scholarly journals PARTICIPATORY ASSESSMENT OF LIVELIHOOD RESOURCES AND ADAPTATIONS TO CLIMATE CHANGE IN MADI VALLEY OF CHITWAN, NEPAL

2021 ◽  
pp. 25-32
Author(s):  
Shree Maharjan
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Social Economic ◽  
Cost Benefit ◽  
Adaptation Strategy ◽  
Environmental Aspects ◽  
Focus Group Discussions ◽  
Group Discussions ◽  
Technical Feasibility ◽  
The Social ◽  
Participatory Assessment

This paper has applied participatory tools to assess the livelihood resources and adaptations in Madi Valley, Nepal. It has utilized the social, economic, and environmental aspects of the identified adaptations through participatory scoring (1 to 5) for participatory cost-benefit (PCB) analysis. Additionally, it considered gender equality, technical feasibility, inclusiveness, future vulnerability for multi-criteria assessment (MCA). Series of focus group discussions (FGDs) were conducted to generate data based on communities’ perceptions. Based on PCB ratio, afforestation was the most prominent adaptation strategy, whereas early warning siren and evacuation tower (EWSET) was found the most effective adaptation based on the MCA.

scholarly journals Political Vigilante Groups in Ghana: Violence or Democracy?

2020 ◽  
Vol 55 (3) ◽  
pp. 321-338
Author(s):  
Justice Richard Kwabena Owusu Kyei ◽  
Lidewyde H. Berckmoes
Keyword(s):  
Democratic Governance ◽  
Focus Group Discussions ◽  
Group Discussions ◽  
Political Field ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
Electoral Campaigns ◽  
The Social ◽  
Group Members ◽  
Organisational Structures ◽  
Depth Interviews

Literature on political vigilante groups has centred on the violence and conflict that emanate from their activities. This article approaches political vigilante groups as political actors who engage in political mobilisation and participation and therewith also contribute to nation state building. It explores how such groups participate in Ghana’s democratic governance and asks whether violence is an inevitable characteristic. The article builds on individual in-depth interviews and focus group discussions with political vigilante group members in Kumasi and Tamale in 2019. Findings show that political vigilante “youth” appeared to refer primarily to the social position attributed to non-elite groups in the political field. Political vigilante groups are multi-faceted in their organisational structures, membership, and activities both during electoral campaigns and during governing periods. While some groups revert to violence occasionally, the study concludes that political vigilante groups, in enabling different voices to be heard, are also contributing to democratic governance.

scholarly journals A Systematic Literature Review of Historic Garden Management and Its Economic Aspects

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (24) ◽  
pp. 10679
Author(s):  
Cassandra Funsten ◽  
Valeria Borsellino ◽  
Emanuele Schimmenti
Keyword(s):  
Social Economic ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Environmental Aspects ◽  
Policy Documents ◽  
Built Heritage ◽  
The People ◽  
Clear Vision ◽  
The Social ◽  
Management Literature ◽  
Recent Policy

Historic gardens are important parts of humanity’s built heritage within the designed landscape, providing many environmental, economic and socio-cultural benefits. Management is a key part of their conservation, perhaps the most difficult because it is costly, must be continual, and requires a skilled workforce. This systematic review looks at the literature addressing historic garden management, with special attention regarding the social, economic and environmental aspects of sustainability. Academic studies on this subject come from many different disciplines, making it both stimulating and fragmented. It is now time to consolidate these interdisciplinary efforts into a clear vision, including a framework of key themes and research methods so as to better coordinate efforts and make the information and innovation generated more accessible to the garden managers “in the trenches”. With this aim, reviewed studies are classified according to 10 criteria: supply or demand orientation; management phase involved; primary sustainability processes addressed; geographic criteria; number of sites covered; policy documents referred to; kind of data collected; study methods employed; possibility of bias specifically regarding historic gardens; garden use. An analysis of these criteria shows that historic garden management literature focuses on describing the gardens themselves, with few studies interested in the people supporting them. Future research should follow recent policy documents’ lead and pay more attention to community value and involvement.

