Local Community Stakeholders Research Articles

School-based linguistic and cultural revitalization as a local practice: Sakha language education in the city of Yakutsk, Russian Federation

In the 1990s, efforts were launched in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) in the Russian Federation to support the revival of Sakha (Yakut) language education. This interdisciplinary study examines the evolution of school-based Sakha language education in the city of Yakutsk over a 25-year period beginning with the launching of the first reforms in the 1990s. Language education reform in the capital city has been shaped by a dynamic interplay between federal, regional, and local factors. Grassroots social and cultural activism continues to play a key role in school-based language revitalization in Yakutsk, influencing how policies have been received and implemented at the local level. Local community stakeholders are working together to counteract federal education policies, which direct school resources away from minority language education. This case study shows that the Sakha (Yakut) language revival has taken root in the capital city, and it provides important evidence that civic activism continues to develop in urban areas of the republic.

Addressing uncertain scoring and weighting factors in social life cycle assessment

Social life cycle assessment (SLCA) is an approach to assess social performances over the entire product’s life cycle. Type I SLCA consists in a qualitative analysis of product’s activities through a set of subcategory indicators. To facilitate decision-making, it is useful to aggregate the subcategory indicator performances of the different activities along the product system into stakeholder dimensions. Currently, these aggregation steps are based on value judgments as scoring and weighting factors. We identified two types of uncertainties related to these value choices: (i) the uncertainty related to the scoring choice and (ii) the uncertainty related to the weighting factors. However, no current SLCA research considers the uncertainty of these value choices. The main objective of this work is to propose a method to systematically address uncertain scoring and weighting factors in SLCA. Our method is structured in three phases: (i) assessing the uncertainty of the scoring factors, (ii) assessing the uncertainty of the subcategory indicators aggregation into stakeholder dimensions, and (iii) interpreting stochastic SLCA results. Monte Carlo simulations were conducted in order to generate stochastic SLCA results from randomly chosen scoring and weighting factors from value judgments of SLCA experts. We applied the approach on an illustrative case study comparing different options of biodiesel supply. Stochastic social impact scores were obtained for three considered stakeholder dimensions by propagating the uncertainty of the scoring and the weighting factors. Interpretation of stochastic SLCA score was performed by analyzing the first rank probability of each supply option within each stakeholder dimension. Results show a stable first rank position (100%) of one among the four options in two stakeholders’ dimensions (workers and society). For the local community stakeholder dimension, three out of the four supply options were likely to take first rank with a likelihood of 91, 8 and 1%, respectively. Addressing uncertainty in social life cycle assessment allows to explicitly include the unavoidable variability of value choices adopted to aggregate the social performance evaluation of each activity over the product life cycle and across subcategory indicators into few meaningful stakeholder dimensions indicators. We demonstrated that our stochastic approach is key to inform decision makers about the robustness of SLCA results and showed that the ranking of a deterministic approach can be potentially modified when uncertainty is included.

“Lost in translation”: Issues with the establishment of a legal market for “low risk” psychoactive products (“legal highs”) in New Zealand

Introduction: New Zealand’s Psychoactive Substances Act (PSA) 2013 established the world’s first regulated legal market for “low risk” psychoactive products. Aim: To explore challenges in relation to regulating the retail environment and public communication of the new policy. Methods: Semi-structured interviews with 30 key informants (KI) from the industry, government, health and NGO sectors were conducted, transcribed and analysed thematically. Results: KI overwhelmingly supported the new PSA retail restrictions, but expressed frustration about how the new regulations were managed. They questioned the effectiveness of communicating the policy to the public and media, enforcement of regulations around licenced retailers, engagement with stakeholders in local communities and the speed of developing regulations for the full regime. Many KI pointed out the reduction in the number of shops concentrated demand which increased social disruption and negative media feedback. The absence of price controls and drug education were identified as gaps in the new regime. Conclusion: Issues with the interim PSA regime highlight the significant challenges of implementing frameworks for regulated drug markets. Many issues were attributed to unrealistic timeframes, resource constraints and insufficient planning. An important task is effectively communicating the new policy to the public, engaging with local stakeholders and educating users.

