Rural governance and livelihoods systems diversification in the Western Balkans: comparative case studies of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro and Serbia

Agriculture is still important for socio-economic development in rural areas of Bosnia, Montenegro and Serbia (BMS). However, for sustainable rural development rural economies should be diversified so attention should be paid also to off-farm and non-farm income-generating activities. Agricultural and rural development (ARD) processes and farm activity diversification initiatives should be well governed. The ultimate objective of this work is to explore linkages between ARD governance and rural livelihoods diversification in BMS. The thesis is based on an extended secondary data analysis and surveys. Questionnaires for ARD governance and coordination were sent via email to public, civil society and international organizations. Concerning rural livelihood diversification, the field questionnaire surveys were carried out in three rural regions of BMS. Results show that local rural livelihoods are increasingly diversified but a significant share of households are still engaged in agriculture. Diversification strategies have a chance to succeed taking into consideration the three rural regions’ assets. However, rural households have to tackle many problems for developing new income-generating activities such as the lack of financial resources. Weak business skills are also a limiting factor. Fully exploiting rural economy diversification potential in BMS requires many interventions including improving rural governance, enhancing service delivery in rural areas, upgrading rural people’s human capital, strengthening rural social capital and improving physical capital, access of the rural population to finance as well as creating a favourable and enabling legal and legislative environment fostering diversification. Governance and coordination of ARD policy design, implementation and evaluation is still challenging in the three Balkan countries and this has repercussions also on the pace of rural livelihoods diversification. Therefore, there is a strong and urgent need for mobilization of all rural stakeholders and actors through appropriate governance arrangements in order to foster rural livelihoods diversification and quality of life improvement.

Sozioökonomische Modernisierung und Demokratie in postkommunistischen Transformationsstaaten : eine quantitativ-empirische Analyse zwischen 1996 und 2009 unter Einbezug von Globalisierung

Die vorliegende Arbeit untersucht, in wie weit sich sozioökonomische Entwicklung und die Einbindung in Globalisierungsprozesse verantwortlich für die demokratische Entwicklung postkommunistischer Transformationsstaaten zeigen. Zu diesem Zweck wird ein theoretisches Modell hergeleitet, welches die klassische Modernisierungstheorie um neuere Ansätze erweitert und um Aspekte der Globalisierungsforschung ergänzt. Die empirischen Resultate basieren auf einer quantitativen Betrachtung von 19 postkommunistischen Staaten im Zeitraum zwischen 1996 und 2009. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass sich sozioökonomische Entwicklung und ökonomische Aspekte der Globalisierung positiv auf die Demokratieentwicklung auswirken; eine ungleiche Verteilung von Einkommen in der Bevölkerung sowie soziale Globalisierungsaspekte hingegen weisen lediglich marginale Effekte auf.

Sozio-emotionale Entwicklung von Ganztagsschulkindern auf der Primarschulstufe

Im vorliegenden Beitrag wird die Entwicklung von Schülerinnen und Schülern aus Ganztagsschulen, welche die Angebote intensiv nutzen im Vergleich zu Schülerinnen und Schülern, die nur den Unterricht besuchen (Kontrollgruppe) bezüglich (a) des prosozialen Verhaltens und (b) der sozio-emotionalen Verhaltensstärken bzw. Verhaltensauffälligkeiten untersucht. Die Teilstichprobe umfasst N = 295 Schüler aus 43 Primarschulklassen und 35 Schulen in der Deutschschweiz, die im Rahmen einer quasi-experimentellen Längsschnittstudie in den ersten drei Primarschuljahren untersucht wurden. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass es der Ganztagsschule insgesamt nicht gelingt, die Entwicklung des prosozialen Verhaltens oder der sozio-emotionalen Verhaltensstärken der Schülerinnen und Schüler positiv zu beeinflussen. Im Weiteren bestätigen die Befunde einen Zusammenhang zwischen der pädagogischen Qualität der Ganztagsschulangebote und der sozio-emotionalen Entwicklung von Primarschulkindern.

