Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Interannual Variability Of Photosynthesis Across Africa And Its Attribution, Christopher A. Williams, Niall P. Hanan, Ian Baker, G. James Collatz, Joseph Berry, A. Scott Denning

Geography

Africa is thought to be a large source of interannual variability in the global carbon cycle, only vaguely attributed to climate fluctuations. This study uses a biophysical model, Simple Biosphere, to examine in detail what specific factors, physiological (acute stress from low soil water, temperature, or low humidity) and biophysical (low vegetation radiation use), are responsible for spatiotemporal patterns of photosynthesis across the African continent during the period 1982-2003. Acute soil water stress emerges as the primary factor driving interannual variability of photosynthesis for most of Africa. Southern savannas and woodlands are a particular hot spot of interannual variability in …

Contention And Ambiguity: Mining And The Possibilities Of Development, Anthony J. Bebbington, Leonith Hinojosa, Denise Bebbington, Maria Luisa Burneo, Ximena Warnaars

Geography

The last decade and a half has witnessed a dramatic growth in mining activity in many developing countries. This article reviews these recent trends and describes the debates and conflicts they have triggered. The authors review evidence regarding debates on the resource curse and the possibility of an extraction-led pathway to development. They then describe the different types of resistance and social mobilization that have greeted mineral expansion at a range of geographical scales, and consider how far these protests have changed the relationships between mining and political economic change. The conclusions address how far such protests might contribute to …

Social Movements And The Dynamics Of Rural Territorial Development In Latin America, Anthony J. Bebbington, Ricardo Abramovay, Manuel Chiriboga

Geography

This special section brings together 4 of the 12 studies conducted within a research program analyzing the relationships among social mobilization, governance, and rural development in contemporary Latin America. The introduction gives an overview of the contemporary significance of social movements for rural development dynamics in the region, and of the principal insights of the section papers and the broader research program of which they were a part. This significance varies as an effect of two distinct and uneven geographies: the geography of social movements themselves and the geography of the rural political economy. The effects that movements have on …

Contention And Ambiguity: Mining And The Possibilities Of Development, Anthony Bebbington, Leonith Hinojosa, Denise Humphreys Bebbington, Maria Luisa Burneo, Ximena Warnaars

Sustainability and Social Justice

The last decade and a half has witnessed a dramatic growth in mining activity in many developing countries. This article reviews these recent trends and describes the debates and conflicts they have triggered. The authors review evidence regarding debates on the resource curse and the possibility of an extraction-led pathway to development. They then describe the different types of resistance and social mobilization that have greeted mineral expansion at a range of geographical scales, and consider how far these protests have changed the relationships between mining and political economic change. The conclusions address how far such protests might contribute to …

Mining And Social Movements: Struggles Over Livelihood And Rural Territorial Development In The Andes, Anthony Bebbington, Denise Humphreys Bebbington, Jeffrey Bury, Jeannet Lingan, Juan Pablo Muñoz, Martin Scurrah

Sustainability and Social Justice

Note: this full-text download is the accepted and/or submitted version of this work.

Social movements have been viewed as vehicles through which the concerns of poor and marginalized groups are given greater visibility within civil society, lauded for being the means to achieve local empowerment and citizen activism, and seen as essential in holding the state to account and constituting a grassroots mechanism for promoting democracy. However, within development studies little attention has been paid to understanding how social movements can affect trajectories of development and rural livelihood in given spaces, and how these effects are related to movements' internal …

Inaugural Conference Of The Mosakowski Institute For Public Enterprise- Program, Jim Gomes

Mosakowski Institute for Public Enterprise

Program for University Research and the American Agenda: Discovering Knowledge, Enabling Leadership. The Inaugural Conference of the Mosakowski Institute for Public Enterprise.

American Challenges, Jim Gomes

Mosakowski Institute for Public Enterprise

In the autumn of 2008, with the United States facing myriad problems both foreign and domestic and entering the final stage of a historic election, The Boston Globe asked Mosakowski Institute Director Jim Gomes to write a series of op-ed pieces about critical issues on the nation’s agenda. The result is the six columns collected here in American Challenges. “When I wrote these pieces,” said Gomes, “the country had entered a period of great uncertainty. So much of what had been taken as a given in the last half of the 20th century, from broadly shared prosperity to the health …

Water And Mining Conflicts In Peru, Anthony J. Bebbington, Mark Williams

Geography

Impacts on water quality and quantity are among the most contentious aspects of mining projects. Companies insist that the use of modern technologies will ensure environmentally friendly mining practices. However, evidence of the negative environmental impacts of past mining activity causes local and downstream populations to worry that new mining activities will adversely affect their water supply. We report on one mine site in Peru where water has become a: particularly conflictive issue. We then provide a detailed proposal for a monitoring plan to recover trust among stakeholders. A welldesigned and executed monitoring plan for water quantity and quality is …

Genetic Engineering In Agriculture: New Approaches For Risk Management Through Sustainability Reporting, Philip J. Vergragt, Halina Szejnwald Brown

Sustainability and Social Justice

Genetically modified crops and foodstuff have been highly controversial for environmental, health, and ethical reasons. The controversies have been worldwide, but most prominent in the European Union, for reasons that include distrust of the regulatory authorities, scientists and technocratic decision making. An informal moratorium in the EU came recently to an end, without solving the underlying problems. In response to the criticisms, the European governments have attempted to improve the risk assessment methods and their scientific basis, and to tailor public policies to the growing demand for transparency, accountability, and public participation. This paper proposes a novel approach to including …

