Large-scale land acquisitions in Peru: Land (re)-concentration, agrarian change and reactions from rural communities

More than 40 years after the agrarian reform, Peru is experiencing a renewed process of concentration of land ownership in the hands of large-scale investors, favoring the development of a sugar cane production cluster along the northern coast. The expansion of the agricultural frontier by means of large irrigation projects – originally developed to benefit medium- and small-scale farmers – is carried out today in order to be sold to large-scale investors for the production of export crops. In the region of Piura the increasing presence of large-scale biofuel investors puts substantial pressure on land and water resources, not only changing the use of and access to land for local communities, but also generating water shortages vis-à-vis the multiple water demands of local food producers. The changes in land relations and the agro-ecosystem, the altering food production regime as well as the increasing proletarization of smallholders, is driving many locals – even those which (initially) welcomed the investment – into resistance activities against the increasing control of land, water and other natural resources in the hands of agribusinesses. The aim of this presentation is to discuss the contemporary political, social and cultural dynamics of agrarian change along the northern Peruvian coast as well as the «reactions from below» emanating from campesino communities, landless laborers, brick producers, pastoralists as well as other marginalized groups. The different strategies, forms and practices of resistance with the goal of the «protection of the territory» shall be explored as well as the reasons for their rather scattered occurrence and the lack of alliances on the land issue. This input shall make a contribution to the on-going debate on individual and communal property rights and the question of what is best in terms of collective defense against land grabbing.

FDI inflows and outflows, intellectual property rights, and productivity growth

Using panel data of 57 countries during the period of 1995-2012, this study investigates the impact of intellectual property rights (IPR) processes on productivity growth. The IPR processes are decomposed into three stages, innovation process, commercialization process, and IPR protection process. Our results suggest that better IPR protection is directly associated with productivity improvement only in developed economies. In addition, the contribution of IPR processes on growth through foreign direct investment (FDI) appears to be very limited. Only FDI inflows in developed countries which help to create a better innovative capability lead to a higher growth. And in connection with FDI outflows, only IPR protection and commercialization processes are proven to improve productivity in the case of developing countries, particularly when the country acts as the investing country.

Better than nothing? : dowry in the absence of the legal protection of women's inheritance rights

The practice of dowry is often thought to be the root cause of the unequal treatment of women in India. For women without inheritance rights, however, dowry may function as their only source of protection. Using a nationwide dataset and exploiting a natural experimental situation, this study explores the effects of dowry on women's empowerment in India, a society where women do not have inheritance rights. In such a society, dowry seems to enhance women's status in the marital household. The effects reverse when women have equal inheritance rights as their brothers. Empirical analysis suggests that the outright ban on dowry that ignores the context may not necessarily benefit women.

Custodia del territorio minero español

El concepto de custodia del territorio sigue siendo desconocido para los defensores del patrimonio minero de nuestro país. La custodia del territorio es una estrategia más para conservar los valores naturales, culturales y paisajísticos de una zona determinada. Para conseguir la implicación de los propietarios, las entidades de custodia emplean distintas estrategias e instrumentos con el objetivo de pactar, de forma voluntaria, un acuerdo entre las dos partes. Cuando se habla de la custodia como estrategia, hay que pensar en herramientas y métodos para acceder a la propiedad del patrimonio o para que los propietarios, sin dejar de serlo, se involucren en la conservación. Los encargados de las acciones requeridas, los agentes que protagonizan las acciones de conservación son las denominadas entidades de custodia. Actualmente hay innumerables entidades de custodia en todo el Mundo, que se dedican al patrimonio natural o cultural, pero que se dediquen específicamente a la protección del patrimonio minero son más escasas. Sin embargo la Sociedad Española para la Defensa del Patrimonio Geológico y Minero es, de hecho, una entidad de custodia, en muchos casos sin que sus socios seamos conscientes de ello. En el presente trabajo se intenta definir el concepto de custodia del patrimonio, aplicándolo al caso concreto del patrimonio minero, y se estudian distintos ejemplos de iniciativas para adquirir bienes inmuebles con el fin de preservar un patrimonio minero que estaba en peligro de desaparición. ABSTRACT The concept of land stewardship remains unknown to the defenders of our country’s mining heritage. Land stewardship is a strategy to conserve the natural, cultural and landscape values of a particular area. To encourage the involvement of the owners, the custodians employ different strategies and tools with the aim of reaching, on a voluntary basis, an agreement between the two parties. When it comes to custody as a strategy, you have to come up with tools and methods to achieve the ownership of the property or to encourage the owners to be involved in its conservation. Those responsible for the actions required, the agents who lead conservation actions are known as Custody institutions. Currently there are innumerable custodians around the world, dedicated to natural or cultural heritage, but those specifically engaged in the protection of mining heritage are scarce. However, the Spanish Society for the Defence of the Geological and Mining Heritage is actually an entity of Custody, in many cases without its partners being aware of this fact. This paper attempts to define the concept of guardianship of a property, applied to the case of mining heritage, and explores different examples of Spanish entities that employ initiatives to acquire property for the purpose of preserving mining heritage in danger disappearing

