Local Actors Research Articles

예술가 없는 예술지구

In the process of revitalizing hateful spaces in cities, cultural urban regeneration is known to play a positive role in fundamentally renewing the old negative image of an area. While the voluntary closure of Seonmi-Village, a notable red-light district in Jeonju City, through the implementation of cultural governance, is well-documented, little attention has been given to the operations and policy implications of Seonosong Arts Village. This study thus examines the transition from Seonmi-Village to Seonosong Arts Village, employing data collection and in-depth interviews with key stakeholders, including women’s rights advocates and local arts actors, with a focus on creative placemaking. As a result, it was stated that although the Women’s Rights Center’s solidarity activities with local artists in the process of publicizing women’s rights discourse showed tangible results, there was a relative lack of communication and solidarity between the actors. Furthermore, it was noted that artists tended to prioritize business endeavors over developing a comprehensive understanding of their locality. Hence, this study underscores the importance of nurturing a community of artists as local stakeholders for the sustainable implementation of cultural regeneration initiatives.

Intricacies of French engagement in Sahel with peace prospects

The Sahel region faces an extreme human security crisis with complex security challenges rooted in historical, ethnic, and geopolitical ties. Decades of armed violence and unstable socio-political systems have led to deteriorating security conditions, with crisis hotspots diversifying across the region. The mobilization of destabilizing actors has necessitated external support, yet outcomes have proven inadequate. This research explores France's engagement in the region, transitioning with dynamic policy shifts towards a more “Sahelian solutions for Sahelian problems” oriented approach. However, externally led peacebuilding exercises have fallen short due to lack of coherence, worsening conditions in the region, leading to adverse effects like the emergence of a 'coup belt'. Thus, this study aims to identify sustainable peace alternatives by investigating key questions like: How has France's role in the Sahel transformed, particularly in response to policy shifts and troop withdrawals? Why does France remain a prominent security provider despite changes in its military posture? What are the limitations and outcomes of peacebuilding processes employed in the region by various actors? How effectively can peacebuilding discourses translate into tangible security improvements for the Sahelian people? Thus, this paper aims to demystify conflict dynamics in the region, analyzing France’s evolving role in the Sahel and evaluating collaborative efforts to address security threats and promote development, empowering local actors. Additionally, it explores peacebuilding theoretically to understand Sahel's ground realities. Through a review of past interventions, it highlights limitations in fostering positive peace, offering recommendations for coherent policies and collaboration in the Sahel. In this regard, the paper explores contemporary events through peace, security, and policy lenses.

Sustainable coffee: A review of the diverse initiatives and governance dimensions of global coffee supply chains.

With a global footprint of 10 million hectares across 12.5 million farms, coffee is among the world's most traded commodities. The coffee industry has launched a variety of initiatives designed to reduce coffee's contribution to climate change and biodiversity loss and enhance the socio-economic conditions of coffee producers. We systematically reviewed the literature on the sustainability and governance of coffee production and developed a typology of eleven sustainability initiatives. Our review shows that coffee sustainability research has focused primarily on the economic outcomes of certification schemes. The typology expands our knowledge of novel sustainability initiatives being led by coffee farming communities themselves, allowing for an improved consideration of power dynamics in sustainability governance. Sustainability initiatives governed by local actors can improve sustainability outcomes by empowering local decision makers to assess direct risks and benefits of sustainable practices to the local environment, economy, and culture.

Apropiación Nacional de las Nociones de Ciudadanía y Paz a la Luz de la Agenda Internacional en el Contexto de la Posguerra Civil en Angola

This study, which has as its problematic the repoliticization of the concepts of citizenship and peace and their joint analytical use, aims to show to what extent the national appropriation of the notions of “citizenship” and “peace” is conditioned by the international agenda, after the end of the civil war in Angola in 2002. This study is a qualitative approach, of a theoretical nature, developed through exploratory bibliographic research. The results indicate that, in Angola, the appropriation of the term “peace” is associated with the appropriation of the term “citizenship” only after the end of the civil war and, from an instrumental point of view, gains some importance following the birth of a new constitutional jurisdiction that changes several of the country's political rules and positions the citizen in an immense sphere of public spaces, but conditioned by the international agenda. From these results, we conclude that, in the post-war context, there are more continuities than ruptures in relation to the need for endogenous appropriation of the concepts of citizenship and peace and the deepening of the positioning of national and local actors within the dimension of the nation-state.

