Postcolonial criticism in one world archaeology: Where is North Africa's place?

áfrica del Norte hace tiempo ha sido considerada una extensión de Europa del sur. Cuando fue claro que los arqueólogos de áfrica del Norte siguieron la dinámica no-europea, ellos fueron excluidos de los actuales debates y recientes rese?as. Este trabajo ofrece una crítica postcolonial derivada de muchos a?os de trabajo en el campo en dos países árabes africanos: Libia y Sudan. Yo comienzo analizando el papel de tema/objeto del arqueólogo, que conlleva hacia una vista engendrada del presente. Después, yo discuto la perspectiva del arqueólogo sobre el desarrollo económico y explotación de recursos. Finalmente, yo sugiero reposicionar al áfrica del Norte en el actual debate arqueológico, igual que en relación a los actuales eventos políticos y sociales.

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Résumé L'Afrique du Nord a longtemps été considérée comme une extension de l'Europe du Sud. Quand il est devenu évident que les archéologues nord africains suivaient une dynamique non-européenne, ceux-ci ont été exclus des débats courants et des révisions. Ce papier offre une critique postcoloniale consécutive à de nombreuses années de travaux passées sur le terrain dans deux pays arabes d'Afrique du Nord: la Libye et le Soudan. Je commence par déconstruire les r?les sujet/objet de l'archéologue, qui mènent à une vision orientée du passé. Puis, j' examine la perspective des archéologues quant au développement économique et l'exploitation des ressources. Enfin, je suggère de replacer l'Afrique du Nord dans le débat archéologique courant, et de la mettre en relation avec les évènements sociaux et politiques en cours.

     

Interacting agents, spatial externalities and the evolution of residential land use patterns

We develop a model of land use conversion that incorporateslocal spillover effects among spatially distributed agents.The model is used to test the hypothesis that fragmented patternsof development in rural-urban fringe areas could be due to negativeexternalities that create a ‘repelling’ effect amongresidential land parcels. Identification of the hypothesizedinteraction effect is complicated by unobserved, spatially correlatedheterogeneity. Using an identification strategy that boundsthe interaction effect from above, we find empirical evidencethat is consistent with a theory of negative interactions amongrecently developed residential subdivisions in exurban Maryland.The result offers an alternative explanation for low densitysprawl to that which is frequently posited in the economicsliterature and one with potentially quite different efficiencyimplications.     

Who goes there? Science, fiction, and belonging in Antarctica

The implications of the ATS regime on Antarctica have been profound, both structuring the possibilities for states to engage Antarctica, while limiting those very engagements to those directly related to science. State-run science has in many ways solved the problem of Antarctica's resistance to capital development and provided a safe course for national rivalry. Yet science has not always been seen as the sole convener of Antarctic activity. Tracing three versions of a story of resistance to an alien invasion of the pole – John Campbell's ‘Who Goes There?’ (1935), and its two filmic remakes, Christian Nyby's The Thing From Another World (1951) and John Carpenter's The Thing (1981), in relation to Richard E. Byrd's Antarctic exploration career, this essay considers US strategies for incorporating Antarctic territory into national and global imaginaries.     

Transnational abductions and transnational responsibilities? The politics of ‘protecting’ female Muslim refugees abducted from Spain