On Modeling an Innovative Monitoring Network for Protecting and Managing Cultural Heritage from Risk Events

In this paper the model of an Innovative Monitoring Network involving properly connected nodes to develop an Information and Communication Technology (ICT) solution for preventive maintenance of historical centres from early warnings is proposed. It is well known that the protection of historical centres generally goes from a large-scale monitoring to a local one and it could be supported by a unique ICT solution. More in detail, the models of a virtually organized monitoring system could enable the implementation of automated analyses by presenting various alert levels. An adequate ICT solution tool would allow to define a monitoring network for a shared processing of data and results. Thus, a possible retrofit solution could be planned for pilot cases shared among the nodes of the network on the basis of a suitable procedure utilizing a retrofit catalogue. The final objective would consist in providing a model of an innovative tool to identify hazards, damages and possible retrofit solutions for historical centres, assuring an easy early warning support for stakeholders. The action could proactively target the needs and requirements of users, such as decision makers responsible for damage mitigation and safeguarding of cultural heritage assets.

Em busca da originalidade do patrimônio cultural na cidade-espetáculo: o caso da Casa Boehm em Joinville/SC

Este trabalho tem o intuito de discutir como um imóvel tombado na cidade de Joinville/SC vem respondendo ao mundo das influências contemporâneas da espetacularização. A Casa Boehm, hoje uma loja de calçados no comércio, foi construída em 1927 e tombada em 2001, por meio do Processo de Tombamento PFCC n. 627/003, de 10 de abril de 2000, homologado pelo Decreto n. 3.461/2001, do Governador do Estado, na época, Esperidião Amin. O imóvel vem sofrendo alterações físicas, que afetam princípios de unidade, volumetria, padrões de estilo arquitetônico, o que faz com surjam debates a respeito dos seus valores estéticos. A depender do gosto dos locatários, especialmente no que se referee às cores externas, sem autorização, vislumbra-se a partir da opinião dos participantes do Conselho de Patrimônio da cidade - COMPHAAN, a espetacularização que este bem vem suportando em nome de uma sociedade de consumo, que apenas visa o lucro, apesar de inúmeros debates teóricos acerca da preservação. Desta forma, quando se pensa em restauração de um patrimônio cultural edificado, a preocupação imanente é com a sua imagem subjetiva/simbólica, e ainda, não menos importante, no que se refere às cores utilizadas nas pinturas das edificações. A metodologia utilizada é qualitativa, por meio de pesquisa bibliográfica, documentais no Arquivo Histórico de Joinville – AHJ e na Fundação Cultural de Joinville – FCJ e, etnográfica. A etnografia, com nuances interdisciplinares, foi realizada nestes mesmos Arquivos da cidade de Joinville, nos arredores do bem em questão e analisando algumas impressões obtidas nas reuniões do Conselho de Patrimônio da cidade – COMPHAAN. Este estudo é parte integrante da pesquisa para doutoramento em Ciências Humanas, na Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina – UFSC. Parte-se da hipótese inicial de que as discussões que envolvem as cores em bens tombados têm se relacionado com a autenticidade e a integridade dos conjuntos nos centros históricos. Porém, vai além, já que o espetáculo buscado pelos gestores públicos, com intento de valorizar suas cidades, acaba por homogeneizar esses territórios em torno de uma ideia de patrimônio que tem sido questionada por alguns teóricos.

Real Property, Dunedin, New Zealand, 1896 (Raster Image)

This layer is a georeferenced raster image of the historic paper map entitled: The Survey Districts of North Harbour & Blueskin, Lower Harbour West, North East Valley, Upper Harbour West, Tomahawk, Sawyers Bay, Andersons Bay, Portobello Bay, Otago Peninsula & Upper Harbour East, drawn by G.P. Wilson, April 1896. It was published by N.Z. Lands and Survey in 1896. Covers the Dunedin region, New Zealand. Scale [ca. 1:63,360]. The image inside the map neatline is georeferenced to the surface of the earth and fit to the Universal Transverse Mercator (UTM Zone 59S, meters, WGS 1984) projected coordinate system. All map collar and inset information is also available as part of the raster image, including any inset maps, profiles, statistical tables, directories, text, illustrations, index maps, legends, or other information associated with the principal map. This map shows features such as property lot and block numbers, boundaries of survey districts and blocks, boroughs, townships and estates, drainage, selected roads, railroads and stations, selected buildings and industry locations, cemeteries, shoreline features, docks and wharves, and more. Relief shown by spot heights.This layer is part of a selection of digitally scanned and georeferenced historic maps from the Harvard Map Collection. These maps typically portray both natural and manmade features. The selection represents a range of originators, ground condition dates, scales, and map purposes.

