Household Agency Research Articles

Preferences, enablers, and barriers for 1.5°C lifestyle options: Findings from Citizen Thinking Labs in five European Union countries

The Horizon 2020 project EU 1.5°C Lifestyles aims to mainstream lifestyles aligned with the aspirational target of the Paris Agreement. The project analyzes lifestyle perspectives at the household level and links them to studies of relevant political and socio-economic structures at various levels of government. Within this project, Citizen Thinking Labs were organized in five EU countries to explore the acceptance of and motivations and barriers to changes that could lead to lifestyles compatible with the 1.5°C target. Through a unique mixed-methods approach, including an exploratory board game (the Climate Puzzle), this research generated insights into citizen acceptance by exploring motivations and barriers associated with the acceptance of key lifestyle changes toward 1.5°C. The results confirm previous research in that citizens are more accepting of lower-impact lifestyle options requiring financial investment (e.g., changing lighting and using efficient devices) than higher-impact options that require more substantial behavior changes. Citizens were also motivated by perceived co-benefits for example, concerning health. The research developed insight into the conditions underlying the acceptance of the least preferred options that included plant-based eating and smaller housing. The results also indicated that citizens’ acceptance could be shaped by discussing options with other citizens. Thus, we note the important role citizens may play in devising solutions for overcoming barriers to the acceptance of less-preferred lifestyle options in various contexts. While this study focused on individuals, the findings also underscore the limitations of individual and household agency and the importance of modifying the socio-technical context that shapes behavioral patterns and environmental impacts.

Upholding household agency in climate mitigation and socio-technical energy transition in Ethiopia

Despite major advances in global energy transition aimed at climate change mitigation, rural households in sub-Saharan Africa have yet to fully benefit from the increasingly accessible and affordable renewable energy sources. Whereas current literature focuses on conceptual frameworks and experiences of energy transition in developed countries, less is known regarding the household level implications of energy transition in the Global South. This paper investigates the socio-technical energy transition (STET) and adopts the muti-level perspective (MLP) to understand how different actors interact to achieve an equitable and sustainable energy transition in developing countries. Based on key informant interviews with stakeholders engaged in the solar energy transition in Ethiopia, we find that structural fragmentation across various levels and actors trickle down to affect household energy access and consumption. Despite enhanced access to clean energy offered by solar panels, the local users are often excluded from the dialogue surrounding renewable energy transition and climate mitigation, thus compromising their utilization of solar energy and the broader efforts to cut carbon emissions. This paper, therefore, calls for interactive governance and the creation of a decentralized communication platform that recognizes local energy consumers as pivotal agents of change.

Agents of change or victims of transition? Media framings on household roles during the energy crisis

The energy crisis that began in late 2021 and escalated after the war in Ukraine in early 2022 was seen as a disruption accelerating the energy transition in Europe. It forced households to save energy and change their patterns of energy use in a struggle to cut dependency on Russian energy, and in public discussions, various kinds of agency were required from and allocated to households. In this article, we analyze a total of 220 articles on energy use published in the main Finnish newspaper, Helsingin Sanomat, during the energy crisis between 1 November 2021 and 31 October 2022. We investigate how household agency driven by the energy crisis is framed in the media by analyzing the variety of roles assigned to households and the framings of the agency attached to those roles in relation to mitigating the energy crisis. The analysis provides insights into how households are embedded within the energy system and whether and how they are expected to facilitate the energy transition; moreover, the article contributes to a better conceptualization of the understudied roles and agency of households in transitions.

Income sources, intrahousehold allocation and individual poverty

Policies aimed at redistributing to the most vulnerable individuals must consider inequality within households as much as between households. In that spirit, many cash transfers are targeted at women rather than men. Tax legislations can also contain specific gender provisions that treat men and women differently. Whether these policies operate some intrahousehold redistribution, or are defeated by the household agency problem, is an open question. This paper provides new insights by adapting models of intrahousehold allocation to account for women's and men's net‐of‐tax earnings and targeted benefits as determinants of the household resource sharing function. We suggest applications using household expenditure data for Argentina and South Africa. Net‐of‐tax earnings and benefits commanded by women are often positively related to their and their children's resources. We provide counterfactual simulations to illustrate how women's financial power – and its sources – may modify their consumption share and thus their individual poverty status.

