People’s Perception of Experimental Installations for Sustainable Energy: The Case of IFMIF-DONES

Nuclear facilities are a main milestone in the long way to sustainable energy. Beyond the well-known fission centrals, the necessity of cleaner, more efficient and almost unlimited energy reducing waste to almost zero is a major challenge in the next decades. This is the case with nuclear fusion. Different experimental installations to definitively control this nuclear power are proliferating in different countries. However, citizens in the surroundings of cities and villages where these installations are going to be settled are frequently reluctant because of doubts about the expected benefits and the potential hazards. In this framework, knowing the opinion of people and their perception of experimental fusion facilities is essential for researchers, administrations and rulemaking bodies planning future fusion plants. This is the case for IFMIF-DONES, a neutron irradiation facility to determine the most suitable materials for the future fusion reactors. The construction of this installation is starting in Escúzar (Granada, Spain), and this work presents a large survey among 311 people living or working in the village. Their perception, fears, hopes and other variables are analyzed, and the conclusions for future installations and their impact on the energy policy are presented.

THE COMMUNITY-BASED TOURISM AT THE TOURIST VILLAGE IN THE LOCAL PEOPLE’S PERSPECTIVE

This study aims to analyze the implementation of community-based tourism (CBT) at the tourist village in the local people’s perspective. The data were collected through observation, interview and library research. The key informant was local community who understands implementation of CBT at tourist village, with total 200 respondents. The result shows that the CBT has been well implemented at tourist village. The community perceives that, among the 20 statements mentioned in questionnaire, 2 items show that the local people’s perception is very good and 18 is good, meaning that CBT have economically, socially, culturally, environmentally, and politically contributed to them. The test result of the CFA shows that 5 factors have significantly contributed to the implementation of the CBT at tourist village. The result of each variable shows that 19 variables have contributed significantly, only one has not significantly contributed.

Public perception of autonomous vehicles: a brief review

There is huge speculation that autonomous vehicles (AVs) will improve urban traffic conditions by enhancing mobility, reducing emissions, and bringing safety. However, AV public acceptance represents a key factor to this technology's success. This paper aims to present a brief review of public perceptions of AVs and focuses on how factors such as demographics, safety, ethics, liability, and COVID-19 pandemic can impact this mobility device’s acceptance. Overall, it was found that young and more educated males are more likely to adopt AVs, whereas concerns about safety, ethics, and liability can impact negatively on people’s perception of them.

Mode Shifting Probability of Working People to Angkot: Is there Any Hope for Angkot to Survive in Bandung City?