Potentials and constraints of modeling for transdisciplinary co-producing strategies for sustainable water governance

Both climate change and socio-economic development will significantly modify the supply and consumption of water in future. Consequently, regional development has to face aggravation of existing or emergence of new conflicts of interest. In this context, transdisciplinary co-production of knowledge is considered as an important means for coping with these challenges. Accordingly, the MontanAqua project aims at developing strategies for more sustainable water management in the study area Crans-Montana-Sierre (Switzerland) in a transdisciplinary way. It strives for co-producing system, target and transformation knowledge among researchers, policy makers, public administration and civil society organizations. The research process basically consisted of the following steps: First, the current water situation in the study region was investigated. How much water is available? How much water is being used? How are decisions on water distribution and use taken? Second, participatory scenario workshops were conducted in order to identify the stakeholders’ visions of regional development. Third, the water situation in 2050 was simulated by modeling the evolution of water resources and water use and by reflecting on the institutional aspects. These steps laid ground for jointly assessing the consequences of the stakeholders’ visions of development in view of scientific data regarding governance, availability and use of water in the region as well as developing necessary transformation knowledge. During all of these steps researchers have collaborated with stakeholders in the support group RegiEau. The RegiEau group consists of key representatives of owners, managers, users, and pressure groups related to water and landscape: representatives of the communes (mostly the presidents), the canton (administration and parliament), water management associations, agriculture, viticulture, hydropower, tourism, and landscape protection. The aim of the talk is to explore potentials and constraints of scientific modeling of water availability and use within the process of transdisciplinary co-producing strategies for more sustainable water governance.

Virtue, Law and Mercy

The attribution of responsibility in world society is increasingly a field of contestation. On the one hand, the perception of causal and moral links reaching far in space and time are ever more explicitly pronounced; on the other hand, the very complexity of these links often engenders a fragmentation of responsibility both in law (Veitch 2007) as well as in moral commitment. Moreover, those institutions of legal responsibility attempting to reflect some of these interrelations are often criticised as insufficient by those who follow alternative narratives of causation and moral community. Current institutions of responsibility in law appear to abstract from what could be called enabling contexts; they perform their cuts in the chains of enabling interactions at very brief intervals (Strathern 2001). The result is often “organised irresponsibility” (Veitch 2007; Beck 1996), producing appeals to a global community of concern in time and space without corresponding obligatory commitments. This talk explores alternative conceptualisations of responsibility, and enquires into their notion of the person, their temporal and socio-spatial dimensions, and their notion of liability.

“No fim não vai ficar nada”: exploração dos recursos florestais em Cabo Delgado relatório do trabalho de campo em Namiune, Nkonga e 5º Congresso: Relatório do trabalho de campo nas concessões COMADEL e a FMJ, Cabo Delgado, Novembro de 2010

This report focuses on forest product users in the COMADEL and FMJ forest concessions, Cabo Delgado, as well as the effects of their combined strategies and activities on sustainable use of natural resources and sustainable socio-economic development of the region. The aim is to contribute to understanding the effects of these strategies and activities on forest regeneration, ecosystem services and on resource sustainability. The study examines the role played by the Committees of Natural Resources in forest exploitation. Data obtained from interviews and observations were used to complement and update a variety of existing data from oral and written sources dealing with forest regeneration in Cabo Delgado. These existing materials originate from previous studies conducted in the context of the ESAPP project that started more than two years ago. They include results from Learning for Sustainability workshops (LforS, http://www.cde.unibe.ch/Pages/Project/2/14/Learningfor- Sustainability-Extension-Approach.aspx), as well as field reports, academic studies, management plans used by concessionaires, and others. The interviews and observations took place more or less continuously from the beginning of this phase of the project in 2008. Interviews were systematically conducted with owners of concessions operating in the region, employees of logging companies, residents of villages within the existing concessions, government officials and others. It was not possible to collect information directly from poachers in part due to the illegal nature of their work. Information on these activities was obtained indirectly through members of the Committees of Natural Resources, the concessionaire, and its workers, as well as by observing the traces of extraction – traps, bones and parts of slaughtered animals, tree stumps, material ready for transportation, etc. The main results indicate that extraction by the logging company MITI Ltd. and others acting in the region, by poachers and by other actors – e.g. sawyers using manual saws – put a lot of pressure on marketable species, particularly Millettia stuhlmannii, Afzelia quanzensis and Swartzia madagascariensis. Natural regeneration of forests in northern Cabo Delgado is being compromised by the combination of various extracting activities and uncontrolled fires. MITI Ltd. continued the pattern of exploitation of forest resources that was characteristic of companies operating in the region earlier, such as COMADEL. MITI Ltd. failed to implement the broad range of development and conservation activities encouraged by the new legislation on forest concessions that was created to promote sustainable use of resources.