Cultural framework and its influence on corporate social responsibility professionals' profile

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) departments are becoming an integral part of contemporary business organisations. This change is the result of an evolving business paradigm that integrates economic performance, social accountability and environmental impact. Investors, customers, shareholders, local community and other key stakeholders are calling for more responsible ways of doing business, following a triple bottom line approach. Although important in shaping the meaning of sustainability at the business level, this topic is generally overlooked by scientific researchers. This paper is focused on understanding the cultural and professional profile of employees in companies' CSR departments and the perception of their work in various European companies. The aim of this paper is to shed light on the impact that different cultural and institutional frameworks may have on the professional profile of employees in companies' CSR departments, in particular by analysing what they perceive to be the main drivers of their strategies and actions.

Cultural framework and its influence on corporate social responsibility professionals' profile

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) departments are becoming an integral part of contemporary business organisations. This change is the result of an evolving business paradigm that integrates economic performance, social accountability and environmental impact. Investors, customers, shareholders, local community and other key stakeholders are calling for more responsible ways of doing business, following a triple bottom line approach. Although important in shaping the meaning of sustainability at the business level, this topic is generally overlooked by scientific researchers. This paper is focused on understanding the cultural and professional profile of employees in companies' CSR departments and the perception of their work in various European companies. The aim of this paper is to shed light on the impact that different cultural and institutional frameworks may have on the professional profile of employees in companies' CSR departments, in particular by analysing what they perceive to be the main drivers of their strategies and actions.

Exploring the cultural intersection of music, sport and physical activity among at-risk youth

Although sport can serve as a valuable mechanism for social change, this does not imply it can single-handedly solve large-scale problems; rather, sport should be utilized with passionate leadership, efficient and innovative program design, and ancillary cultural enrichment activities to achieve optimal results. This research was motivated by developments in some marginalized and at-risk communities where several sport-for-development programs have started to incorporate music to enhance the appeal and impact of sport interventions. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the use of hip-hop and sport by one sport-for-development program to educate and improve the lives of inner-city youth in Harlem. Data were collected by interviewing key stakeholders of the program, including participants, workshop leaders, staff, and upper-level executives along with onsite observations. Results of our investigation highlighted the cultural influence of music and sport within a local demographic and a sport-for-development initiative aimed to appeal to both local at-risk youth and key community stakeholders.

Earthquake Disaster Resilience: A Framework for Sustainable Gardening in Haiti’s Vulnerable Population

ABSTRACTFood shortages following earthquake disasters lead to chronic food insecurity, malnutrition, illness, and an escalation in deaths. For Haiti, an island nation with limited resources, including food, resilience is more difficult without a framework to guide recovery. A model that proposes the use of partnership development and gardening interventions to achieve sustainable food relief is described. The approach involves assessment of needs, nutrition education and training, community and home gardens, partnerships, entrepreneurship, policy development, marketing, and the involvement of stakeholders in local and international communities. Application of the model may greatly enhance sustainable food supply for the most vulnerable populations in Haiti.

APhA recognizes 2016’s Immunization Champions

Clinic, a walk-in clinic for patients aged 15 years and older, at a large Indian Health Service medical center in Phoenix. But providing only 10% of the vaccines given on campus, the clinic’s reach isn’t great enough for Van Lew. “We want vaccines addressed at every visit,” Van Lew said. Primary care alone, she noted, can’t cover all adult vaccines. Patients may have many specialty visits between less frequent primary care visits at the time immunizations are due. Van Lew aimed to standardize the approach to immunizations across the medical center campus. Through education campaigns, she has motivated nurses to embrace CDC recommendations to address immunizations at every visit. She successfully advocated for a protocol that would allow all nurses to offer routine vaccines anywhere on campus. In 2015, she provided 20 education sessions to more than 250 providers across specialties and professions to increase vaccine awareness, integrate vaccination into workflows, and devise better ways to use electronic health records and screening tools in this endeavor. Nationally, Van Lew has collaborated on research with CDC and the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases to better understand and improve adult vaccination rates. “I get involved in so many different arenas because there’s so many different ways we can impact vaccination rates—not just in the clinic.” In 2015, on Van Lew’s watch, more than 44,000 vaccines were administered to children and adults in her health system, substantially increasing immunization rates for zoster, human papillomavirus, tetanus, diphtheria, and pertussis.