Bandung is one of Indonesia’s major cities, holding a strategic position as the center of the Bandung Metropolitan Area. The most dominant paratransit with the widest coverage in Bandung City is the angkot, a small four-wheeled vehicle (minibus) that has been modified for use as public transportation. As it stands currently, however, this paratransit service is inadequate and unreliable, and it has pushed people to use private vehicles to support their daily commute, which causes traffic congestion to worsen. Workers are the biggest traffic-generating group in Bandung city. Their regular commute pattern as well as their large proportion in Bandung city’s population (47.78% of the total population in 2020) make this group an important determinant in Bandung City’s transportation. Shifting the workers’ mode of transportation from private to public transportation including the angkot is predicted to decrease traffic jams on some level. Through binary logistic regression, this study provides an analysis of mode shifting probability to the angkot, key factors that could be intervened to increase this shifting probability, as well as the extent to which intervention toward these factors will increase angkot usage so that it can provide a picture of future characteristics of the angkot in contrast to the current condition, should this transportation mode continue to run in the future. Based on the modeling result, the study identified four key variables that significantly influence mode shifting probability in Bandung City: 1) private vehicle ownership, 2) driving license ownership, 3) people’s perception of current transportation costs, and 4) people’s perception of the level of comfort provided by the mode of transportation. If in the future the angkot in Bandung City is improved with better comfort and affordability, approximately only 3.31% of workers will start using the angkot. This very low probability indicates that if in the future the government wants to shift working people from private vehicles to the angkot, then the angkot must be transformed. Abstrak. Bandung merupakan salah satu kota besar di Indonesia yang memiliki posisi strategis sebagai pusat kawasan metropolitan. Paratransit yang paling dominan dengan jangkauan terluas di Kota Bandung adalah angkot, kendaraan roda empat kecil (minibus) yang telah dimodifikasi untuk digunakan sebagai transportasi umum. Namun, layanan paratransit ini tidak memadai dan tidak dapat diandalkan sehingga mendorong orang untuk menggunakan kendaraan pribadi dalam mendukung perjalanan sehari-hari, yang menyebabkan kemacetan lalu lintas semakin parah. Pekerja merupakan kelompok penghasil lalu lintas terbesar di kota Bandung. Pola komuter yang teratur serta proporsi penduduk kota Bandung yang besar (47,78% dari total penduduk pada tahun 2020) menjadikan kelompok ini sebagai determinan penting dalam transportasi Kota Bandung. Pergeseran moda transportasi pekerja dari angkutan pribadi ke angkutan umum termasuk angkot diprediksi dapat mengurangi kemacetan di beberapa tingkatan. Melalui regresi logistik biner, penelitian ini memberikan analisis probabilitas perpindahan moda ke angkot, faktor-faktor kunci yang dapat diintervensi untuk meningkatkan probabilitas perpindahan tersebut, serta sejauh mana intervensi terhadap faktor-faktor tersebut akan meningkatkan penggunaan angkot sehingga dapat memberikan gambaran karakteristik angkot di masa depan yang kontras dengan kondisi saat ini, dalam kasus moda transportasi ini tetap berjalan di masa yang akan datang. Berdasarkan hasil pemodelan, penelitian ini mengidentifikasi empat variabel kunci yang berpengaruh signifikan terhadap probabilitas perpindahan moda di Kota Bandung: 1) kepemilikan kendaraan pribadi, 2) kepemilikan SIM, 3) persepsi masyarakat terhadap biaya transportasi saat ini, dan 4) persepsi masyarakat terhadap tingkat kenyamanan yang diberikan oleh moda transportasi tersebut. Jika kedepannya angkot di Kota Bandung ditingkatkan dengan kenyamanan dan keterjangkauan yang lebih baik, kira-kira hanya 3,31% pekerja yang akan mulai menggunakan angkot. Probabilitas yang sangat rendah ini menunjukkan bahwa jika di masa depan pemerintah ingin memindahkan pekerja dari kendaraan pribadi ke angkot, maka angkot tersebut harus diubah. Kata kunci. Pergeseran moda, angkot, pekerja, logistik biner.

Chinese People’s Perception and Opinion of Feminism

As the global economy moves towards the direction of gender equality, feminist movements have also become more predominant worldwide, including in Chinese society. The purpose of this research is to explore perceptions and opinions about feminism and women empowerment on feminism-related articles posted on Chinese media sites. This qualitative study looks into four articles on feminism-related topics and developed a codebook to analyze the comments of each of the four articles. The findings show that anti-feminists expressed beliefs that women are not a vulnerable group and that women receive more tolerance, assistance, and care in society. Also, according to the analysis of data, anti-feminists show the tendency of overgeneralizing feminism while pro-feminism comments present clarification or de-stigmatization for feminism. However, overall 49.5% of comments were positive, suggesting an overall positive view of feminist issues.

How Civility Matters in Civil Matters: Procedural Justice and Court Legitimacy in the Midst of a Legitimacy Crisis

The procedural justice thesis that quality of treatment matters more than outcomes in people’s perception of institutional legitimacy is supported by a large body of research. But studies also suggest that distributive justice and the effectiveness of authorities are more important in certain legal settings (civil courts) and national contexts (posttransition societies). This study tests these ideas through a survey of 192 civil litigants in Poland, a postcommunist country where the national judiciary has recently been subject to intense political scrutiny. Our findings support the generalizability of procedural justice, and especially voice, but also demonstrate the significance of outcomes and legal cynicism. We also discuss prior court contact, role (plaintiff versus defendants), and representation (presence of counsel) as potential moderators on litigants’ perceptions of court legitimacy.

Communism and Anti-Communist Dissent in Romania as Reflected in Contemporary Textbooks

The structural changes brought about by the collapse of the communist system also included the reconfiguration of social memory, so that future generations have a more objective imagining of the impact of the communist period on the societies from Central and Eastern Europe. In this view, the depoliticization of recent history is a top priority. The present study aims to highlight the way in which the schoolbooks in Romania bring into the memory of the young generation a strictly secret episode in recent (pre-1990) history: anti-communist dissent. Two categories of methods were used: researching the data and information contained in history textbooks and other bibliographic sources on anti-communist dissent in Romania in the overall socio-political context of that era; and assessing—with the help of a set of surveys—the degree of assimilation by young people in Romania of the knowledge about communism conveyed through textbooks. Research points to the conclusion that the Romanian curriculum and textbooks provide an objective picture of the communist period in this country, but young people’s perception of communism in general and of Romanian communism in particular tends to be distorted by poor education, poverty and surrounding mentalities rooted in that period.