Species interactions and random dispersal rather than habitat filtering drive community assembly during early plant succession

Theory on plant succession predicts a temporal increase in the complexity of spatial community structure and of competitive interactions: initially random occurrences of early colonising species shift towards spatially and competitively structured plant associations in later successional stages. Here we use long-term data on early plant succession in a German post mining area to disentangle the importance of random colonisation, habitat filtering, and competition on the temporal and spatial development of plant community structure. We used species co-occurrence analysis and a recently developed method for assessing competitive strength and hierarchies (transitive versus intransitive competitive orders) in multispecies communities. We found that species turnover decreased through time within interaction neighbourhoods, but increased through time outside interaction neighbourhoods. Successional change did not lead to modular community structure. After accounting for species richness effects, the strength of competitive interactions and the proportion of transitive competitive hierarchies increased through time. Although effects of habitat filtering were weak, random colonization and subsequent competitive interactions had strong effects on community structure. Because competitive strength and transitivity were poorly correlated with soil characteristics, there was little evidence for context dependent competitive strength associated with intransitive competitive hierarchies.

El espacio público urbano : entre la disputa y la dominación

El concepto de espacio público, cuya actual tendencia expansiva lo carga de abundante ambigüedad, a menudo es tratado en la geografía desde una perspectiva ineludible y sombría. Este conjunto de argumentos han conformado en estos últimos veinte años una retórica sobre la pérdida del espacio público, condenándolo a un destino poco prometedor. Proponemos abordarlo en la Ciudad de Mendoza desde una perspectiva posible y dinámica, donde el espacio público constantemente se esté rehaciendo y redefiniendo entre conflictos, disputas y acuerdos cotidianos en la sociedad, que adquieren prácticas socio-espaciales específicas.

Partir e ficar : Dinâmicas nos processos de migraçao e imigraçao no norte de Minas Gerais- Brasil

This proposal assumes that the migration process is a socio-spatial process. Where desires, goals, fears and hopes of migrating become identities, social constructs that ultimately lead to ways of belonging. Place is a form of interaction, whether between man and the environment, or the man with a specific space. Place demand belonging. Belonging demand identity. Migration then became a strategy, a resistance, an eternal possibility or impossibility of staying or leaving. The displacements eventually cause changes in the relationships and interactions of individuals in their most different spaces. In this sense, they grasp the shifting process of an individual or social group, it is seen that migration and immigration is a process beyond "of being in different social spaces", is a mode of social reproduction defined in relations of time and space, emphasizing the duality of being in motion. Therefore, this proposal seeks to emphasize the dynamics of migration and immigration process in their contexts, as well as highlight the economic social constructions arising from these proceedings, in its social, cultural, political and, thus characterizing the various identities of individuals

Exclusión socioterritorial

Este artículo analiza el concepto de Exclusión Socioterritorial, por ser esta una de las realidades socio-espaciales más visibles de nuestro continente, puesto que la mayor cantidad del territorio y población ha resultado perdedora, marginada y excluida de su participación en las redes globales y sus beneficios.

