Land-use patterns and cultural change in the Middle to Late Bronze Age in Ireland: inferences from pollen records

In Ireland, the Middle to Late Bronze Age (1500-600 cal. B.C.) is characterised by alternating phases of prolific metalwork production (the Bishopsland and Dowris Phases) and apparent recessions (the Roscommon Phase and the Late Bronze Age-Iron Age transition). In this paper, these changes in material culture are placed in a socio-economic context by examining contemporary settlement and land-use patterns interpreted from the pollen record. The vegetation histories of six tephrochronologically-linked sites are presented that provide high-resolution and chronologically well-resolved insights into changes in landscape use over the Middle to Late Bronze Age. The records are compared with published pollen records in an attempt to discern if there are any trends of woodland clearance and abandonment from which changes in settlement patterns can be inferred. The results suggest that prolific metalworking industries correlate chronologically with expansive farming activity, which indicates that they were supported by a productive subsistence economy. Conversely, declines in metalwork production occur during periods when farming activity is generally less extensive and perhaps more centralised, and it is proposed that disparate socio-economic or –political factors, rather than a collapse of the subsistence economy, lies behind the demise of metalworking industries.

Authenticity and stakeholder planning in the segregated city

This paper is concerned with the production and reproduction of segregation in Northern Ireland and how territoriality has impacted on the Protestant community in Derry/Londonderry. The city was pivotal in the development of the most recent conflict, has a majority Catholic population, sits on a contested border and has attempted to respond to expressions of alienation that have emerged from the Protestant community. The research used multiple methods to understand the nature of alienation and exclusion using secondary data, a quantitative household survey, in-depth interviews and focus
groups. This empirical commitment was important in identifying and unpacking the claims of various stakeholders with an interest in the use and development of the area. It is argued here that a version of Collaborative Planning provides a loosely articulated conceptual and methodological framework for drawing Protestant communities into the wider planning framework for the city. The data, however, suggest that the nature of stakeholders is complex and contradictory, and discursive practice that seeks consensus has limits, especially in validating or legitimating the assertions of self-acclaimed stakeholders. The research shows that the Protestant community had declined and residualised but had little experience of direct conflict with the majority community. Moreover, the Protestant community is now more likely to use the city centre (a predominantly Catholic space) for consumption and work, and its demographic decline has stopped. These findings are important as policy responses and community relations programmes have failed to distinguish between measurable socioeconomic needs and claims concerning ethnic alienation based on emotion and manipulation. Such alienation has tended to bolster single identity communities who have little or no prospect and/or knowledge of the collaborative efforts required to deliver meaningful regeneration. More realistic strategies based on agonism focus attention on power relations and the authenticity of positions adopted by competing interests in land use management and change. The paper concludes by highlighting the need to acknowledge and value contestation but to challenge sectarian discourses represented as legitimate claims about community needs and priorities.

Evidence and Spatial Planning for Sustainable Development: A Model for Spatially Allocating Material Flows

The aspiration the spatial planning should act as the main coordinating function for the transition to a sustainable society is grounded on the assumption that it is capable of incorporating both a strong evidence base of environmental accounting for policy, coupled with opportunities for open, deliberative decision-making. While there are a number of increasingly sophisticated methods (such as material flow analysis and ecological footprinting) that can be used to longitudinally determine the impact of policy, there are fewer that can provide a robust spatial assessment of sustainability policy. In this paper, we introduce the Spatial Allocation of Material Flow Analysis (SAMFA) model, which uses the concept of socio-economic metabolism to extrapolate the impact of local consumption patterns that may occur as a result of the local spatial planning process at multiple spatial levels. The initial application the SAMFA model is based on County Kildare in the Republic of Ireland, through spatial temporal simulation and visualisation of construction material flows and associated energy use in the housing sector. Thus, while we focus on an Ireland case study, the model is applicable to spatial planning and sustainability research more generally. Through the development and evaluation of alternative scenarios, the model appears to be successful in its prediction of the cumulative resource and energy impacts arising from consumption and development patterns. This leads to some important insights in relation to the differential spatial distribution of disaggregated allocation of material balance and energy use, for example that rural areas have greater resource accumulation (and are therefore in a sense “less sustainable”) than urban areas, confirming that rural housing in Ireland is both more material and energy intensive. This therefore has the potential to identify hotspots of higher material and energy use, which can be addressed through targeted planning initiatives or focussed community engagement. Furthermore, due to the ability of the model to allow manipulation of different policy criteria (increased density, urban conservation etc), it can also act as an effective basis for multi-stakeholder engagement.

School exclusion, drug use and delinquency in adolescence

Fifty-one young people aged 14�15 years considered to be at a high-risk of substance abuse and exhibiting antisocial behavior, primarily because they longer attended mainstream school, participated in this research by completing a questionnaire to measure drug use and delinquent behaviour. The findings suggest that many of them may have already developed a high propensity to drug abuse and antisocial behaviour compared with their peers in mainstream education. As they were all excluded from school, they were not accessing school based prevention programmes delivered to their contemporaries at school suggesting that additional and specialized resources are required to fully meet their needs.

Resource pressure and environmental change on the North African littoral: Epipalaeolithic to Roman gastropods from Cyrenaica, Libya.

This paper discusses the marine and terrestrial shell on Epipalaeolithic to Classical-period sites in the Cyrenaican coastlands, northeast Libya, with particular reference to the Haua Fteah, with parallel studies at a late-Roman farmstead and two small caves. Together they provide evidence for coastal and terrestrial environments and for the continued nutritional importance of gastropods to humans during the Holocene. Land snail evidence is consistent with regional vegetation in coastal Cyrenaica becoming increasingly open through the Holocene, as a result of some combination of climate change and human impact. Marine species suggest that the coastline near the Haua had been rocky throughout the Holocene. At Hagfet al-Gama, changing faunas provide evidence for sand encroachment onto a previously rocky shoreline in Hellenistic times. A biometric study of Osilinus turbinatus shows that in the archaeological sites these shells are systematically smaller than modern specimens, providing evidence for long-term dietary stress in the human populations around the Haua Fteah, with particularly severe stress in parts of the Epipalaeolithic. A biometric study of Patella spp. provided evidence for size selection, but also seems to show evidence for resource pressure. It is unlikely that variations in resource pressure seen in the mollusc biometrics are the result of climatic stress or natural ecological factors and explanations must be sought in society-environment dynamics.