Conflation in political gardening: concepts and practice

Author(s):  
Lucy Rose Wright ◽  
Ross Fraser Young

This chapter is an introduction to the concept of political gardening; it aims to inform the reader of the political turn in the urban gardening movement. It begins by contextualising the re-evaluation of ‘everyday space’ through the neoliberal processes of privatisation, devolution and entrepreneurialism. It then marries together these processes with the rise of academic interest in urban gardening and a more recently the political aspect of this movement. The chapter then conflates the ideas of political gardening with injustice based on Rawls theory of social justice. Case study examples are then used to unpack the process of political gardening – in six iterative stages - in dealing with these injustices, arriving at a working definition of what political gardening is and that it is not just a term but also a process in which participants undergo towards becoming engaged ‘democratised’ citizens.

Author(s):  
Smita Ramnarain

Critiques of liberal, top-down approaches to peacebuilding have motivated a discussion of alternative, locally-led, and community-based approaches to achieving and maintaining sustainable peace. This article uses a case study of women's savings and credit cooperatives in post-violence Nepal to examine the ways in which grassroots-based, locally-led peace initiatives can counter top-down approaches. The article presents ethnographic evidence from fieldwork in Nepal on how cooperatives expand through their everyday activities the definition of peace to include not only the absence of violence (negative peace) but transformatory goals such as social justice (positive peace). By focusing on ongoing root causes of structural violence, cooperatives problematize the postconflict period where pre-war normalcy is presumed to have returned. They emphasize local agency and ownership over formal peace processes. The findings suggest ongoing struggles that cooperatives face due to their existence within larger, liberal paradigms of international postconflict aid and reconstruction assistance. Their uneasy relationship with liberal economic structures limit their scale and scope of effectiveness even as they provide local alternatives for peacebuilding.


Author(s):  
J. Phillip Thompson

This article examines the political aspect of urban planning. It discusses Robert Beauregard's opinion that planning should not reject modernism entirely or unconditionally embrace postmodernism, and that planners should instead maintain a focus on the city and the built environment as a way of retaining relevancy and coherence, and should maintain modernism's commitment to political reform and to planning's meditative role within the state, labor, and capital. The article suggests that planners should also advocate utopian social justice visions for cities which are not so far-fetched as to be unrealizable so that planning can then attach itself to widespread values such as democracy, the common good, or equality.


2021 ◽  
pp. 86-110
Author(s):  
Paul K.J. Han

Chapter 5 presents an approach to managing uncertainty in medicine. It develops the idea of “uncertainty tolerance” as a normative goal for efforts to manage uncertainty. It offers a working definition of uncertainty tolerance as an optimal, adaptive balance in people’s responses to uncertainty and identifies humility, flexibility, and courage as key moral virtues or capacities that enable uncertainty tolerance. The chapter presents a practical integrative framework of uncertainty management that aims to promote uncertainty tolerance through four key tasks: establishing the diagnosis of uncertainty, assessing its prognosis, clarifying goals, and initiating treatment. The chapter uses a case study to explore the potential practical value of the framework in helping clinicians and patients to manage and tolerate the uncertainties they experience.


2016 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 124-138 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mette Marie Roslyng ◽  
Bolette B Blaagaard

This article argues that the definition of the political and its role in on- and offline public spheres calls for a conceptualization that takes into account the networked connections established between lay and professional political actors, mass media and mobile media. While acknowledging the importance of popular and mass media’s impact on participatory and democratic processes, this article focuses on the cultural citizen and proposes that a rethinking of publics affords a new understanding of the idea of networks as a series of connection points fostering a dynamic and relational view on the political. We illustrate this conceptualization through a case study mapping the agonistic and antagonistic frontiers in communication in a variety of publics and counter-publics in the context of Danish minority culture and politics.


2016 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 467-484 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fatemeh Anvarifar ◽  
Chris Zevenbergen ◽  
Wil Thissen ◽  
Tushith Islam

Flexibility is often proposed as a valuable capability to cope with uncertainty and change. However, there is no consensus about what constitutes flexibility across the literature. A review of publications on flood management, real options and manufacturing reveals remarkable commonalities along with substantial inconsistencies in the use of flexibility. These observations are used for structuring the discussion of flexibility in this paper. A framework is proposed in the form of four self-consistent and step-wise questions: (Q1) why is flexibility needed; (Q2) what is it that flexibility is required for; (Q3) what are the dimensions of flexibility; (Q4) what needs to change or be adapted? In order to answer the questions in the context of multifunctional flood defences (MFFDs), eight characteristic features of flexibility in connection with the four questions are distilled from the synthesized publications. Subsequently, a working definition of flexibility is developed. An illustrative case study examines the framework's potential for the development of a MFFD. It is shown that the iterative use of the framework can serve as a guideline for identifying and evaluating flexibility for MFFDs. The paper ends with some challenges for future research.