Cartografías migratorias urbanas : Distribución espacial de la población extranjera en la Ciudad de Buenos Aires (2010)

El presente artículo se propone estudiar la distribución espacial de los migrantes internacionales en la Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires, mediante un análisis estadístico-cartográfico que toma como fuente de datos el Censo Nacional de Población, Hogares y Viviendas 2010. Se realiza un análisis socioespacial a partir de datos censales georeferenciados mediante Sistemas de Información Geográfica (SIG), y se trabaja a partir de la construcción de mapas temáticos y el cálculo de indicadores estadísticos de distribución espacial. En este sentido, desde un abordaje metodológico cuantitativo que combina una escala macrosocial (en tanto abarca a esta ciudad en su totalidad) y microespacial (en la medida que permite visualizar diferencias que se producen a nivel intraurbano), se analiza cómo la presencia urbana de estos grupos, resultado de trayectorias sociales y espaciales diferentes, se manifiesta en patrones de localización particulares en el territorio urbano

Los territorios corporativos de la globalización

Cada período histórico puede ser visto como un orden socio-espacial, un momento de la formación socio-espacial, que requiere un esfuerzo de análisis -más complejo cada día- sobre dos importantes dimensiones. En primer lugar, podemos analizar lo que está ahí, las existencias del territorio usado, el territorio tal como es hoy utilizado a partir de una articulación de variables clave de la época; esto es, el complejo de la llamada tecnociencia, pero también con los contenidos de información y, ciertamente, los contenidos financieros. Éstas son las variables que revelan el rostro hegemónico del espacio y cuyo análisis muestra el funcionamiento de los territorios. En segundo lugar, deberíamos estar atentos al movimiento; es decir, cómo el territorio está siendo usado y cómo podría ser usado. En otras palabras, una mirada sobre las posibilidades del período histórico que vivimos, que pueden o no volverse existencias. El espacio actual, dominado por la ciencia y la técnica, cuya dinámica responde a los totalitarismos de la información y de las finanzas, podría también ser resultado de otras posibilidades y combinaciones, que comienzan tímidamente a surgir como formas de vida y de trabajo.

Cartografías migratorias urbanas : Distribución espacial de la población extranjera en la Ciudad de Buenos Aires (2010)

El presente artículo se propone estudiar la distribución espacial de los migrantes internacionales en la Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires, mediante un análisis estadístico-cartográfico que toma como fuente de datos el Censo Nacional de Población, Hogares y Viviendas 2010. Se realiza un análisis socioespacial a partir de datos censales georeferenciados mediante Sistemas de Información Geográfica (SIG), y se trabaja a partir de la construcción de mapas temáticos y el cálculo de indicadores estadísticos de distribución espacial. En este sentido, desde un abordaje metodológico cuantitativo que combina una escala macrosocial (en tanto abarca a esta ciudad en su totalidad) y microespacial (en la medida que permite visualizar diferencias que se producen a nivel intraurbano), se analiza cómo la presencia urbana de estos grupos, resultado de trayectorias sociales y espaciales diferentes, se manifiesta en patrones de localización particulares en el territorio urbano.

Exclusión socioterritorial

Este artículo analiza el concepto de Exclusión Socioterritorial, por ser esta una de las realidades socio-espaciales más visibles de nuestro continente, puesto que la mayor cantidad del territorio y población ha resultado perdedora, marginada y excluida de su participación en las redes globales y sus beneficios.

Cartografías migratorias urbanas : Distribución espacial de la población extranjera en la Ciudad de Buenos Aires (2010)

El presente artículo se propone estudiar la distribución espacial de los migrantes internacionales en la Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires, mediante un análisis estadístico-cartográfico que toma como fuente de datos el Censo Nacional de Población, Hogares y Viviendas 2010. Se realiza un análisis socioespacial a partir de datos censales georeferenciados mediante Sistemas de Información Geográfica (SIG), y se trabaja a partir de la construcción de mapas temáticos y el cálculo de indicadores estadísticos de distribución espacial. En este sentido, desde un abordaje metodológico cuantitativo que combina una escala macrosocial (en tanto abarca a esta ciudad en su totalidad) y microespacial (en la medida que permite visualizar diferencias que se producen a nivel intraurbano), se analiza cómo la presencia urbana de estos grupos, resultado de trayectorias sociales y espaciales diferentes, se manifiesta en patrones de localización particulares en el territorio urbano