Chinese Cultural Construction of Harmony: Implications for an Ongoing Dialogue on Sustainability

2007 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 303-315
Author(s):  
Tian Shi
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Cultural Context ◽  
Common Ground ◽  
Cultural Construction ◽  
Policy Goal ◽  
Cultural Economic ◽  
Cultural Considerations ◽  
Institutional Settings ◽  
Ongoing Dialogue ◽  
Current Stage

Sustainable development has now become a general policy goal around the world. However, this concept is open to interpretation depending on different socio-cultural, economic and political circumstances. This is mainly because we are now living in a world that is characterised by heterogeneous rather than homogeneous frames of reference, motives and interests, institutional settings and agendas. This paper provides a brief Chinese cultural context of the sustainability discourse. It is argued that social and cultural considerations will be crucial on the way towards the achievement of sustainable development. Chinese interpretation of sustainability has reflected the significant influence from the country’s unique cultural and philosophical heritage. Although the concept of sustainable development still remains ambiguous and lacks consistency in its use, it has allowed peoples with different backgrounds and often conflicting interests to reach some common ground upon which concrete policies can be developed and implemented toward a sustainable future. To achieve the goal of sustainable development, it is proposed that one of the priorities at the current stage is to maintain cultural diversity and promote inter- and trans-cultural communications.

scholarly journals Culture and Psychopathology: Foundations, Issues, Directions

2010 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 103-115 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anthony J. Marsella ◽  
Ann Marie Yamada
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Context ◽  
Diagnostic Category ◽  
Epidemiological Studies ◽  
Human Mind ◽  
Cultural Construction ◽  
Diagnostic Systems ◽  
Cultural Variations ◽  
Cultural Considerations ◽  
Cultural Boundaries ◽  
Definition Of

AbstractThe present article offers an overview of the historical influences, conceptual assumptions, and major findings and issues associated with the study of culture and psychopathology. The article traces continuing reductionistic resistance to the incorporation of cultural considerations in the etiology, expression, and treatment of psychopathology to historical and contemporary forces. These forces include ‘cultural context’ of Western psychiatry and psychology, which choose to locate the determinants of behaviour in the human mind and brain. A definition of culture that acknowledges its internal and external representations is offered, and steps in the cultural construction of reality are proposed. Within this context, the risks of imposing Western cultural views universally are noted, especially attempts to homogenise classification and diagnostic systems across cultures. ‘Culture-bound’ disorders are used as example of Western bias via the assumption that they have ‘real’ disorders, while the other cultures have disorders that are shaped by culture. Cultural considerations in understanding the rate, etiology, and expression are presented, including recommended criteria for conducting epidemiological studies across cultural boundaries, especially ‘schizophrenic’ disorders as this problematic diagnostic category is subject to multiple cultural variations. The article closes with discussions of ‘cultural competence’ and ‘multilevel’ approaches to behaviour.

Formation of background of sustainable development and transition to the «green» economy strategy

2020 ◽  
pp. 75-83
Author(s):  
L.Z. Khalishkhova ◽  
A.Kh. Temrokova ◽  
I.R. Guchapsheva
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Economic Development ◽  
Global Economy ◽  
Social Problems ◽  
Green Economy ◽  
Human Needs ◽  
Environmental Processes ◽  
Environmental Development ◽  
Current Stage

The article is devoted to the issues of measuring environmentally oriented economic development. The current stage of economic development requires the integration of environmental development, taking into account: environmental boundaries, biosphere processes, social problems, human needs and environmental processes. A green economy can become the main point of growth for the modern global economy. The article presents a complex of measures for the transition to a green economy, as well as tools for their implementation.

scholarly journals The Perils of Accommodation: Jesuit Missionary Strategies in the Early Modern World

2017 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 395-414
Author(s):  
Andrés I. Prieto
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Cultural Context ◽  
Common Ground ◽  
Modern World ◽  
The Political ◽  
Central Feature ◽  
Matteo Ricci ◽  
Jesuit Missionaries ◽  
Jose De Acosta ◽  
Christian Message