An elemental ethics for artificial intelligence: water as resistance within AI’s value chain

AbstractResearch and activism have increasingly denounced the problematic environmental record of the infrastructure and value chain underpinning artificial intelligence (AI). Water-intensive data centres, polluting mineral extraction and e-waste dumping are incontrovertibly part of AI’s footprint. In this article, I turn to areas affected by AI-fuelled environmental harm and identify an ethics of resistance emerging from local activists, which I term ‘elemental ethics’. Elemental ethics interrogates the AI value chain’s problematic relationship with the elements that make up the world, critiques the undermining of local and ancestral approaches to nature and reveals the vital and quotidian harms engendered by so-called intelligent systems. While this ethics is emerging from grassroots and Indigenous groups, it echoes recent calls from environmental philosophy to reconnect with the environment via the elements. In empirical terms, this article looks at groups in Chile resisting a Google data centre project in Santiago and lithium extraction (used for rechargeable batteries) in Lickan Antay Indigenous territory, Atacama Desert. As I show, elemental ethics can complement top-down, utilitarian and quantitative approaches to AI ethics and sustainable AI as well as interrogate whose lived experience and well-being counts in debates on AI extinction.

A dam or a polder? Stakeholders' dispute over the "right" flood-protection measure in the Czech Republic.

This study focuses on the Skalička Waterwork(SWW), a largely debated and media-covered water-related/flood-protection project in the Czech Republic. Relying primarily on stakeholder interviews, we traced back and reconstructed the project's development, including its key tipping points reflecting the changing societal preferences for particular measures, yet also the involvement of individual actors/stakeholders, and their differing views. The case eventually crystallized into the "dam versus polder" dispute; concerned by the repercussions for the local landscape, a joint initiative of NGOs, local activists, and politicians not only opposed the dam variant proposed by the state river basin administration but also succeeded in pushing through the alternative scheme of side dry polder. While in many ways specific (e.g. not entailing local resistance), the case exemplifies recent shifts (and respective struggles) within flood risk management, including the increasing importance attributed to complex, catchment-wide perspectives, joint local and scientific knowledge, participatory decision-making processes, or implementation of nature-based and hybrid solutions.

Strategic planning for a sustainable local-regional transit-oriented development

ABSTRACT Regional enlargement and Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) has in Sweden been an active policy and strategy at both municipal, regional, and national level to make society more resource efficient and strengthen local labour markets. The paper aims to explore and discuss how strategic local-regional planning can be used to counteract local, municipal and sub-regional uneven development enhanced by city-centric transit-oriented development. Mutual learning processes between local and regional actors can be used to benefit regional investments and manage local expectations. This means including local knowledge of the local situation and local knowledge of the regional context in the regional planning process and to institutionalize local-regional integration and common projections of TOD.

Coloniality, modern subjectivities in Kenya and exclusion of African women in preventing violent extremism

Cosmetic attention to contextual nuances has been a major obstacle in many programmes for preventing violent extremism (PVE) in Kenya. The study highlights how donor-funded interventions often disregard cultural values and local experience by posing a subtle resistance to learn from the knowledge of local actors. The non-recognition of contextual knowledge postures a gender problem, increasing chances for systemic exclusion of African women from the knowledge production system. The paper interrogates how modern subjectivities, entrenched in contemporary interventions, exude colonial legacies in PVE. Using decolonial theory and interviews with local practitioners, the study submits that many donor-funded PVE approaches risk pushing further the voice of indigenous African women to the periphery of knowledge production. The paper concludes that PVE interventions in the local context have an opportunity for reinforcing indigenous perspectives through a decisive decolonial strategy in the women peace and security agenda.

Coalitional game-based gain generation and distribution for collective self-consumption in an energy community