LiberRoad: Probing into the Journey of Chinese Classics Through Visual Analytics.

Books act as a crucial carrier of cultural dissemination in ancient times. This work involves joint efforts between visualization and humanities researchers, aiming at building a holistic view of the cultural exchange and integration between China and Japan brought about by the overseas circulation of Chinese classics. Book circulation data consist of uncertain spatiotemporal trajectories, with multiple dimensions, and movement across hierarchical spaces forms a compound network. LiberRoad visualizes the circulation of books collected in the Imperial Household Agency of Japan, and can be generalized to other book movement data. The LiberRoad system enables a smooth transition between three views (Location Graph, map, and timeline) according to the desired perspectives (spatial or temporal), as well as flexible filtering and selection. The Location Graph is a novel uncertainty-aware visualization method that employs improved circle packing to represent spatial hierarchy. The map view intuitively shows the overall circulation by clustering and allows zooming into single book trajectory with lenses magnifying local movements. The timeline view ranks dynamically in response to user interaction to facilitate the discovery of temporal events. The evaluation and feedback from the expert users demonstrate that LiberRoad is helpful in revealing movement patterns and comparing circulation characteristics of different times and spaces.

Japanese Primary Sources Relating to World War ii: Post-Cold War Developments

Abstract This article introduces readers to World War ii-era Japanese primary sources that have become available, over the last three decades, at the major archives and libraries. It also illustrates how and why some of these hitherto unavailable archival materials have become publicly accessible. At first, political, diplomatic and military historians primarily conducted their research at Diplomatic Archives, Military Archives, and the Modern Japanese Political History Materials Room, until the Japanese Diet passed a law in 2011 stipulating that all government and agencies, except for the Foreign Ministry and Imperial Household Agency, must transfer archived documents to the National Archives of Japan (naj). Enhancing its importance for research, the naj played the lead role in creating and maintaining the Japan Center for Asian Historical Records that has sustained a major effort at digitization. Other important primary sources include documents related to Emperor Hirohito, the Documents on Japanese Foreign Policy series, holdings of the Military History Department, and materials non-governmental organizations have published. The amount of Japanese source materials and their digitization now has reached a level that meets the U.S. and European standards.

Gender, place, and agricultural extension: a mixed-methods approach to understand farmer needs in Liberia

ABSTRACT Purpose This study explores the intersection of gender and place with agricultural extension services to understand disparities in resource and information access and build community resilience in post-conflict Liberia. It emphasizes how such intersections may be further compounded by climate change and provides possible solutions. Methodology Using a community-based research approach, 352 surveys and 44 focus groups were conducted in 22 communities in 3 counties in north-central Liberia. Subsequently, qualitative, quantitative, and spatial analyses were done to explore gender and place-based differences in farmer access to agricultural resources and household agency. Findings Study results show that women farmers have less access to technology, agricultural resources and information; higher, combined productive and domestic, labor burdens; and that farmers of both genders want more female extension officers. Practical Implications This study provides critical data to help effectively target limited expenditures on national extension services to smallholder farmers in post-conflict settings. Further, solutions for practitioners to adaptively mitigate farming challenges enhanced by climate change. Theoretical Implications Studying the intersection among gender, rural isolation and diminished capacity in post-conflict countries will enhance understanding of (extension service) capacity in settings with multiple drivers affecting gender inequalities. Originality Improve the overall understanding of how compounding factors such as gender and place effect extension service access and the ability of farmers to adapt to change, in Liberia and other post-conflict settings.

일본 16~17세기 세계지도병풍 연구

This study examines why Japanese world map screens were made and what was the hidden meaning of their production in the late 16th and early 17th centuries in Japan. Japanese world map screens were made towards the end of the 16th century and at the beginning of the 17th century. While they were generally modeled after world maps produced in Europe, the Japanese either modified the European prototypes or incorporated new elements. Therefore, they are important visual testimonies of the cultural exchange between Japan and the West in the early modern period. By taking into account both their cartographic and pictorial nature in relation to the political and the economic contexts in which they were produced, this study examines the significance of two sets of world map screens. These two sets of screens are the most elaborate examples of the two world map screen types: One is the world map screens from Jōtokuji Temple, which prominently show political concerns of the time, and the other is the world map screens from the Imperial Household Agency in Tokyo, which demonstrate economic interests of the Japanese ruling class. By analyzing the visual characteristics of these two works, this study suggest their possible patronage in connection with both the novel features of the images on the screens and the interests of the Japanese rulers; Toyotomi Hideyoshi and Tokugawa Ieyasu. Also, it explores the ways in which the map screens reflected and contributed to the construction of a national identity that followed the growing self-awareness of the Japanese people in the late 16th -early 17th centuries.