IPBES is in the books: Pollination and scenario assessments are <i> the first </i> two steps to guiding policy makers in the global biodiversity crisis

editorial frontiers of biogeography 8.1, e30404, 2016 IPBES is in the books: Pollination and scenario assessments are the first two steps to guiding policy makers in the global biodi- versity crisis During their 4th plenary session in Kuala Lumpur, the 124 member states of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Eco- system Services (IPBES) adopted their first assess- ment on the global state of pollination, pollinators and food production (IPBES 2016a) and a second one on scenarios and models (IPBES 2016b). With these first assessments, meant to provide an ‘early win’ for the work program 2014–2018 (Opgenoorth and Faith 2013), IPBES establishes itself as a vital source of information for policy makers to counter the global biodiversity crisis just like IPCC has done regarding global climate change. Bob Watson, the new IPBES chair and for- mer chair of the IPCC, stated (somewhat tongue- in-cheek) that the pollination assessment is “clearly better than anything the IPCC has ever produced.” Enthusiasm is more than justified re- garding the impressive amount of work the two teams of experts have put into the assessments over the last two years. It is now timely to have a closer look at what they set out to do and how it was carried out as well as to check how the 124 governments have dealt with the summaries for policy makers that were discussed in plenary. The pollination and food production assess- ment The pollination assessment—as will be the rule for IPBES assessments in general—is made up of a technical report and the summary for policy mak- ers (SPM). As IPBES is a science-policy interface controlled by member states, the SPM is a docu- ment that needs to be adopted line by line by gov- ernment representatives. This requires consensus and government delegations can hold up the pro- cess indefinitely if they don’t agree with any as- pect of the text. Requests for changes to the text could well be politically motivated; however, the co-chairs of the report as well as the coordinating lead authors of the respective chapters are pre- sent during this procedure to make sure that the content of the technical report is not distorted in the SPM. The technical report on the other hand stands as presented to the governments by the experts. Here, only the executive summaries of each chapter get approved individually by govern- ments’ representatives. The technical report The technical report in its draft version includes some 830 pages of text divided into 6 chapters covering (i) background, (ii) drivers of change, (iii) status and trends, (iv) economic valuation, (v) bi- ocultural diversity and socio-cultural values, and (vi) response to risks and opportunities associated [sic], all in relation to pollinators and pollination. The aim of the assessment, as originally set out in the scoping document, was to “assess animal pol- lination as a regulating ecosystem service under- pinning food production in the context of its con- tribution to nature’s gift to people and supporting a good quality of life”. Its scope is global with the exception of Antarctica where no pollinators are known. As in all IPBES products, it is informed by natural, social and economic sciences as well as “knowledge of indigenous and local community stakeholders and practitioners”. Especially this latter aspect is considered to be one of the central innovations of the IPBES process. This first report clearly documents that IPBES takes this innovative challenge serious. Numerous examples from indig- enous and local knowledge (ILK) holders are pre- sented in the assessment. At the same time it also documents that there is still some distance to cov- er until ILK will leave example boxes and become a more equal part of the assessment. Nevertheless, in Kuala Lumpur it was evident, that all bodies of IPBES will work hard to develop this integration further. A second overarching perspective of IPBES is that this body and its assessments intend to be policy relevant but not policy prescriptive. To that end, each chapter presents factual statements frontiers of biogeography, ISSN 1948-6596 — © 2016 the authors; journal compilation © 2016 The International Biogeography Society

Collaboration of Community and University Scholars: Training in the Transformation of Research for Community Development

Community-based Participatory Research (CBPR) provides a methodology that creates mutually beneficial and equitable partnerships between researchers and community people involved in positive change. Participatory Action Research (PAR) is rooted in trust, connectivity, and reciprocity to address issues and actions that remedy inequitable social, economic, and environmental problems arising from racism rooted in structural/political imbalances. In this paper, we discuss the Health Equity Alliance of Tallahassee (HEAT) and its affiliated six week Ethnographic Field School that trains graduate students in CBPR methodology by bringing faculty, local community activists and stakeholders, and students together for mutual learning in dynamic classroom, community, and social settings. The paper offers reflections on the experience by a student, HEAT activist, local and visiting faculty, and demonstrate how a model field school based on PAR offers an empirical approach to building capacity to address power inequities in local settings and beyond.