Cultural Politics of Resilience in Kingston, Jamaica

Recently, resilience has become a catchall solution for some of the world’s most pressing ecological, economic and social problems. This dissertation analyzes the cultural politics of resilience in Kingston, Jamaica by examining them through their purported universal principles of adaptation and flexibility. On the one hand, mainstream development regimes conceptualize resilience as a necessary and positive attribute of economies, societies and cultures if we are to survive any number of disasters or disturbances. Therefore, in Jamaican cultural and development policy resilience is championed as both a means and an end of development. On the other hand, critics of resilience see the new rollout of resilience projects as deepening neoliberalism, capitalism and new forms of governmentality because resilience projects provide the terrain for new forms of securitization and surveillance practices. These scholars argue that resilience often forecloses the possibilities to resist that which threatens us. However, rather than dismissing resilience as solely a sign of domination and governmentality, this dissertation argues that resilience must be understood as much more ambiguous and complex, rather than within binaries such as subversion vs. neoliberal and resistance vs. resilience. Overly simplistic dualities of this nature have been the dominant approach in the scholarship thus far. This dissertation provides a close analysis of resilience in both multilateral and Jamaican government policy documents, while exploring the historical and contemporary production of resilience in the lives of marginalized populations. Through three sites within Kingston, Jamaica—namely dancehall and street dances, WMW-Jamaica and the activist platform SO((U))L HQ—this dissertation demonstrates that “resilience” is best understood as an ambiguous site of power negotiations, social reproduction and survival in Jamaica today. It is often precisely this ambiguous power of ordinary resilience that is capitalized on and exploited to the detriment of vulnerable groups. At once demonstrating creative negotiation and reproduction of colonial capitalist social relations within the realms of NGO, activist work and cultural production, this dissertation demonstrates the complexity of resilience. Ultimately, this dissertation draws attention to the importance of studying spaces of cultural production in order to understand the power and limits of contemporary policy discourses and political economy. 

Innovation and Development in the Age of Climate Change Adaptation: Open or Closed?

Change Adaptation: Open or Closed? Paper read at the Second African International Economic Law Network Conference, 7-8 March 2013, Wits School of Law, Johannesburg, South Africa. In a time of rapid convergence of technologies, goods, services, hardware, software, the traditional classifications that informed past treaties fail to remove legal uncertainty, or advance welfare and innovation. As a result, we turn our attention to the role and needs of the public domain at the interface of existing intellectual property rights and new modes of creation, production and distribution of goods and services. The concept of open culture would have it that knowledge should be spread freely and its growth should come from further developing existing works on the basis of sharing and collaboration without the shackles of intellectual property. Intellectual property clauses find their way into regional, multilateral, bilateral and free trade agreements more often than not, and can cause public discontent and incite unrest. Many of these intellectual property clauses raise the bar on protection beyond the clauses found in the WTO Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS). In this paper we address the question of the protection and development of the public domain in service of open innovation in accord with Article 15 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) in light of the Objectives (Article 7) and Principles (Article 8) set forth in TRIPS. Once areas of divergence and reinforcement between the intellectual property regime and human rights have been discussed, we will enter into options that allow for innovation and prosperity in the global south. We then conclude by discussing possible policy developments.

Holland; list of monuments and objects of cultural importance

Mimeographed.

Report of the United States delegation to the Vienna Diplomatic Conference on Industrial Property : Vienna, Austria, May 17 to June 12, 1973 /

"Within the framework of the Diplomatic Conference, there were three Conferences: (a) the Conference on the Trademark Registration Treaty; (b) the Conference on the Protection to Type Faces and their International Deposit; and (c) the Conference on the International Classification of the Figurative Elements of Marks."

Former Toastmaster property : soil sampling results, 401 Washington Street, McHenry County, Algonquin, Illinois /

"August 2010."

Gilberts/Kedzie Property : former battery recycling facility : Kane County - Gilberts, Illinois.

In 2004, both Illinois EPA and U.S. EPA investigated the location of a former battery cracking and recycling operation in Gilberts. The main site is located immediately north of the intersection of Railroad and Mill Streets bounded to Galligan Road on the east and the Chicago and Northwestern Railway on the west. It is in an area that is mostly wooded near both industrial and residential properties. Lead acid batteries were cracked open to recover the lead. Some of the lead seeped into the ground along with acid contained in the batteries. Extensive environmental sampling last summer identified a six-acre area of gross contamination (mainly lead). Later, a second area of contamination was discovered to the southwest, where the Village of Gilberts Public Works building is now located, west of the railroad tracks - this is known as the Tower Hill Road site.

Cultural landscape report for the Vanderbilt Mansion formal gardens : Vanderbilt Mansion National Historic Site, Hyde Park, New York : site history, existing conditions, analysis and evaluation, treatment /

Includes bibliographical references.