‘Participatory consociationalism? No,but South Tyrol's Autonomy Convention is evidence that power‐sharing can transform conflicts’

South Tyrol is an autonomous, predominantly German‐speaking province in Italy, and one of the most successful cases of power‐sharing in the world. Nevertheless, the Province recently conducted a participatory‐democratic process known as the ‘Autonomy Convention’ to debate and draft a proposal for revising the 1972 Autonomy Statute. It is the first such process with the stated intent of amending a power‐sharing arrangement, and our research questions are whether this represents a new type of consociational negotiation, and what made it possible. The answer to the first question is ‘no’, and the Convention is best seen as a ‘participatory‐ish consultation’ which had no formal power. But the problems that it faced, and the fact that it occurred at all, are evidence of consociational democracy's potential to transform conflicts. The Convention, we argue, is the result of ‘normal’, not ‘ethnic’ politics, and two generations of successful power‐sharing made that possible by desecuritising the relationship between South Tyrol's three official linguistic groups.     

The effect of culture on home-ownership

In this paper, we analyze the role of culture in determining whether, or not, an individual is a homeowner. We use data on first-generation immigrants who arrived in the United States under 6 years old. Following the epidemiological approach, any dissimilarity in the proportion of homeowners by country of origin may be interpreted as a consequence of cultural differences. Our estimates indicate that there is a positive and statistically significant relationship between the cultural proxy and the immigrants’ choice of home-ownership. Additionally, we present evidence of different mechanisms of transmission of culture, which reinforces our results on the cultural effect.     

Moralism in theories of secession: a realist perspective

Moral reasoning is the most common approach to secession in political philosophy. Just‐cause, choice and liberal‐cultural theories rely on moral conceptions of political authority. This article examines an alternative view through an exploration of moral theories of secession from a realist perspective. Realism has recently seen a revival as a form of normative political philosophy and focuses on political disagreement and legitimacy rather than rights and moral analysis. I claim that realism would reject utopianism and moralism present in theories of secession. Instead of regarding secession as a right, realism would frame secession as a political option. According to this view, this article explores a realist theory of secession that would be based on the priority of politics and disagreement among other concepts. This would be a middle‐ground theory, compatible with liberal values and existing moral theories.     

The tyranny of transnational discourse: ‘authenticity’ and Irish diasporic identity in Ireland and England

Through the prism of current state discourses in Ireland on engagement with the Irish diaspora, this article examines the empirical merit of the related concepts of ‘diaspora’ and ‘transnationalism’. Drawing on recent research on how Irish identity is articulated and negotiated by Irish people in England, this study suggests a worked distinction between the concepts of ‘diaspora’ and ‘transnationalism’. Two separate discourses of authenticity are compared and contrasted: they rest on a conceptualisation of Irish identity as transnational and diasporic, respectively. I argue that knowledge of contemporary Ireland is constructed as sufficiently important that claims on diasporic Irishness are constrained by the discourse of authentic Irishness as transnational. I discuss how this affects the identity claims of second‐generation Irish people, the relationship between conceptualisations of Irishness as diasporic within Ireland and ‘lived’ diasporic Irish identities, and implications for state discourses of diaspora engagement.     

The representation of Mongolia in contemporary travel writing: imaginative geographies of a travellers' frontier

This article analyses the representation of Mongolia in five works of travel writing published since the fall of the country's communist regime in 1990. It argues that this travel writing is characterized by a discourse that generates and circulates an ‘imaginative geography’ of Mongolia as a ‘travellers' frontier’. Support for this argument is derived from highlighting sets of collective, cohesive representations, performances and speaking positions that crosscut the works studied. It is maintained that these have the effect of naturalizing a very particular conceptualization of Mongolia as a frontier destination in the age of globalization and mass tourism. This research adds to an established body of geographical scholarship on travel writing, but departs from it by considering contemporary works rather than ones from the colonial period. In doing so it attempts to illustrate the relevance of contemporary travel writing as an object of study for geographers seeking to explore the anatomy of today's imaginative geographies, which have clear links to, but are not entirely mediated by, the discourses that characterize colonial travel writing.     

Combining New Awareness and Public Support for Archaeology with In Situ Preservation of an Archaeological Monument

Preserving archaeological remains in situ is one of the main objectives of the Valletta Treaty, which was signed by the Dutch government in 1992. Subsequently, preservation in situ has become one of the pillars of archaeological heritage management in the Netherlands. Another objective of the Treaty is the promotion of heritage education and raising of public awareness for the protection and investigation of archaeological heritage. Until recently, this goal has received too little attention. The design and building of an underground visitor centre, DOMunder, raised an important question: How can we transform an archaeological monument into an asset for the community and at the same time ensure long-lasting preservation? Not many parallels exist, as most archaeological sites in urban environments are seen as a burden for development. Sites are generally either excavated or left in situ; in both cases the archaeology remains invisible and inaccessible to the public. In the case of DOMunder, the location in a wet sedimentary environment provided even more challenges. This paper focuses on a few of the many questions and problems that were raised before and during the building process and the (preliminary) answers and solutions.