Abundance Of Immature Anopheles And Culicines (Diptera: Culicidae) In Different Water Body Types In The Urban Environment Of Malindi, Kenya, Daniel E. Impoinvil, Joseph Keating, Charles M. Mbogo, Matthew D. Potts, Rinku Roy Chowdhury, John C. Beier

Geography

In this study we 1) describe the abundance of Anopheles and culicine immatures in different water body types in urban Malindi, Kenya, 2) compare Anopheles immature density in relation to culicine immature density, and 3) identify characteristics that influence the likelihood of water bodies being co-colonized by Anopheles and culicines. Entomological and environmental cross-sectional surveys conducted in 2001 and 2002 were used in the analysis. A total of 889 Anopheles and 7,217 culicine immatures were found in diverse water body types in 2001 and 2002. Car-track pools (n=45) and unused swimming pools (n=25) comprised 61% (70 of 115) of all …

Components Of Information For Multiple Resolution Comparison Between Maps That Share A Real Variable, Robert Gilmore Pontius, Olufunmilayo Thontteh, Hao Chen

Geography

This paper presents quantitative methods that allow scientists to compare the patterns in two maps that show a shared real variable. Specifically, this paper shows how to budget various components of agreement and disagreement between maps. The components are based on the separation of a map's information of quantity from its information of location. The technique also examines how variation in resolution influences the measurement of the components of information. The manner in which the measurements change as a function of spatial resolution can be more important and interesting than the results at any single particular resolution, because the results …

Habitat Selection By A Rare Forest Antelope: A Multi-Scale Approach Combining Field Data And Imagery From Three Sensors, Lyndon Estes, G. S. Okin, A. G. Mwangi, H. H. Shugart

Geography

It can be difficult to further scientific understanding of rare or endangered species that live in inaccessible habitat using traditional methods, such as probabilistic modeling based on field data collection. Remote sensing (RS) can be an important source of information for the study of these animals. A key advantage of RS is its ability to provide information over an animal's complete range, but models incorporating RS data are limited by RS's ability to detect important habitat features. In this study, we focus on the rare, poorly-understood mountain bongo antelope (Tragelaphus euryceros isaaci) which survives in the wild in isolated pockets …

Modeling Data Envelopment Analysis (Dea) Efficient Location/Allocation Decisions, Ronald K. Klimberg, Samuel J. Ratick

Sustainability and Social Justice

Many types of facility location/allocation models have been developed to find optimal spatial patterns with respect to various location criteria that include cost, time, coverage, and access among others. In this paper we develop and test location modeling formulations that utilize data envelopment analysis (DEA) efficiency measures to find optimal and efficient facility location/allocation patterns. We believe that solving for the DEA efficiency measure, simultaneously with other location modeling objectives, provides a promising rich approach to multiobjective location problems. © 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Asia Comes To Main Street And May Learn To Speak Spanish: Globalization In A Poor Neighborhood In Worcester, Robert J.S. Ross, Kate Driscoll Derickson

Local Knowledge: Worcester Area Community-Based Research

This paper considers how and why an Asian enclave of small businesses has appeared in a poor neighborhood characterized by Puerto Rican and other Latino immigration in the post-industrial city of Worcester, Massachusetts. We begin by examining the role of the US in the world system, and argue that the US hegemonic role and specific political economic aspects of global capitalism (ie. deindustrialization) account for some of the migration stream. Next, using socioeconomic and historical data, interviews, and observations, we outline the history of Worcester’s economy and immigration patterns. We demonstrate that the increasing economic inequality leaves few promising employment …

Mapping Selective Logging In Mixed Deciduous Forest: A Comparison Of Machine Learning Algorithms, Christopher D. Lippitt, John Rogan, Zhe Li, J. Ronald Eastman, Trevor G. Jones

Geography

This study assesses the performance of five Machine Learning Algorithms (MLAS) in a chronically modified mixed deciduous forest in Massachusetts (USA) in terms of their ability to detect selective timber logging and to cope with deficient reference datasets. Multitemporal Landsat Enhanced Thematic Mapper-plus (ETM+) imagery is used to assess the performance of three Anificial Neural Networks - Multi-Layer Perceptron, ARTMAP, Self-Organizing Map, and two Classification Tree splitting algorithms: gini and entropy rules, MLA performance evaluations are based on susceptibility to reduced training set size, noise, and variations in the training set, as well as the operability/transparency of the classification process. …

Response Of Carbon Fluxes To Water Relations In A Savanna Ecosystem In South Africa, W. L. Kutsch, N. Hanan, B. Scholes, I. Mchugh, W. Kubheka, H. Eckhardt, Christopher A. Williams

Geography

The principal mechanisms that connect carbon fluxes with water relations in savanna ecosystems were studied by using eddy covariance method in a savanna ecosystem at Kruger National Park, South Africa. Since the annual drought and rewetting cycle is a major factor influencing the function of savanna ecosystems, this work focused on the close inter-connection between water relations and carbon fluxes. Data from a nine-month measuring campaign lasting from the early wet season to the late dry season were used.

Total ecosystem respiration showed highest values at the onset of the growing season, a slightly lower plateau during the main part …