The notion of accommodation, or the adaptation of one’s message to one’s audience, has been regarded as a central feature of the Jesuit way of proceeding at least since the seventeenth century. In recent years, scholars have come to understand accommodation as a rhetorical principle, which—while rooted in the rules of classical oratory—permeated all the works and ministries performed by the Jesuits of the Old Society. By comparing the theoretical notions about accommodation and the advantages and risks of adapting both the Christian message to native cultures and vice versa, this paper shows how and under what conditions the Jesuit missionaries were able to translate this rhetorical principle into a proselytizing praxis. By focusing on the examples of José de Acosta in Peru, Matteo Ricci in China, and of those Jesuits working in the missions in Paraguay and Chile, this essay will show how the needs in the missionary field superseded and overruled the theoretical requirements set beforehand. They revealed the ways in which the political and cultural context in which the missionaries operated determined the negotiations needed in order to achieve a common ground with their would-be converts if their mission was going to happen at all.

scholarly journals Komparativna analiza hrvatskog i nizozemskog školskog sustava

2018 ◽  
Vol 36 (13) ◽  
Author(s):  
Igor Radeka ◽  
Ljiljana Radman
Keyword(s):  
Elementary Schools ◽  
School System ◽  
Cultural Context ◽  
Basic Characteristic ◽  
Institutions Of Higher Education ◽  
Cultural Economic ◽  
Resource Potential ◽  
The Social ◽  
State And Society ◽  
Developed World

The article commences its comparative analysis of the Croatian and the Holland system by emphasising the main features of the Croatian and the Holland state and society and by analysing the Croatian and the Holland school subsystems: kindergardens, elementary schools, high schools, institutions of higher education, specialized schooling and schools for grownups. Transition, as the basic characteristic of the Crotian school system and multiculturalism as the chief feature of the Holland system, are given places of prominence.The authors conclude that the surrounding European cultural context, the geographical and resource potential of the countries which stress the immense significance of education, the large number of the population covered by elementary and high school subsystems and the problems of the social deviation of youth are common to both the Croatian and the Holland societies and their school systems.The differences between these two systems are much greater and these can be divided according to the structure, the degree of centralization and way of running the schools, financing them, their ownership, the organisation of their activitiess, their programs, the pedagogical standards, the position of those attending the systems and the state of the educated labour market.At the end of the article, the authors voice a plea for the application of the positive experience of the Holland school system into the Croatian school system, taking into consideration its historical, cultural, economic, social and national specificities in order to bring the school system of Croatia as close as possible to that of the developed world.

scholarly journals Production Cultures and Differentiations of Digital Labour

2014 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yujie Chen
Keyword(s):  
Production Process ◽  
Cultural Differences ◽  
Cultural Production ◽  
Cultural Context ◽  
Cultural Construction ◽  
Construction Site ◽  
Economic Activities ◽  
Global Inequality ◽  
Digital Production ◽  
The Relationship

The article makes two theoretical interventions to engage with current scholarship on digital labour. First, the author complicates the relationship between culture and production by bringing the former from the “superstructure” in the classical Marx’s framework to the “base.” As various cultural production, consumption, and economic activities converging onto digital, networked media eco-system, digital labour is indeed the indispensable source for capitals’ accumulation of surplus and, more importantly, for cultural construction around production process. How labourers perceive their relations and interactions to the digital production process as crucial as which capacity they rely on to perform their labour. Culturalization of production process (re)draws the boundaries for desirable skills and constructs ideal digital workers with normative behaviours.  Second, precisely because the production process has become normative construction site, meanings and values of labouring are subject to broader social and cultural context including prior established global inequality and cultural differences.

scholarly journals Human Rights

2021 ◽  
pp. 51-62
Author(s):  
Reetta Toivanen ◽  
Dorothée Cambou
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Indigenous Peoples ◽  
Cultural Context ◽  
Sustainable Development Goals ◽  
Political Agency ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
Legal Situation ◽  
The Status ◽  
Development Goals

This chapter takes up the status of the human in terms of rights and law. Surveying the status of human rights law within the framework of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the authors highlight the cultural context of Arctic Indigenous peoples, namely the Sámi people in Finland. The lack of legal and political agency is a barrier not only to sustainable and culturally desirable livelihoods, as the authors detail: this legal situation enables ongoing extractivist projects in the form of mining and forestry.