2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 115-128
Author(s):  
Sari Wulandari ◽  
Guntur Guntur ◽  
Martinus Dwi Marianto

RajutKejut is a knitting community in Jakarta, Indonesia, that has been doing yarnbombing activities since 2014. In 2019, Jakarta Arts Council invited RajutKejut to collaborate with Kampung Air Baja residents in Penjaringan, North Jakarta, in a program called Young Curator Class: Titik Temu Gembira. The program combines forces between RajutKejut and urban village residents to explore life from a different perspective, specifically through art activism. This program’s spirit helps residents have joyful independent lives with dignity through art that encourages life’s passion. The RajutKejut Community shares its knowledge with residents on making necklaces from threads for their dance costumes. This research discusses how RajutKejut brings forward the passion of life through art activism. This research uses Alyce McGovern’s Craftivism method, which dissects craftivism in personal, community, and political aspects. It shows the relation of art to the residents, how art can influence and raise an individual’s potential. The community aspect shows the relation of art and the residents and how art can restore the spirit of togetherness and cooperation. On the political aspect, the art facilitates statements of empowerment from the residents. Through RajutKejut craftivism, the residents have the social capital to help them catch their breath for a while, stop their routines for a moment, and allow them to feel their existence as human beings who have expressions and feelings. Eksplorasi Eksistensi Diri melalui Kraftivisme RajutKejut: Studi Kasus di Hutan Penjaringan, Jakarta ABSTRAK RajutKejut adalah komunitas merajut di Jakarta, Indonesia yang telah melakukan kegiatan ‘bom-benang’ sejak tahun 2014. Pada tahun 2019, Dewan Kesenian Jakarta mengundang RajutKejut untuk berkolaborasi dengan warga Kampung Air Baja di Penjaringan, Jakarta Utara, dalam program Kelas Kurator Muda: Titik Temu Gembira. Program tersebut menggabungkan potensi komunitas RajutKejut dan warga kampung kota untuk mengeksplorasi kehidupan melalui perspektif yang berbeda, khususnya lewat aktivisme seni. Semangat program ini adalah membantu warga untuk memiliki kehidupan mandiri yang menyenangkan dan bermartabat, melalui seni yang mendorong gairah hidup. Komunitas RajutKejut berbagi pengetahuan kepada warga kampung kota, cara membuat kalung dari benang untuk kostum tari mereka. Penelitian ini membahas bagaimana RajutKejut mendorong gairah hidup melalui aktivisme seni. Penelitian ini menggunakan metode Craftivism Alyce McGovern, yang membedah craftivism dalam aspek personal, komunitas, dan politik. Penelitian menunjukkan relasi seni dengan warga kampung, bagaimana seni dapat mempengaruhi dan meningkatkan potensi individu. Dalam aspek komunitas, menunjukkan bagaimana seni berelasi dengan masyarakat dapat mengembalikan semangat kebersamaan dan kerjasama. Pada aspek politik, kesenian memfasilitasi pernyataan pemberdayaan dari warga kampung. Melalui kraftivisme RajutKejut, warga kampung memiliki modal sosial untuk membantu mereka mengatur napas sejenak, menghentikan rutinitas sejenak, dan memberi mereka kesempatan untuk merasakan keberadaannya sebagai manusia yang memiliki ekspresi dan perasaan.