Force fields of the modern

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Prem Poddar
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Intellectual History ◽  
Social Economic ◽  
Force Fields ◽  
Cultural Dimensions ◽  
Contemporary Theory ◽  
Western Modernity ◽  
Space And Time ◽  
The Social ◽  
Different Levels

The essentially contested notion of the modern, and its cognate form “modernity,” have a long intellectual history. The emergence and dissemination of the idea of Western modernity was sometimes forcibly imposed, sometimes partially accepted, and sometimes resisted at different levels around the globe. Recent thinking has produced qualifiers and prefixes such as “unfinished,” “post-,” “late,” “inevitable,” “contra-,” “alternative,” or “differential” in relation to modernity, to signal the striations in approaches, interpretations, and positionings towards what is seen as an umbrella term to describe the various possibilities that can be brought to bear while considering contentions in contemporary theory and praxis. The social, economic, political, and cultural dimensions of this field of forces are integral to any thinking about the symbolic contestation of power in multifarious re-imaginings. This article charts this field mainly by looking at the colonial and postcolonial interventions that have impacted and continue to the present day to effect and inflect cultures and societies, including pressing questions of climate change and cyberspace. Sections are sorted under the following sub-headings: “The vortex of the modern;” “Subaltern bodies, subversive minds;” “Communication and colonization: Re-inventing space and time;” “Borderlands, migrations, identities;” and “Contesting and controlling cyberspace.”

scholarly journals Youth perspective on social media discourse on “Lazy Nigerian Youths” conversations

INFORMASI ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 50 (2) ◽  
pp. 111-122
Author(s):  
Nkiru Comfort Ezeh ◽  
Augustine Godwin Mboso
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Political Communication ◽  
Freedom Of Expression ◽  
Media Discourse ◽  
Focus Group Discussions ◽  
Group Discussions ◽  
Political Issues ◽  
The Social ◽  
Youth Perspective

The Social Media has emerged as a new platform for discourses. It has no doubt provided people with easier and faster accessibility to information and has become an outlet for them to share their views on socio-political issues. It has also been observed that negative and hate comments seem to dominate on social networks used for social and political communication. Anchored on Public Sphere Theory, focus group discussions were conducted with undergraduate youths in South-east Nigeria examined on the issue of President Mohammadu Buhari’s referring to Nigerian youths as lazy, while speaking at the Commonwealth Business Forum in Westminster on 18th April 2018. This article, therefore, explored the opinions advanced in the discourse based on the principles of freedom of expression and responsibility. The study suggests that while Twitter platform was more objective in the discussion of the issue of the day because it allows the use of filters to ensure that contents posted on the platform adhere strictly to rules and fair usage; Facebook and Whatsapp trailed with abuses and hate comments. The study recommended that owners of blogs and media houses who now post their contents on the social media should coordinate comments on such platforms and continue developing mechanisms that work to regulate the quality of posted content.

High-yielding seeds in unyielding environments: Examining the learning process of maize and bean producers in eastern and midwestern Uganda

2021 ◽  
Vol 50 (4) ◽  
pp. 418-440 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claris Riungu ◽  
Harro Maat ◽  
Marrit Van Den Berg
Keyword(s):  
Focus Group ◽  
Learning Process ◽  
Negative Consequences ◽  
Focus Group Discussions ◽  
Group Discussions ◽  
Environmental Learning ◽  
The Social ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Selection Of

This paper examines the learning process by which farmers come to a decision to use newly introduced seeds which were promoted through demonstration plots in midwestern and eastern regions of Uganda. Framed as social and material interactions, we investigated the learning process of the demonstration plots using data from focus group discussions, interviews and a survey amongst 983 individuals. The results reveal several constraints that impede learning, resulting in an overall low awareness and adoption of the introduced seeds. Some of the most prominent constraints resulted from the selection of location and demonstration plot host, the distance of agro-dealers, at district headquarters, limited interactions amongst farmers and irregular involvement of farmers in the demonstrations. Moreover, the prominent role of agro-dealers at field days suggests that informing farmers about where to buy seeds was considered more important than explaining farmers how to grow these seeds profitably. This commercial focus of field days and demonstrations plots had negative consequences for the social learning. This paper contributes to the learning and adoption literature by showing that interactions amongst actors can improve or reduce the balance between didactic, social and environmental learning.