Risks, Uncertainty and Climate Confusion in the Murray–Darling Basin Reforms

2016 ◽  
Vol 03 (03) ◽  
pp. 1650038 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jason Alexandra
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Water Policy ◽  
Water Governance ◽  
Climate Science ◽  
Cultural Construction ◽  
Policy Integration ◽  
Institutional Settings ◽  
Murray Darling Basin ◽  
Financial Consequences ◽  
Key Dimensions

Risks and uncertainties arising from climate change are increasingly recognized as significant challenges for water governance. To support adaptive approaches, critical examinations of water policy practices and rationalities are needed. This paper focuses on the treatment of climate change in Australia’s Murray–Darling Basin (MDB) reforms over the past decade. While the MDB faces potentially significant drying trends due to climate change no reductions in future water availability due to climate change were formalized in the 2012 Basin Plan — a regulatory instrument agreed to by Australia’s National Parliament. The background, key dimensions and possible reasons for this decision are examined. Possible reasons for not formally reducing water deemed available in the future include the complexity and uncertainty of climate science, the cultural construction of “climate normal” based on long-term averages, and institutional settings that reinforce dominant “hydro-logical” approaches and rationalities. Minimizing the political, legal and financial consequences of attributing reductions in water allocations to climate change are also potential reasons. The case of the MDB, as outlined in this paper, demonstrates some of the ways climate change is causing systemic challenges for adaptive water governance, and that innovative approaches need to be embraced, including better processes for institutionalizing science/policy integration.

scholarly journals The Idea of Universality in the Sustainable Development Goals

2015 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 203-222 ◽  
Author(s):  
Graham Long
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Sustainable Development Goals ◽  
Final Section ◽  
Burden Sharing ◽  
The Sustainable Development ◽  
Guiding Principle ◽  
Development Goals ◽  
Normative Significance ◽  
Current Stage

A new set of “Sustainable Development Goals” (SDGs) are currently being negotiated at the United Nations, and there is a widespread consensus that these goals must be “universal.” This article analyses what universality might mean in this context, and its normative significance as a guiding principle for the goals. After briefly introducing the Sustainable Development Goals as found in the current stage of the negotiations, thearticle proceeds in three sections that consider three different senses of universality. In the first, I outline the most intuitive or straightforward sense of universality as a claim about the scope of the goals, with limited import for the content. In the second section, I expand on this idea by noting a widespread understanding of the content of the goals which might also be thought universal and which reflects a moral cosmopolitan constraint on the ambition of each goal. Universality is paired with, and contrasted against, the need fordifferentiation. In the final section, I examine this idea of differentiation, asking how and how far, the goals should allow for country context. From this discussion arises a third account of universality which incorporates a demand for fair burden-sharing. I consider, and ultimately caution against, this account of universality, even though the demand forfairness is crucial in its own right.

THE CONTRIBUTION OF THE JOURNALS: JTEFS AND DCSE ON A SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT OF THE REGION

Via Latgalica ◽  
2017 ◽  
pp. 62
Author(s):  
Dzintra Ilisko ◽  
Astrida Skrinda ◽  
Anita Pipere
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Education ◽  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Formal Education ◽  
Education For Sustainable Development ◽  
Education For Sustainability ◽  
Cultural Economic ◽  
Global Issues ◽  
Sustainable Education ◽  
Open Access Journals ◽  
Global Action

The report reveals the contribution of two international UNESCO/ UNITWIN Chair’s peer-reviewed journals – “Discourse and Communication for Sustainable Education” (DCSE) and “Journal of Teacher Education for Sustainability” (JTEFS) to sustainable development of Latgale. They are international, cross-disciplinary, scholarly and open access journals focusing on diverse aspects of environmental, cultural, economic and social sustainability thus enabling one to constructively and creatively address present and future global challenges in creating more sustainable and resilient societies. Both journals aim to respond to the priorities set by the United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development and the Global Action Programme as implemented in LATGALE and in the partner countries. The study reflects on the thematic scope of the two journals that centres on reorienting education towards the goal of sustainable education and sustainable community in Latgale, Latvia, Europe and beyond. In order to respond to the challenges of global community that we are facing today, the research published in both journals suggests how education can contribute to overcoming the current crises in education and community, as well as offers strategies and ways of dealing with it sustainably and responsibly in Latgale. Education for sustainable development (ESD) includes more than knowledge related to the environment, economy, culture and society. It also addresses learning perspectives, strategies and values that guide and motivate people to seek sustainable livelihoods, participate in a democratic society and live in a sustainable manner. ESD also involves studying both local and global issues. The research offers the study of JTEFS contribution to meeting different views, ideas and research to promote further development of studies and practice of teacher education in all areas of formal and non-formal education in relation to sustainability. DCSE is an international, peer-reviewed journal that provides a platform for examination of policies, theories and practices related to the discourse and communication for sustainable education. Since contemporary discourse study has extended its field to the study of multifaceted contexts of discourse, it integrates a broader study of the phenomena of communication in relation to sustainable education. The diversity of the journal is apparent in the variety of its theories, methods and approaches, thus avoiding the frequent limitation to one school, approach or academic branch.

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