COVID-19 is expanding global consciousness and the sustainability of travel and tourism

Abstract

The sustainable development model has largely failed to address the social and environmental challenges of the 21^st century. True sustainability will only occur when it is valued as a part of the taken-for-granted daily life of individuals and cultures across the globe. This has not yet happened because humanity has not evolved a global consciousness quickly enough to match the global advances in telecommunications and transportation technologies that have created a socially and economically ever-shrinking planet. Travel and tourism contributes to the expansion of global consciousness, although only in a haphazard and unintentional manner. The COVID-19 pandemic is a result of planetary time-space compression and is forcing an expansion in human consciousness that will make humankind better able to address global problems. There will still be considerable diversity on the planet, as now, but the pandemic will stimulate growing numbers of people, businesses and governments to adopt new ways of thinking, behaving and operating that are more closely aligned with the goals of sustainable development. This could be further enhanced if travel and tourism were to adopt the expansion and awakening of global conscious as a fundamental and transformational value in the products and experiences that it offers.     

Nationalising indigenous peoples,legalising indigenous lands: a (post)colonial critique of the land demarcation process in Brazil by the analysis of the Guarani-Mbyá case

The Brazilian 1988 constitution recognises indigenous peoples as ‘first and natural owners of Brazilians land’ and the 231st Article ensures their right to special territories where they could live their culture and traditions without colonising presence. The authentication of these territories, however, requires Public Power promotion, which lies on colonising, juridical accounts and depends on anthropological, scientifically historical research. Our argument here is that the bureaucratisation of the land demarcation process is only possible within a context of epistemological advantage of science, i.e. modernity, which ignores indigenous territory and time conceptions. We will also argue that this bureaucratisation has been contributing to the (neo)colonisation of the territory by retarding the recognition and protection of indigenous rights.     

Executives, Legislatures, and Decentralization

This article considers the role of executives and legislatures in authoring decentralizing legislation to study the type of decentralization each sought to achieve. I find that differences across branches are more significant than differences across political parties. The executive played a significant role in the process of decentralization emphasizing administrative forms of decentralization. Congressional efforts to write laws, on the contrary, focused on the political aspects. Thus, the involvement of both branches in policymaking contributed to the multidimensional form and high degree of decentralization in Colombia.     

A new Palaeolithic discovery: tar-hafted stone tools in a European Mid-Pleistocene bone-bearing bed

Two stone flakes partly covered in birch-bark-tar and a third without tar on it were discovered in fluvial gravel and clay in central Italy, in association with the bones of a young adult female Elephas (Palaeoloxondon) antiquus and several micromammals. The probable chronology of the stone flakes is compatible with the late Middle Pleistocene suggested by the site's small mammals and geological context. The fauna indicates a cool stadial episode before isotope stage 6. That age means the flakes are the oldest ever found hafted with tar and indicate a greater capacity for late Middle Pleistocene hominins to utilize raw materials available during cold phases.     

No Permission to Cross: Cypriot women's dialogue across the divide

Much scholarly attention has been given to the study of the gendered aspect of ethno-national conflicts trying to understand the experiences of men and women in a conflict situation and to what extent these shape different types of intervention for peacemaking and peace-building. Are women's experiences of conflict different from men's? Do women have a different voice than the mainstream dominant discourses produced by patriarchal systems? Do women in conflict societies respond to militarism and the violation of human rights differently from men? Are women's needs for identity and peace different depending on which ethnic–religious group they belong to? Are their needs different from those of men? This article will try to answer the above questions focusing on a feminist understanding of conflict in Cyprus. The main contention put forward in the article is that gender is an important factor to take into account when conflict societies are engaging in peace processes. To this end, data are analysed from different inter-ethnic women's workshops in which the author was either a participant–observer, or a facilitator. This analysis of the data demonstrates that Greek and Turkish Cypriot women's voices and experiences are diverse and multiple. Both men and women are socialised in the same nationalist paradigms, a fact that can explain how in the initial phases of the dialogue processes both groups of women tended to reproduce official discourses. Their own experiences and differentiated voices began to emerge only after a gendered understanding of the conflict was introduced and trust and conflict resolution skills were instituted in the dialogue process. Drawing attention to the gradual shift of perspectives in the context of inter-ethnic workshops, the article concludes by arguing that women's dialogue can challenge the omnipotence of the state and may open up a new space whereby a diversity of perspectives and mutual trust can emerge.

Flying Away to the Other Side

Our birthplace is split in two and we

Are caught on barbed wire-hybrids

Turk and Greek alike