Exploring the “Social” in Social Media: Adolescent Relatedness—Thwarted and Supported

2021 ◽  
pp. 074355842110621
Author(s):  
Monique West ◽  
Simon Rice ◽  
Dianne Vella-Brodrick
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Social Connectedness ◽  
Media Use ◽  
Focus Group Discussions ◽  
Group Discussions ◽  
Social Media Use ◽  
Rich Picture ◽  
Relational Experiences ◽  
The Social ◽  
Media Research

The pervasiveness of social media in adolescents’ lives has important implications for their relationships. Considering today’s adolescents have grown up with social media, research capturing their unique perspectives of how social media impacts their relationships is needed to increase understanding and help guide behaviors that nurture social-connectedness. Utilizing multiple qualitative methods, this study explores adolescents’ perspectives of how their social media use impacts their relationships. The sample comprised 36, Year 9 students aged 15 years from four metropolitan schools in Melbourne, Australia. All participants completed a rich picture mapping activity and focus group discussions. To gain deeper understandings, a sub-sample of 11 adolescents participated in subsequent one-on-one interviews. Reflexive thematic analysis generated two overarching themes (1) developing and strengthening relationships and (2) diminishing relationships. Sub-themes included; making new friends, maintaining relationships, deepening connections, enhancing belonging, rifts and strains, and anti-social behavior. Findings revealed nuanced insights into “how” and “why” adolescents believe social media impacts relationships. Adolescents explained that social media transforms interactions through amplifying and intensifying relational experiences resulting in both beneficial and detrimental outcomes for their relationships. Cultivating the positive aspects of adolescents’ social media use whilst mitigating the negative is important toward supporting relatedness and fostering wellbeing.

Philosophy and Climate Change

2021 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Political Institutions ◽  
Social Economic ◽  
Human Life ◽  
Independent Interest ◽  
The Social

Climate change is poised to threaten, disrupt, and transform human life, and the social, economic, and political institutions that structure it. In light of this, understanding climate change, and discussing how to address it, should be at the very center of our public conversation. Philosophy can make an enormous contribution to that conversation, but only if both philosophers and non-philosophers understand what it can contribute. The sixteen original articles collected in this volume both illustrate the diverse ways that philosophy can contribute to this conversation, and ways in which thinking about climate change can help to illuminate a range of topics of independent interest to philosophers.

scholarly journals Socioeconomic factors influencing farmers’ specific adaptive strategies to climate change in Talensi district of the Upper East Region of Ghana

2020 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Damian Felladam Tangonyire ◽  
George Agana Akuriba
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Socioeconomic Factors ◽  
Sampling Technique ◽  
Adaptive Strategies ◽  
Focus Group Discussions ◽  
Group Discussions ◽  
Content Type ◽  
East Region ◽  
Key Informant ◽  
Upper East Region

