis (CA). The focus is on a process of change in the sequences of interaction, which consist of the therapist’s conclusion and the patient’s response to it. In the conclusions, the therapist investigates and challenges the patient’s tendency to transform her feelings of disappointment and anger into self-blame. Over the course of the therapy, the patient’s responses to these conclusions are recast: from the patient first rejecting the conclusion, to then being ambivalent, and finally to agreeing with the therapist. On the basis of this case study, we suggest that an analysis that focuses on sequences of talk that are interactionally similar offers a sensitive method to investigate the manifestation of therapeutic change. It is suggested that this line of research can complement assimilation analysis and other methods of analyzing changes in a client’s talk.

Change detection and controlling forest information using multi-temporal Landsat TM imagery.

A method was developed for relative radiometric calibration of single multitemporal Landsat TM image, several multitemporal images covering each others, and several multitemporal images covering different geographic locations. The radiometricly calibrated difference images were used for detecting rapid changes on forest stands. The nonparametric Kernel method was applied for change detection. The accuracy of the change detection was estimated by inspecting the image analysis results in field. The change classification was applied for controlling the quality of the continuously updated forest stand information. The aim was to ensure that all the manmade changes and any forest damages were correctly updated including the attribute and stand delineation information. The image analysis results were compared with the registered treatments and the stand information base. The stands with discrepancies between these two information sources were recommended to be field inspected.

From ‘Afflicted’ to Activists: Structural Violence and Climate Change Discourse in the States of Pernambuco and Paraíba in Northeast Brazil

This study approaches the problem of poverty in the hinterlands of Northeast Brazil through the concept of structural violence, linking the environmental threats posed by climate change, especially those related to droughts, to the broader social struggles in the region. When discussions about potentials and rights are incorporated into the problematic of poverty, a deeper insight is obtained regarding the various factors behind the phenomenon. It is generally believed that climate change is affecting the already marginalized and poor more than those of higher social standing, and will increasingly do so in the future. The data for this study was collected during a three month field work in the states of Pernambuco and Paraíba in Northeast Brazil. The main methods used were semi-structured interviews and participant observation, including attending seminars concerning climate change on the field. The focus of the work is to compare both layman and expert perceptions on what climate change is about, and question the assumptions about its effects in the future, mainly that of increased numbers of ‘climate refugees’ or people forced to migrate due to changes in climate. The focus on droughts, as opposed to other manifestations of climate change, arises from the fact that droughts are not only phenomena that develop over a longer time span than floods or hurricanes, but is also due to the historical persistence of droughts in the region, and both the institutional and cultural linkages that have evolved around it. The instances of structural violence that are highlighted in this study; the drought industry, land use, and the social and power relations present in the region, including those between the civil society, the state and the private agribusiness sector, all work against a backdrop of symbolic and moral realms of value production, where relations between the different actors are being negotiated anew with the rise of the climate change discourse. The main theoretical framework of the study consists of Johan Galtung’s and Paul Farmer’s theory of structural violence, Ulrich Beck’s theory of the risk society, and James Scott’s theory of everyday peasant resistance.

Unraveling the helix of change : An activity-theoretical study of health care change efforts and their consequences

M.A. (Educ.) Anu Kajamaa from the University of Helsinki, Center for Research on Activity, Development and Learning (CRADLE), examines change efforts and their consequences in health care in the public sector. The aim of her academic dissertation is, by providing a new conceptual framework, to widen our understanding of organizational change efforts and their consequences and managerial challenges. Despite the multiple change efforts, the results of health care development projects have not been very promising, and many developmental needs and managerial challenges exist. The study challenges the predominant, well-framed health care change paradigm and calls for an expanded view to explore the underlying issues and multiplicities of change efforts and their consequences. The study asks what kind of expanded conceptual framework is needed to better understand organizational change as transcending currently dominant oppositions in management thinking, specifically in the field of health care. The study includes five explorative case studies of health care change efforts and their consequences in Finland. Theory and practice are tightly interconnected in the study. The methodology of the study integrates the ethnography of organizational change, a narrative approach and cultural-historical activity theory. From the stance of activity theory, historicity, contradictions, locality and employee participation play significant roles in developing health care. The empirical data of the study has mainly been collected in two projects, funded by the Finnish Work Environment Fund. The data was collected in public sector health care organizations during the years 2004-2010. By exploring the oppositions between distinct views on organizational change and the multi-site, multi-level and multi-logic of organizational change, the study develops an expanded, multidimensional activity-theoretical framework on organizational change and management thinking. The findings of the study contribute to activity theory and organization studies, and provide information for health care management and practitioners. The study illuminates that continuous development efforts bridged to one another and anchored to collectively created new activity models can lead to significant improvements and organizational learning in health care. The study presents such expansive learning processes. The ways of conducting change efforts in organizations play a critical role in the creation of collective new practices and tools and in establishing ownership over them. Some of the studied change efforts were discontinuous or encapsulated, not benefiting the larger whole. The study shows that the stagnation and unexpected consequences of change efforts relate to the unconnectedness of the different organizational sites, levels and logics. If not dealt with, the unintended consequences such as obstacles, breaks and conflicts may stem promising change and learning processes.