Integrating Top-Down and Bottom-Up Adaptation Planning to Build Adaptive Capacity: A Structured Learning Approach

Climate adaptation planning provides an opportunity to enhance the adaptive capacity of stakeholders across multiple levels. However, reviews of standard top-down and bottom-up approaches indicate that the value of multistakeholder involvement is not fully recognized or incorporated into guidelines. Focusing on provinces in Indonesia and Papua New Guinea within the Coral Triangle region, we present a novel integrated top-down and bottom-up planning approach. Based on Participatory Systemic Inquiry the process involves three stages of workshops intentionally designed to promote social learning, knowledge exchange, empowerment and social networks among multilevel stakeholders. Stage 1 workshops engage government, nongovernment and science stakeholders at the provincial level to analyze sub-districts' vulnerability and design appropriate adaptation strategies. Stage 2 engages local government, non-government and community stakeholders within vulnerable sub-districts identified in Stage 1. Stage 3 combines Stage 1 and 2 stakeholders to refine adaptation strategies and design action plans for sub-districts. Evaluation demonstrated that different stakeholder groups' perceptions of community adaptation needs varied significantly, justifying the approach. In terms of adaptive capacity, the primary outcome for all stakeholder groups was innovative ideas, suggesting that social learning and knowledge exchange had occurred. Empowerment was a secondary outcome. We discuss how the approach could be further refined.

Strategic and Operational Plan Implementation of Seaports (Utilization Jeddah Port)

The Port of Jeddah (Port) released the initial version of this Strategic Plan in 2006. It was developed by Port staff, along with input, as a five-year rolling plan designed to guide the Port's future development while keeping in mind the needs of our tenants, local community members and stakeholders, and the nation. This is the second update to the Strategic Plan since its initial release. While the Port's overarching principles -- commitment to environmental stewardship, addressing tenant needs, goods movement, economic development, and security --have remained largely unchanged, it is important for us to adapt our strategies to meet the challenges of an ever changing local and global environment. The Port is among the world's premier ports and is a critical hub for global trade. This prominence brings with it responsibilities and expectations for the highest possible standards for efficiency, safety and security, and environmental leadership. The Port is the nation's busiest container port and part of the world's busiest port complex, handling 3.7 million twenty-foot equivalent units in 2013. Global trade and goods movement is Western kingdom of Saudi Arabia's strongest industries in terms of jobs and economic activity. The Port of Jeddah powers these industries, handling almost more than a quarter of the cargo that enters the kingdom of Saudi Arabia annually. Through the Port's activities, a lot of jobs are created in western kingdom of Saudi Arabia and over five hundred thousand nationwide. In order to maintain our position among the world the kingdom of Saudi Arabia premier ports, the Port is continually addressing the demands for providing modern and efficient cargo handling terminals as well as transportation and infrastructure projects. Protecting one of the nation's most vital economic hubs is also an ongoing challenge. Finally, promoting a sustainable grow green philosophy and ensuring that we are the leader among ports in promoting environmental stewardship is a strategic objective of the Port. A strategic plan is a management tool used to improve the performance of an organization and outlines the organization's direction and priorities. This plan identifies the Port's twelve strategic objectives for the next five years. Each of the objectives identifies a series of an act or strategy intended to resolve a difficulty or improve a situation; a fresh approach to something that the Port will undertake to accomplish that objective. While these objectives are organization-focused and require the coordination of resources throughout the Port, each one will be championed by a bureau, and the divisions within that bureau, as this paper will contain.