Climate change is requiring changes in energy use. The integration of renewable energy sources into the energy mix is a viable solution for electricity generation, but their intermittence forces us to imagine new ways to consume and distribute electricity. Thus, new economic models and new organizations have to be established. Energy communities are a recent legal solution to share renewable energy among local actors. These structures facilitate the set-up of collective self-consumption operations. Collective self-consumption is an interesting tool to increase local renewable energy consumption and limit energy losses on the distribution grid. Consequently, energy communities are pursuing a dual objective: reducing energy bills and the environmental footprint of the participants. However, the distribution of gains generated through collective self-consumption is one of the main obstacles to the implementation of energy communities. An interesting possibility comes from game theory, especially from cooperative games, as solutions concepts already exist to solve this kind of problem.In this paper, a payoff distribution is proposed through a collaborative game. The aim of the study is to explore ways to distribute gains generated by collective self consumptions on individual self consumptions. These gains are 8% on the total energy bill and 25% on the self-consumption rate, assuming a collective objective based on the self-consumption rate and individual objectives based on the price of energy. In order to distribute the financial gains, two major concepts in cooperative game theory are studied in this paper: the Shapley Value and the Nucleolus. The advantages and drawbacks of these concepts in an energy community context are identified, as these concepts are based on two different philosophies: The properties of individual fairness of the Shapley Value and collective fairness of the Nucleolus for energy management are therefore discussed. Furthermore, a methodology is proposed to enable a fairer distribution of payoffs according to specific energy management parameters, such as efficiency and flexibility.

Ports for whom? Harbors in the early thirteenth-century Eastern Baltic

ABSTRACT The thirteenth-century crusades to Estonia and Livonia have traditionally been seen from the conquerors’ perspective, considering the local actors only as passive subjects of these processes. Recent archeological research has challenged this. Various centers, such as hillforts or harbors, were controlled by locals and functioned as more or less neutral places. This article examines three harbors, which may have possessed a central importance in the region: Daugavgrīva (Dünamünde) in the lower reaches of the Daugava River, portus novus (the New Harbor) in Saaremaa, and the port of Tallinn. The discussion treats local magnates as active participants in these places, thus creating a more nuanced picture of how different foreigners were treated in the ports of the Eastern Baltic.

Local governance networks as public authority: Insights from Mozambique, Myanmar and Pakistan

AbstractDrawing upon ‘governance diaries,’ a method which used repeated interviews with a set of households and intermediaries in three countries—Mozambique, Myanmar and Pakistan—to understand how marginalised groups meet their daily governance needs, we argue that local governance networks constitute a form of public authority. The networks we examine encompass a range of local actors (state and non‐state), who help develop and enforce rules and ensure social coordination. We highlight the role of intermediaries who constitute the first point of contact for people seeking to resolve various issues. We show how these intermediaries and their networks are specific to each context, not just at a national level, but down to a granular local level. Decision‐making and the exercise of power moves around within the networks, blurring formal/informal boundaries. We conclude that in these contexts of fragility, public authority is embedded in and exercised through local governance networks.

A Turn to Assets in Community-Based Computing Research: Tradeoffs, Deficits, and Neoliberalism in Technological Development

CSCW and HCI scholars are increasingly adopting asset-based approaches to community-based social computing research. Emerging from asset-based community development (ABCD), an approach to community and economic development research and practice that emerged in the 1990s, advocates for asset-based approaches argue that a "needs-based approach" to development is overly focused on community deficits, and in doing so portrays communities in a largely negative light. Using ABCD methods, social computing scholars work to aid communities in identifying, classifying, and deploying their unrealized assets through sociotechnical systems. But researchers deploying asset-based approaches in CSCW and HCI more broadly have yet to grapple with the origins of ABCD in neoliberal economic shifts of the 1980s and 1990s that perpetuated distrust in the state and sought to transfer development power to private, local actors. Drawing on a case study of controversy around the construction of a cell tower in a very remote and rural community in the Midwestern United States to examine the inherent tradoffs present in asset- and deficit-based research.

Integrating refugees through ‘flexible housing’ policy in The Netherlands

The Dutch government recently introduced ‘flexwonen’ (flexible housing) to accommodate refugees, with policymakers encouraging housing suppliers to rent modular houses under temporary contracts. These housing practices, nonetheless, ostensibly conflict with integration policy goals, as integration requires stability. Building on an analysis of policy discourses and interviews with central government and municipal actors, our research adopts a capability-based perspective to assess how policymakers and housing suppliers evaluate housing and integration prospects and securities. Our findings illustrate how national policy discourses emphasise opportunities offered through flexible housing, but also how the actual needs and unique circumstances of those being housed are overlooked. Consequently, local policy actors and housing providers report that they struggle with the implications of uncertain living conditions, with some refugees adapting better than others. This study underscores the importance of considering refugees’ ‘capabilities for integration’ in accommodation policies at all levels of governance.