Underinsurance as adaptation: Household agency in places of marketisation and financialisation

The underinsurance of property is pervasively and persuasively promoted as an indicator of risk and riskiness and, in Western nations, is assumed to be aligned with socio-economic disadvantage. Yet, the solution – in its most simple form, buying more insurance – lacks critical interrogation of what the problem actually is. To understand underinsurance better, we map house and contents underinsurance across two municipalities in Australia’s island state of Tasmania, and observe that the existing delineation of disadvantage and advantage between these two places is muted in relation to insurance – underinsurance does not straightforwardly map onto disadvantage. We provide an alternative explanation: that underinsurance is not a risk for households per se and does not represent riskiness on behalf of these households. Rather, it is indicative of household agency that produces place-specified responses within the processes of financialisation and marketisation. We observe that the growth in renting, driven in part by housing financialisation, is associated with property underinsurance. The history of renting as temporary and marginal informs renter decision making not to insure, and thus current financialised changes in housing co-produce rather than ameliorate underinsurance. We also conclude that in negating or resisting insurance marketisation, households garner everyday financial and material adaptative capacity by underinsuring.

Negotiating trans-ethno space: An inductive investigation of kimchi's ability to bound Korean-American transnational identity

It has been suggested that the linkages among the sensory, memorial and social aspects of culinary symbolism for transnationals are pronounced by particular food preparations. By using direct evidence, the present investigation tests this postulate by seeking to understand the connectivity of kimchi to Korean-American identity and if so, how this functions above and below the surface. Five focus groups were conducted comprised of 35 Korean-American adults. The research was designed around a grounded theory approach with an open-ended grand tour question: How does kimchi affect your sense of identity? Seven themes were uncovered: Recreating Memories – Collectivity, Connectivity and Family; Affirmation of Family Structure; Kimchi Is Love; Territorial Space; Acquired Taste; Cheating Memories - Shame and Sadness; and Female Kitchen Agency and Power Relations. Kimchi has held on through space and time to provide a shared sense of connectivity to the Korean-American informants, perhaps more intensely and more democratically than in Korea, their ethic homeland. Reported kimchi taste acquisition followed a trajectory from aversion to familiarity to longing. The re-negotiation of kimchi's ethno-space in America has led to feelings of shame, guilt and sadness to some. Concessions have been made. Manufactured kimchi provided a common generic bridge to the trans-Korean-American community. However, the move away from home-prepared kimchi has taken a toll on family's historic and structural connectivity, emotions, the deliverance of cultural capital and has affected the distribution of household agency.

The long-term impact of community mobilisation through participatory women's groups on women's agency in the household: A follow-up study to the Makwanpur trial.

Women’s groups practicing participatory learning and action (PLA) in rural areas have been shown to improve maternal and newborn survival in low-income countries, but the pathways from intervention to impact remain unclear. We assessed the long-term impact of a PLA intervention in rural Nepal on women’s agency in the household. In 2014, we conducted a follow-up study to a cluster randomised controlled trial on the impact of PLA women’s groups from 2001–2003. Agency was measured using the Relative Autonomy Index (RAI) and its subdomains. Multi-level regression analyses were performed adjusting for baseline socio-demographic characteristics. We additionally adjusted for potential exposure to subsequent PLA groups based on women’s pregnancy status and conduct of PLA groups in areas of residence. Sensitivity analyses were performed using two alternative measures of agency. We analysed outcomes for 4030 mothers (66% of the cohort) who survived and were recruited to follow-up at mean age 39.6 years. Across a wide range of model specifications, we found no association between exposure to the original PLA intervention with women’s agency in the household approximately 11.5 years later. Subsequent exposure to PLA groups was not associated with greater agency in the household at follow-up, but some specifications found evidence for reduced agency. Household agency may be a prerequisite for actualising the benefits of PLA groups rather than a consequence.