2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 10-14
Author(s):  
Eric Ng ◽  
Caroline Wai

Increasingly, dietitians have found ourselves working with racialized clients, communities, and colleagues across the health and food systems in Canada. We are often asked to treat the adverse health outcomes of Black, Indigenous, and racialized communities resulting from these oppressions at the individual level. However, it is the role of dietitians to engage in efforts to "reduce health inequities and protect human rights; promote fairness and equitable treatment" (College of Dietitians of Ontario, 2019). An anti-oppression approach is required for dietitians to understand how their power and privilege shape the dietitian-client relationship. The purpose of this commentary is to propose a shift from cultural competence or diversity and inclusion in dietetics to an explicit intention of anti-oppressive dietetic practice. We begin our exploration from the Canadian context. We draw from our background working in health equity in public health, and our experiences facilitating equity training using anti-oppression approaches with dietetic learners and other public health practitioners. In creating a working definition of anti-oppressive dietetic practice, we conducted a scan of anti-oppression statements by health and social services organizations in Ontario, Canada, and literature from critical dietetics. A literature search revealed anti-oppressive practice frameworks in nursing and social work. However, this language is lacking in mainstream dietetic practice, with anti-oppression only discussed within the literature on critical dietetics and social justice. We propose that "dietitians can engage in anti-oppressive practice by providing food and nutrition care/planning/service to clients while simultaneously seeking to transform health and social systems towards social justice."


Author(s):  
Livnat Holtzman

This chapter introduces the corpus of aḥādīth al-ṣifāt and its role in shaping the traditionalistic definition of anthropomorphism through the case-study of an anthropomorphic tradition attributed to Mujahid, one of the earliest Quran exegetes. According to this tradition, the ‘honourable station’ (maqām maḥmūd) which is mentioned in Quran 17:79, denotes that the Prophet Muhammad will sit on the heavenly throne with God. This marginal tradition which was rejected by the majority of the traditionalists became an iconic text due the relentless efforts of the Baghdadian Hanbalites of the ninth and tenth centuries. The Hanbalites toiled to prove the antiquity and the authenticity of the text, while using an array of rhetorical devices to promote this text and sanctify it. Thus, Abu Bakr al-Marwazi (d. 888), who was Ahmad ibn Hanbal’s (d. 855) foremost disciple, used to illustrate Muhammad’s sitting on the throne by standing up and sitting down. This gesture conveyed the Hanbalite creed that Muhammad’s sitting on the throne was actual rather than metaphoric. The political events that accompanied this anthropomorphic text are also surveyed in this chapter.


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (7) ◽  
pp. 2925 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin Nölting ◽  
Heike Molitor ◽  
Julian Reimann ◽  
Jan-Hendrik Skroblin ◽  
Nadine Dembski

Higher education institutions (HEIs) are increasingly confronted with societal needs beyond research and teaching. These include sustainable development and technology transfer as well as the practical application of knowledge and ideas. Several HEIs already put sustainable development and transfer into practice. These practitioner–university partnerships comprise a broad range of actors, disciplines, topics, and formats. However, transfer activities that contribute to sustainable development in society still make up only a very small part of HEIs’ activities. In response to calls from society as a whole, HEIs could combine transfer and sustainable development more systematically. In this article, we suggest a concept of transfer for sustainable development. The focus is on sustainability transfer in teaching. We used mixed methods for this conceptual work: exploratory workshops, expert interviews, and a case study of transfer in teaching. One of the results presented in this article is a working definition of sustainability transfer at HEIs. In addition, six characteristics for describing sustainability transfer in its various forms are formulated. This conceptualization makes it possible to analyze the diversity of HEIs’ sustainability transfer activities, it helps to identify and encourage potential transfer actors at HEIs as well as practitioners, and, thus, tap the full potential of sustainability transfer.


1975 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 299-305 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert F. Adie

In the many volumes written on the “agrarian question” in Mexico, probably no subject has received as much attention as the ejido, village communal land. Whether polemical or objective, most of these works have been concerned with the ejido primarily in economic terms. Questions have been raised about its importance as an economic unit, government action to improve its output, and its reform or even abolition for economic reasons. Related studies have been concerned with the ejido in terms of social justice, that is, the extent to which and the ways in which the ejidatarios, members of the ejido, have benefitted from the revolution. A few studies have been sociological or anthropological in nature, examining the ejido in terms of how it reinforces or breaks down traditional social and cultural patterns. While utilizing the data presented in these various studies, this note is concerned with the political aspect of the ejido or more specifically, how the ejido is a device which, both alone and in conjunction with a subculture of poverty, allows political control to be exercised over a vast peasant population engaged for the most part in primitive agriculture while urban Mexico proceeds with industrialization.In the early 1920s George McCutcheon McBride insisted in his major study of Mexican land tenure patterns that the Indians had to be kept on the land.


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