This article examines evolving gendered protection narratives surrounding four ‘abduction’ cases in which Sahrawi refugee girls and young women living in Spain were ‘abducted’ by their birth-families and forcibly returned to the Algerian-based Sahrawi refugee camps between 2002 and 2009. By exploring Spanish state and civil society responses to these girls' ‘abductions’, I argue that there has been a major shift in the ways in which legitimate responsibility and authority over Sahrawi refugee women as Muslim female forced migrants have been conceptualised and invoked by Spanish actors. I therefore assess the gendered nature of competing claims of responsibility to ‘protect’ Sahrawi refugee women both within and outside of the Algerian-based Sahrawi refugee camps, exploring the motivations and implications of different actors' in/actions towards these girls and women. With Polisario claiming to represent and act as a liberal ‘state’ committed to protecting the rights of its ‘refugee-citizens’ in some instances, while denying politico-legal responsibility in others, the question of ‘who’ or ‘what’ claims the legitimate authority to ‘protect’ Sahrawi refugee women and girls is thus accentuated by such cases. By exploring shifts in Spanish public and political discourses of responsibility over the past decade on the one hand, and the accentuation of competing discourses as presented by Spanish, Polisario and Algerian actors on the other, this article highlights the complex nature and implications of the ‘intimate’ Spanish civil society networks that ensure the physical and political survival of the Sahrawi refugee camps. Ultimately, I argue that Sahrawi girls and women have become hypervisible in Spain, being conceptualised as women who ‘belong’ to the Spanish nation that in turn has a responsibility to ‘protect’ ‘our’ Sahrawi women from ‘their’ culture.     

Absolute chronology of fluvial events in the Upper Dnieper River system and its palaeogeographic implications

A set of 121 radiocarbon and OSL dates has been compiled from the Upper Dnieper River and tributary valleys, Western European Russia. Each date was attributed according to geomorphic/sedimentological events and classes of fluvial activity. Summed probability density functions for each class were used to establish phases of increasing and reducing fluvial activity. The oldest detected reduction of fluvial activity was probably due to glacial damming at LGM. Within the Holocene three palaeohydrological epochs of millennial-scale were found: (1) high activity at 12,000–8,000 cal BP marked by large river palaeochannels; (2) low activity at 8,000–3,000 cal BP marked by formation of zonal-type soils on -floodplains; short episodes of high floods occurred between 6,500—4,400 cal BP; (3) contrasting hydrological oscillations since 3,000 cal BP with periods of high floods between 3,000–2,300 (2,000) and 900–100 cal BP separated by long interval of low floods 2,300 (2,000)-900 cal BP when floodplains were not inundated — zonal-type soils were developing and permanent settlements existed on floodplains. In the last millennium, four centennial-scale intervals were found: high flooding intervals are mid-11–mid-15^th century and mid-17–mid-20^th century. Intervals of flood activity similar to the present-day were: mid-15–mid-17^th century and since mid-19^th century till present. In the context of palaeohydrological changes, discussed are selected palaeogeographic issues such as: position of the glacial boundary at LGM, role of changing amounts of river runoff in the Black Sea level changes, floodplain occupation by Early Medieval population.     

Neanderthal Shell Tool Production: Evidence from Middle Palaeolithic Italy and Greece

The vast majority of tools recovered from Palaeolithic sites are made of stone varieties. Only rarely do non-lithic implements come to light, let alone tools produced on marine mollusc shell. Interestingly, a good number of shell implements made on Callista chione and Glycymeris sp. valves have been reported from 13 Middle Palaeolithic (Mousterian) sites in southern peninsular Europe. Of these, more than 300 specimens display evidence of deliberate edge retouch. They are all considered products of Neanderthals and date from ~110?ka BP to perhaps ~50?ka BP. In this paper, we review the evidence for Mousterian shell tool production in Italy and Greece??the only two countries in which such tools have been securely identified??and present experimental results obtained in the effort to understand the production process and typo-functional role(s) of the artefacts. We examine the general provisioning pattern of raw materials, as well as the typological, species-related and chronological data pertinent to the production of shell tools by Neanderthals. The data suggest that the Mousterian shell scrapers are a response to poor availability of lithic raw material in the areas of occurrence, and may be best described as an extension of chipped stone technologies to specific types of marine shell, their form defined by an existing mental template. As such, they constitute evidence for refined adaptation strategies and advanced provisioning of resources amongst Neanderthals, and may lend further support to the idea that these hominids displayed a degree of complex behaviour.     