Is women’s empowerment associated with political knowledge and opinions? Evidence from rural Mali

According to many prominent theorists of democracy, citizens must be able to “formulate and signify preferences” to participate as ‘political equals’ for democracy to work (Dahl, 1971). However, a gender gap in political knowledge and opinions exists across the Global South, especially in rural areas. In this paper, we study the relationship between rural women’s socioeconomic empowerment (household agency and mobility outside the village) and political knowledge and opinions in Mali, a West African country with patriarchal gender norms. To reduce well-known difficulties of gaining access to rural women and reducing bystander effects, we use simultaneous co-gender interviews of one man and one woman per extended family household and a modified Audio-Self-Administered Questionnaire for illiterate populations. Further to reduce “satisficed” opinions, we elicit opinion justifications and measure “justified opinions.” Consistent with predictions, we find that women’s empowerment is positively associated with rural women’s political knowledge and opinions. We close by examining opinions towards one controversial policy area with redistributive consequences for men and women—the Family Code, which regulates rights of men and women in marriage, inheritance, and the family. More empowered women are more likely to support pro-woman changes.

日本 宮內廳 所藏 『李太王實錄』·『李太王實錄資料』의 체재와 특징

日本 宮內廳 所藏 『李太王實錄』·『李太王實錄資料』의 체재와 특징

Hirohito and General Douglas MacArthur: The First Meeting as Documented by Shōwa tennō jitsuroku

ABSTRACTThis analysis allows readers to confront for themselves the 27 September 1945 meeting between the Shōwa Emperor and General Douglas MacArthur, as recently documented by Japan’s Imperial Household Agency. It also introduces readers to a long-standing debate amongst Japanese scholars that has received no attention in English-language literature. The debate centres on the question as to whether the emperor offered at this meeting to take responsibility for the war fought in his name. This analysis offers its own conclusions and suggests that the emperor in all probability offered to take responsibility for the war.

利用・崇敬・規制 : 昭和戦前・戦中期における宮内省と皇族表象

利用・崇敬・規制 : 昭和戦前・戦中期における宮内省と皇族表象

宮内庁所蔵,磐梯火山1888年噴火の写真(II)

宮内庁所蔵,磐梯火山1888年噴火の写真(II)

宮内庁書陵部における古典籍資料 : 保存と公開( 古典籍資料の最前線)

宮内庁書陵部における古典籍資料 : 保存と公開( 古典籍資料の最前線)

A30 宮内庁で見つかった磐梯火山1888年噴火の写真 : 写真の修復と検証(火山の物質科学(3),日本火山学会2008年秋季大会)

A30 宮内庁で見つかった磐梯火山1888年噴火の写真 : 写真の修復と検証(火山の物質科学(3),日本火山学会2008年秋季大会)

W・K・バルトンが濃尾地震後に大垣で撮影した写真と撮影地点について

This article considered the photograph which W. K. Burton photographed after the Nobi earthquake in Ogaki of the stricken area, and following points become clear. The photograph which Burton photographed after the Nobi earthquake in Ogaki has 2 pieces of photograph (1) and photograph (2) put in “THE GREAT ERTHQUAKE IN JAPAN, 1891.”, 4 pieces of photograph (3)～(6) which was put in the Imperial Household Agency without being put in that book, I can confirm 6 pieces of existence in total at least. In photograph (1), Tenjinsya and its south side site were photographed, looked to the north-northwest direction on the municipal road of east side of the Tenjinsya, at Shinmachi in Ogaki city. Photograph (2), Burton looked to the northwest direction from the Tenjinsya neighboring site and photographed fried lost territory, Ogaki Castle, Ikeda mountains of the rear. Photograph (3), (4), he turned to the north from the Tenjin bridge southern coast and photographed the ruin of a fire of Jyoren-ji temple. Photograph (5), he overlooked the east side from Ogaki Castle tower and photographed it, and the Western-style building on the right side of screen is equal to the building of photograph (6). Photograph (6), he overlooked the former Rokugai-gakko school at Kuruwamachi and photographed it from the east bank of the moat.

Publication of the ‘Gongjoksilok’ Chronicles in the Imperial Household Agency of Japan, and Their Features

Publication of the ‘Gongjoksilok’ Chronicles in the Imperial Household Agency of Japan, and Their Features