Perceptions of Tourists Towards the Role of Stakeholders for Tourism Development

This paper studies the role of stakeholders for tourism development in Malaysia based on the perceptions of tourists who come to the Melaka city. Even though the tourists are satisfied by the existing facilities available presently, there are a few shortcomings that need to be addressed such as neglected traditional issues, bureaucratic barriers, definition of sustainable tourism and communication problem with the local communities. The purpose of the study is to find out the roles of public, private and local community stakeholders of the historic city of Melaka for meeting the needs of tourists for tourism development. The findings indicate that the government, private and local community stakeholders have played positive roles for satisfying the demands of the tourists in shaping the development of sustainable tourism in Melaka. The primary data were collected through survey via interviews with 135 respondents based on their responses to a set of questionnaires which looked into the tourists’ perceptions in connection to the facilities available for sustainable tourism. The Likert scale data analyzing and reviewing the role of stakeholder’s towards perceptions of the tourists. The implication of the study is that majority of the tourists were positively satisfied and receptive towards tourism in Melaka.

Can the “Social Licence to Operate” Concept Enhance Engagement and Increase Acceptance of Renewable Energy? A Case Study of Wind Farms in Australia

Social licence to operate (SLO) is the ongoing acceptance or approval for a development that is granted by the local community and other stakeholders. From the current media and political attention on Australian wind farms, it appears that many specific wind farms, or indeed the industry as a whole, may not hold an SLO with affected stakeholders. This research was undertaken to examine whether the SLO might be a useful framework to enhance engagement and increase societal understanding of wind farms. Twenty-seven interviews across nine wind farms were conducted with stakeholders representing wind companies, local government authorities, local opposition, local support and turbine hosts. The interviews revealed a complexity of concerns that informed the stakeholders’ perspectives, including “game-changing” issues that may stand to significantly increase wind farm acceptance. The results are presented with practical steps towards the development of a preliminary working model of an SLO for Australian wind farms that addresses identified concerns. The emerging concept of SLO appears to provide a useful framework for wind farm developers to incorporate an improved model of consultation that engages local communities in ways that could enhance transparency and local support, and complement formal regulatory processes.

The Challenges of Effective Community Participation in District Education Strategic Planning and Implementation Process in The Salaga Town Council of Ghana

ABSTRACT This study was undertaken to assess the challenges affecting the local community’s involvement and participation in the District Education Strategic Planning (DESP) process towards quality basic education delivery in Salaga Town Council. Primary data was collected through in-depth interview and analysed qualitatively using deductions and inferences approach. From the study, the District Education Officers and the District Assembly Officers were of the view that inadequate funds/resource, difficult terrain and lukewarm attitude on the part of the community level stakeholders were the major challenges adversely affecting community stakeholder’s participation in the DESP process. The local community stakeholders also attributed the challenges accounting for their non involvement in the DESP process to poor Communication between the district and local community stakeholders. The Ministry of Education should provide adequate funding and ensure effective two-way communication between the two groups of stakeholders to foster collaboration in the quest to improving the quality of basic education in Salaga area.

Social Licence in British Columbia: Some Implications for Energy Development

Crown land is unique to the Commonwealth and better represented in British Columbia than anywhere else in the Commonwealth (95% of the land base). Through tradition and common law, British Columbians have come to define Crown lands as publicly owned lands that belong to all residents and to expect governments to shepherd them for the benefit of all. Social licence to operate on this land requires approval from the local community and other stakeholders. The concept of Crown land makes every British Columbian a potential stakeholder and has led to more drama and noise around social licence than occurs elsewhere. The four main reasons for failure in past applications for social licence have been a lack of respect, assuming economics is a sufficient framework, appearing to bully, and hiding or obscuring information deemed relevant. Recent events in the province suggest the provincial and federal governments, and some companies, have learned little from past failures. Energy development faces particular challenges because location counts and impacts are both intrusive and extensive, but the errors described here are avoidable. W. Edwards Deming reputedly observed, “Learning is not compulsory… neither is survival.” Some companies have learned.The topic is addressed under six headings: (1) Whose land is it?; (2) What the public has said; (3) Defining social licence; (4) Lessons from exploring social licence; (5) Lessons and energy development; and (6) What’s next?