Industry Influence in Stakeholder‐Driven State Climate Change Planning Efforts

Drawing from the literature on public participation and stakeholder collaboratives, this article investigates the influence of power and wealth, as well as political and economic context on the output of stakeholders advisory committees convened to formulate state greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation policies. Using small sample regression techniques, we analyze the outputs of stakeholder groups in 18 states that have completed Climate Action Plans to reduce GHGs. We find that an increase of 1 percent in the number of energy industry representatives that participate in Climate Action Councils significantly predicts a 4 percent reduction of GHG mitigation targets for the energy sector. More surprisingly, the results also show that where the utilities represent a larger share of the state economy, the Climate Action Plans identify more aggressive GHG reduction goals for the energy sector. We also find that the political orientation of the executive of the state is not correlated with GHG mitigation requirements for the energy sector, suggesting that GHG mitigation is less partisan at the state level than in Washington, DC. We find no evidence that state wealth is associated with GHG mitigation requirements. Finally, we suggest additional research needed to clarify the role of stakeholder participation processes in the evolving arena of climate change policy.     

Women’s representation and participation in UNESCO heritage discourse

ABSTRACT

Gender equality represents one of the most challenging objectives in contemporary society and has become a priority for UNESCO (Medium-Term Strategy 2008–2013 and 2014–2021), as it is considered ‘an essential part of the equation for more inclusive and sustainable development’. However, in various World Heritage sites, women are still being marginalised from decisional processes concerning the identification and interpretation of the past and they are often underrepresented in the main narratives. Using the case study of the World Heritage Vineyard Landscape of Langhe-Roero and Monferrato (Italy), I explore how international and national documents frame gender equality in order to uncover underground power dynamics that risk undermining cultural representation and participation. Through the analysis of the interviews done with a group of local female wine producers, I compare heritage discourses with the perception women have of their contribution in the identity and heritage-building process. If dominant heritage discourses are characterised by a rather male-driven set of values, could lack of women’s representation influence the activation of their participation? Are women willing to participate in the management of a heritage which has not been recognised through their values and meanings? What kind of participation would they desire?     

The novel spaces and power-geometries in tourism and hospitality after 2020 will belong to the ‘local’

Abstract

The global crisis we have experienced due to the COVID-19 pandemic emergency challenges our perception of the global and local context in which we live, travel, and work. This crisis has spread novel uncertainties and fears about the future of our world, but at the same time, it has also set the ground to rethink the future scenario of tourism and hospitality to bring about a potentially positive transformation after 2020. Such a scenario can be understood in light of the work of Doreen Massey and the pivotal theorisations on ‘space’ and ‘power-geometry’ she presented in her book For Space (2005). Massey conceives space as the product of multiple relations, networks, connections, as the dimension of multiplicity, the result of an ongoing making process, and in a mutually constitutive relationship with power. Interweaving Massey’s theorisations with a critical examination of the neoliberal capitalism approach to the conceptualization of space, the COVID-19 global crisis prompts us to rethink the space inside and outside of tourism and hospitality by re-focusing on the local dimension of our space as the only guarantee of our own wellbeing, safety, and security. While the global dimension seems more broken than ever, the urgency of belonging to the local is more and more evident. Hence, we propose a critical reflection on the implications of such a scenario in the space of tourism and hospitality, foreseeing a potentially positive transformation in terms of activation of local relations, networks, connections, and multiplicities able to open up such space to multiple novel functions designed not just for tourists and travelers but also for citizens.     

Breaking the CMEA hold: Romania in search of a ‘strategy’ towards the European Economic Community, 1958–1974

ABSTRACT

This article analyses Cold War Romania’s conceptualization of its relations with the European Economic Community (EEC) and its struggle to influence the policy of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA) towards the EEC in a way compatible with Bucharest’s interests. Addressing a significant historiographical gap, in a sense, this study investigates the origins of Romania–EU relations. Multi-archival in approach, it argues that the period between 1969 and 1974 represents the formative years of Romania–EEC relations. Exploring the political rationale behind Romania’s attitude towards the Common Market, the article finds that the country’s ‘strategy’ in this respect had three main characteristics: it was pragmatic, active and, to some point, adaptive; drawing heavily from Romania’s previous position, it took shape in the early 1970s; and, although it seemed to focus on the commercial aspects of relations, it reflected a far more complex interaction between the two political and social systems than previously acknowledged.