Purpose Farmers all over the country have been exposed to various adaptation strategies to climate change. The adaptation options however focus too closely on technical skills and technologies and fail to address critical social factors such as culture, beliefs and values that influence the adoption and effective implementation of new adaptation technologies, skills and capacity. This paper aims to assess the socioeconomic factors influencing farmers’ specific adaptive strategies to climate change in Pwalugu and Balungu communities in the Talensi district of the Upper East Region of Ghana. This study used purposive sampling technique to select the study communities, whereas simple random sampling technique was used to select a total of 100 respondents from the selected communities. Questionnaires, key informant interviews and focus group discussions were used in collecting data from respondents. This study used detailed statistical test to analyze the data, and the results are presented in the form of figures and tables. This study highlights the legal and institutional context which must be adopted for effective response to climate change impacts in rural communities in Northern Ghana. It also recommends that government and relevant stakeholders should collaborate with financial institutions to ensure that funds are readily available to farmers to enable them to effectively adapt to climate change as well as provide training/workshop programs to farmers to enhance their capacity in planning and implementing effective strategies to climate change. Design/methodology/approach This study used the integrated methodological approach where quantitative methods were combined with appropriate qualitative methods. According to Sandelowski (2000), this method ensures reliability (the extents to which results are consistent over time) and validity (the means of which measurements are accurate) of the research. A combination of participatory methods, including key informant interviews, household questionnaire surveys and focus-group discussions were used, allowing local people the opportunity to participate by sharing their experiences and knowledge to outline possible solutions to the problem at hand. Multiple methods (Yeasmin and Rahman, 2012) are good at reducing the inadequacies of a single method. Cross-sectional study was used in designing the research. Variables were measured or determined at the same period in a given population. This method allowed the assessment of practices, attitudes, knowledge and beliefs of a population in relation to a particular event or phenomenon (Olsen and George, 2014). Findings The findings of this study revealed farming as the major occupation in the two communities with males being dominant. Diverse livelihood activities such as fishing, animal/poultry rearing, firewood/charcoal production, hunting and driving were other activities respondents engaged to earn a living. In terms of institutional arrangements, avoidance of bush burning and tree felling were the norms influencing decision-making in the two communities. Fear of being punished, animals feeding on some of the grasses, trees inducing rainfall as well as benefits respondents get from trees were the reasons these norms were adhered to in the study area. Access to land, gender dynamics and finance were identified as the socioeconomic factors in the study area. High demands by landowners, last minute change of mind by landowners, limited fertile lands, lack of money to acquire lands, behavior of tenants, number of acres required and lands far from water bodies were the challenges associated with acquiring land in the communities. Access to finance influenced respondents’ ability to acquire fertile lands, lands closer to water bodies and any number of acres of their choice. Gender however impeded women adaptation strategies to climate change. Women were not allowed to own land and other property in the form of animals simply because they are seen as migrants and they do not know the history of the land. Originality/value This is a master’s thesis project. This paper shows the socioeconomic factors, which are influencing farmers’ specific adaptation to climate change in the Talensi district of Ghana.

Participation in Work Life and Access to Public Transport – Lived Experiences of People with Disabilities in Sweden

2012 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 148-155 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rafael Lindqvist ◽  
Jörgen Lundälv
Keyword(s):  
Public Transport ◽  
Public Transportation ◽  
Work Life ◽  
Work Organisation ◽  
Focus Group Discussions ◽  
Group Discussions ◽  
Physical Impairments ◽  
The Social ◽  
Work Tasks ◽  
Age Range

This study explores accessibility to public transport facilities and participation in work life experienced by persons with physical and cognitive impairments. Participants were 21 persons with mobility (n = 6), neuropsychiatric (n = 6), hearing (n = 7), or visual impairments (n = 2) (males = 11, females = 10; age range = 16 to 79). Data were collected using focus group discussions and thematically analysed. The findings point to significant physical, social/attitudinal and communication limitations to the access of public transportation and participation in work life. While participants with physical impairments emphasised lack of accessibility in terms of transport accommodations, persons with neuropsychiatric impairments focused on the social and interactional aspects of public transport. Work life participation was mostly impacted by lack of flexibility in work tasks and work organisation, and fear of being misunderstood and perceived as incapable.

Climate-induced Gender Vulnerabilities in Northwestern Bangladesh

2017 ◽  
Vol 24 (3) ◽  
pp. 360-372 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nishith Zahan Tanny ◽  
M. Wakilur Rahman ◽  
Rafiqun Nessa Ali
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Climate Change Policy ◽  
Vulnerability Index ◽  
Climatic Conditions ◽  
Focus Group Discussions ◽  
Group Discussions ◽  
Factors Influencing ◽  
Change Policy ◽  
Northwestern Bangladesh ◽  
Main Determinants

Risks and vulnerabilities arising out of climate change are exacerbated by unequal gender relations. The current study examines climate-induced vulnerabilities to which men and women are exposed and explores the factors that affect women more than men. This study was conducted in purposively selected Kurigram district as a representative of Northern Bangladesh, where people experience climatic divergence and extreme poverty. Data were collected from 100 randomly selected participants from three villages of Kurigram district through questionnaire survey and focus group discussions. The gender vulnerability index was used to measure the extent of vulnerability and the factors influencing vulnerability. The results show that 72.2 per cent are highly vulnerable with females being almost more than twice as vulnerable as males. The analysis indicates that the amount of land, difficulty in bathing when the basic bathroom structure was destroyed and use of borrowed money were the main determinants of gender vulnerability in changing climatic conditions. The findings of this study might help to integrate gender into climate change policy discourse and find appropriate adaptation strategies in Bangladesh, particularly in Northwestern Bangladesh.

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