2879 – Adaptation of a disaster mental health preparedness training model for black communities in the southeastern united states

Providing timely and accessible mental health services in the immediate aftermath of disasters remains a major challenge in under-resourced minority communities. We postulated that in black communities, successful strategies would require training both clinical providers and community leaders to collaboratively plan for and deliver culturally responsive disaster mental health services. We aimed to: 1) adapt an evidence-based, disaster mental health training model for black community leaders and clinical providers in under-resourced areas at risk of natural disasters, and 2) evaluate a train-the-trainer (TTT) model for building culturally-appropriate local mental health response capacity. We developed a core curriculum package based on a training needs assessment and resource review and then culturally tailored audience-specific workshop materials after pilot testing in eastern North Carolina. Pilot test participants included 13 community leaders and 10 clinical provider attending workshops facilitated by 3 mental health professionals. Evaluations indicated the workshop components were culturally relevant and post-test knowledge scores were generally higher among clinical providers. Process evaluation results have led to expanded content, a community planning session at 3 months, a refresher skills-building workshop at 6 months, training of trainers in facilitation skills, and tailoring of exercises to specific subpopulations. Field-testing with repeated outcome evaluation is underway in 8 culturally distinct coastal Carolina communities. Local relevance is critical to training acceptability and recruitment requires significant input from local community stakeholders. Evaluation of collaborative community engagement efforts and outcome evaluation will allow us to determine if this model is scalable and effective for under-resourced black community settings.

“Liberating” social knowledges for water management, and more broadly environmental management, through “place-change planning”

In response to the big policy problem of increasing failures of traditional, largely technical, policy approaches to constructively address transformational or radical socio-environmental problems from major facility siting, landscape modification, and/or new environmental management at the local level, this paper introduces “place-change planning”. This concept is applied to recent calls by Australian water scientists and policy-makers “to liberate the knowledge, skills and individual leadership and collaboration of all stakeholders to reflect a more decentralised, disaggregated and localised water world”. Local community stakeholders appear the most neglected stakeholder currently in such water management, despite increasing international recognition of their importance for constructive change in transitional sustainability contexts. As such, place-change policy design focuses on the importance of collaborative participatory approaches for better understanding of the underlying rationalities, and, by association, of better liberating the social knowledges, of place-based local communities for better policy input to realise new visions of sustainable water management, and beyond.

Contextual influences on the development of obesity in children: A case study of UK South Asian communities

ObjectiveAn advocated approach to childhood obesity prevention research is the use of local community knowledge to inform intervention development. This paper demonstrates the value of accessing such local knowledge, and discusses how this information fits with existing conceptual models of childhood obesity. MethodsA series of 9 focus groups were run in 2007 with 68 local community stakeholders (including parents, school staff, community leaders and health and local government representatives) from 8 South Asian communities in Birmingham, UK to explore perceptions of factors contributing to the development of childhood obesity. ResultsPerceptions of causal influences were grouped into several contexts, from the individual to the macro-level, that influence diet and physical activity. Specific cultural contextual data emerged that may explain decisions around physical activity and food intake of children within these communities. Assumptions made about South Asian communities were frequently contested. ConclusionsIn order to truly understand the contextual influences on childhood obesity in target communities, it is necessary to access knowledge from local community members. Existing conceptual models of childhood obesity do not bring the role of cultural factors to the fore, but this context needs to be explicitly considered in the development of childhood obesity interventions.

Proposing a Welfare Framework for the Society and Local Community Stakeholders

In India, society and social welfare has always been an important part of business and its broad objectives. From Merchant Charity to Corporate Citizenship, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has undergone a lot of change over the past many centuries. Whatever be the nomenclature, the objective remains the same—ensuring the welfare of the society and local community as an important stakeholder of an organization. While many companies use CSR as a strategic tool, many others undertake CSR activities for genuine altruism. In both cases, CSR can be a very powerful tool for inclusive growth—the need of the hour. In this article, an attempt has been made through a mixed method study of proposing a Society and Local Community Welfare Framework. The quantitative data is gathered through an Executive Perception Survey wherein 400 responses from 125 organizations were gained and statistical analyses of the same were undertaken by the author. The qualitative data was gathered through personal interactions with senior management executives from nine eminent corporate organizations across industry categories. The framework and its major components are thus based on empirical data of practices as existent in corporate India today. Thus, the framework could be considered as a working model of CSR in India.