“Planning for anything, not for everything:” Uncertainty and temporal coordination in social movement organizing

A month before the 2020 US presidential election, then President Trump amplified a false claim about poll watchers monitoring early voting in Philadelphia, stating “They were thrown out. They weren’t allowed to watch. You know why? Because bad things happen in Philadelphia, bad things.” The months preceding the November 3rd election featured many similar discursive attacks on the integrity of Philadelphia's election systems, part of a larger right-wing campaign to delegitimate election outcomes in advance. Fearing what this might portend for election day, dozens of local progressive movement organizations and activist groups formed the “Philadelphia Action Council” (PAC), a coordinative space for organizing and planning a mobilized response to a contested election. Strategic collective action involves the coordination of complex temporal orientations, at multiple scales, however, PAC activists couldn’t be sure when, where, or for how long they may need to mobilize, nor what sorts of targets or messages or tactics the action should be orientated around. In fact, they couldn’t be sure if they would need to mobilize at all. In this paper, I analyze the temporal structure of the PAC's “action council” model, arguing that the contingent, eventful temporality embedded in the structure of the PAC engendered similarly contingent modifications in the temporal orientations of its participants, allowing PAC activists to embrace uncertainty in ways that they typically strive to avoid. I then demonstrate how the embrace of uncertainty (somewhat paradoxically) expanded the PAC's collective capacity for improvisation and adaptation in the days following the election. This research draws on (and contributes to) critical time studies to further the emergent project of temporalities research in the field of social movements studies.

Fostering Inclusive Management and Community Participation: Lessons from the Field

ABSTRACT World Monuments Fund (WMF) is a leading organization dedicated to preserving the world's most cherished cultural sites. In Latin America and the Caribbean, WMF has collaborated with local communities, funders, and governments on over 186 conservation projects since the 1980s, with a strong emphasis on local partnerships and capacity building. Recognizing the importance of community involvement, inclusive management, and diverse heritage narratives, as well as the need to foster this approach in our Latin American portfolio, recent WMF projects there aim to establish models for participatory heritage conservation. Two ongoing projects where WMF is testing this approach focusing on community participation and inclusive management include Teotihuacán in Mexico, where we aim to create the conditions for sustainable and equitable tourism development by fostering collaboration between local and institutional stakeholders. A second case study explores Rapa Nui National Park, where WMF is addressing the preservation of the endangered Mata Ngarahu petroglyphs in Orongo and empowering the Ma'u Henua Polynesian Indigenous Community in conservation efforts. These projects underscore the importance of long-term commitment, flexibility, and cultural sensitivity in promoting participatory approaches, with the need for adapting engagement strategies based on local dynamics. Lessons learned emphasize that successful implementation requires time, consistency, and alignment with local actors, particularly considering potential conflicts with institutional timing and constraints.

Do Service Providers Play a Market Stewardship Role in Social Care Quasi-Markets, and Should They?

Market stewardship of social care quasi-markets has been an important area of inquiry. While most focus has been on central government stewardship, local level actors can also play a role. Using a case study of the Australian National Disability Insurance scheme, this article focuses on both how service providers can be market stewards and whether they should be. Findings suggest that while some aspects of market stewardship are appropriate for service providers to perform, others may be better done by different actors. We propose a preliminary framework for distributed stewardship to help join up the work of local level actors with central agencies.

THE UTILIZATION OF KAUM-BASED VILLAGE FUNDS AS A FORM OF STRENGTHENING THE CAPACITY OF THE NAGARI GOVERNMENT DURING THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC

This study discusses the capacity of the nagari government to utilize village funds during the COVID-19 pandemic. Limitations in communication patterns, interaction, and community legitimacy are identified as issues in policy implementation. As the front line to accelerate economic recovery for the community during the pandemic, the nagari government has to offer various innovations in policy implementation, including the utilization of village funds. Remarkably, one of the nagari in West Sumatra, namely Nagari Pasia Laweh, utilized the pandemic as a turning point for generating various innovations using village funds. Consequently, this nagari was rewarded as the best Nagari in village fund transparency in 2020 and the best nagari in West Sumatra in 2021. This study employed a qualitative method to observe the phenomena related to the institutional capacity of nagari in the utilization of village funds during the pandemic. The data were collected through in-depth interviews with the purposive sampling technique. The results indicate that various policy innovations are carried out through schemes involving local actors in Nagari Pasia Laweh using a kaum-based method. The collaboration between the government and local elite facilitates the acceptance and implementation of various policies in the community. Thus, community participation and legitimacy greatly influence Nagari Pasia Laweh to the extent that it is selected as the best nagari.

Role-based privacy cynicism and local privacy activism: How data stewards navigate privacy in higher education

This study examines the impact of role-based constraints on privacy cynicism within higher education, a workplace increasingly subjected to surveillance. Using a thematic analysis of 15 in-depth interviews conducted between 2017 and 2023 with data stewards in the California State University System, the research explores the reasons behind data stewards’ privacy cynicism, despite their knowledge of privacy and their own ability to protect it. We investigate how academic data custodians navigate four role-based tensions: the conflict between the institutional and personal definitions of privacy; the mutual reinforcement between their privacy-cynical attitudes and their perceptions of student privacy attitudes; the influence of role constraints on data stewards’ privacy-protective behaviors; and the contrast between the negatively valued societal surveillance and the positively valued university surveillance. The findings underscore the significance of considering organizational privacy cultures and role-based expectations in studying privacy cynicism. The study contributes to the theoretical understanding of privacy cynicism and offers practical implications for organizations, emphasizing the importance of aligning organizational definitions of privacy with employees’ understanding. Future research should further explore the mutual reinforcement of privacy cynicism in the relationship between data providers and data consumers (which we call the “spiral of resignation”) and consider the impact of role-based constraints in other organizational contexts.

Empirical analysis of social impacts of a rural social enterprise: insights for local and regional development

ABSTRACT In developing countries the most marginalised and disadvantaged people are in rural, remote and regional areas and social enterprises in these areas – rural social enterprises (RSEs) – have been identified as key development actors in this context. However, their impacts are rarely rigorously measured. Our study fills this gap by measuring an RSE’s social impact in a developing country. A smallholder farmers’ survey (n = 1021) is utilised in a propensity score-based method which allowed us to generate counterfactual and estimate outcomes between members and non-members of an RSE. This method was complemented by a stakeholder focus group discussion. Predictors of participation and social impacts of the RSE are identified besides an evaluation of its interventions. Results generate implications for social enterprise practitioners, supporters and policymakers interested in applying RSEs as local and regional development actors as well as researchers involved in social impact measurement.

The Nefashot Initiative’s Journey: Transforming from Local Activism into a Diverse Community Promoting Mental Health through Arts and Culture

IntroductionNefashot, meaning ‘Souls’ and ‘People’ in Hebrew, emerged from a local group of impassioned activists. Our core mission is to promote mental health awareness through cultural and artistic expressions, bridging gaps in open and inclusive conversations.ObjectivesIn our early years, our primary goal was to infuse MH discussions into public spaces through art. However, as our community has evolved, so too have our objectives. Today, we recognize the profound impact of these connections and discussions, both within and beyond our dynamic community. We’ve come to understand that belonging to this community is, in itself, a catalyst for change. This shift in perspective has allowed us to fully embrace the transformative potential of community engagement and direct our activities.MethodsAt the heart of our approach is the nurturing of a profound sense of belonging within our diverse community. We achieve this through two vital activities: (1) Ongoing Community Communication: Within our dynamic community, which includes individuals dealing with mental health challenges, professionals, family members, friends, and allies, communication is paramount to our unity. We maintain an open and continuous dialogue through a dedicated WhatsApp group. This platform facilitates connection, sharing of experiences, and mutual support, strengthening the bonds that unite us in our shared mission. (2) Community-Driven Event Production: Beyond our annual ‘Osim Nefashot’ week, held around World Mental Health Day, we seize opportunities throughout the year to organize events or collaborate with larger events like International Women’s Day in March or Book Week in June. Encouraging active participation in event planning and execution not only amplifies the voices of our members but also deepens their sense of belonging within our ever-evolving community.ResultsOur hallmark is a sustainable process, welcoming new creators, forging connections, and expanding our influence while retaining core members. This renewal and continuity enable us to reach new audiences and expand mental health awareness through art and culture. Our growth is showcased, with 90 events organized last year.ConclusionsNefashot’s transformation from activists to a diverse community is an ongoing journey requiring commitment and deliberate steps. Our allocated resources and activities ensure each participant, from creators to venues to attendees, plays a vital role in advancing mental health awareness. We remain dedicated to nurturing inclusivity and promoting mental well-being through art and culture.Disclosure of InterestNone Declared