The Greek Neolithic: A new review

The Greek Neolithic, here divided into five phases, is the oldest in Europe. Geographically, it is the closest to the Near East and has thus long been seen as an impoverished derivative of the latter. However, recent research has tended to emphasize the autochthonous nature of Neolithic development in Europe, including Greece. The Greek Neolithic economy, which was based almost entirely on domesticates, and its densely packed, long-lived villages strongly recall the Near East, as do also the early emphasis on fine, decorated, nonculinary pottery and the wealth of figurines. On the other hand, the evolution of stylistic patterns is specifically Greek, although generally related to trends in the Balkans. Originality in the development of the Greek Neolithic is also seen in its latest phase, with apparent decreases, rather than increases, in site density, social differentiation, and, to some extent, long-distance trade. At the same time, however, the dichotomy became much sharper between the rich agricultural plains of northern Greece and the more pastoral(?) regions of the Peloponnese and Cycladic Islands; this presages similar contrasts during the Bronze Age.     

Settlement and social change in central Europe, 3500–1500 BC

The chronology of the period is briefly considered in the light of the dendrochronological results which have appeared in recent years. Patterns of settlement history in different parts of the area are then examined, and it is suggested that in some of them the late fourth millennium was a period of population decline which was not reversed until the Early Bronze Age, 1000 years later. Detailed information about specific local occupation patterns is provided by recent work on the circum-Alpine lake villages. Changes in cultural patterns during the period, especially the appearance of the Corded Ware, are discussed and explanations of them reviewed. It is argued that changing patterns of gender relations were a major feature of the period, linked to processes which eventually led to the development of small-scale chiefdoms. The development of copper and bronze metallurgy and its connection to these processes are discussed.     

Spatial and social mobility

This paper analyzes the relationship between spatial mobility and social mobility. It develops a two‐skill‐type spatial equilibrium model of two regions with location preferences where each region consists of an urban area that is home to workplaces and residences and an exclusively residential suburban area. The paper demonstrates that relative regional social mobility is negatively correlated with segregation and inequality. In the model, segregation, income inequality, and social mobility are driven by differences between urban and residential areas in commuting cost differences between high‐skilled and low‐skilled workers, and also by the magnitude of taste heterogeneity.     

Social sustainability tool for assessing land use planning processes

The aim of this paper was to develop a social sustainability tool to clarify what social sustainability means in land use planning processes. The tool was developed through a robust research process covering a large amount of scientific literature and built environment sustainability assessment tools. To assess how the developed tool works in practice, we used it as a coding system for the assessment of social sustainability in a case study from Finland. The case study includes the master planning process of a medium-sized city and the legal framework guiding it. The theoretical contribution of the paper lies in creating a holistic tool for the assessment of social sustainability in planning processes. This study also provides a strong practical contribution, as it goes beyond theoretical definitions to the pragmatic level by providing exemplary measures to be used in designing and implementing processes. Therefore, this paper is a valuable source for those stakeholders (for example planners, developers and policymakers), who struggle with the issue of the successful implementation of social sustainability practices, and it will help them to benchmark their processes against the themes found in the tool.     

Evolution of knowledge bases in European regions: searching for spatial regularities and links with innovation performance

This paper aims at a greater comprehension of the distribution of differentiated knowledge bases and their association with innovation performance. Drawing on evolutionary economic geography, we applied a combinatorial and dynamic view on knowledge bases. The main contribution is the examination of changes and transformations of knowledge bases over time in particular group of regions in Europe and links with innovation performance. Our study revealed systematic regularities between regions with different innovation performance and their knowledge bases. With decreasing regional innovation performance the volatility of knowledge bases over time increases. Innovation leaders evinced stability over time and the most balanced composition of knowledge bases (compared with Central and Eastern Europe regions). Western European countries and regions exhibit the most balanced structure of knowledge bases. An important complementarity and synergy has been identified in the close relatedness of the symbolic knowledge base to the analytical knowledge base. The highest intensity of SME cooperation takes place in regions with a strong analytical base and in regions with the most balanced mix among all three bases (particularly in the UK, the Netherlands and Belgium. Underperforming in innovation show a balanced mix of synthetic and symbolic knowledge bases.     

International Solidarity in reproductive justice: surrogacy and gender-inclusive polymaternalism

Reproductive justice and gestational surrogacy are often implicitly treated as antonyms. Yet the former represents a theoretic approach that enables the long and racialised history of surrogacy (far from a new or ‘exceptional’ practice) to be appreciated as part of a struggle for ‘radical kinship’ and gender-inclusive polymaternalism. Recasting surrogacy as a dynamic contradiction in itself, full of latent possibilities relevant to early Reproductive Justice militants’ family-abolitionist aims, this article invites scholars in human geography and cognate disciplines to re-think the boundaries of surrogacy politics. As ethnographies of formal gestational workplaces, accounts of gestational workers’ self-organised resistance, and readings of the attendant public media scandals show (taking examples from India, Thailand, and New Jersey), there is no good reason to place these new economies of ‘third-party reproductive assistance’ in a ‘realm apart’ from conversations about social reproduction more generally. Surrogacy, I argue, potentially names a practice of commoning at the same time as it names a new wave of accumulation in which clinicians are capitalising on the contemporary – biogenetic-propertarian, white-supremacist – logic of kinmaking in the Global North. Ongoing experiments in the redistribution of mothering labour (‘othermothering’ in the Black feminist tradition) suggest that ‘another surrogacy is possible’, animated by what Kathi Weeks and the 1970s intervention ‘Wages Against Housework’ conceive as anti-work politics. In making this argument, the article revives the concept ‘gestational labour’ as a means of keeping the process of ‘literal’ reproduction open to transformation.     

European Cohesion Policy impact on development and convergence: a local empirical analysis in Portugal between 2000 and 2014

Substantial European Structural and Investment Funds (ESIF) monies have been directed at regional economic and social development in Portugal in which Portuguese local government plays a vital role. Given the magnitude of funding, an important question turns on the effect of the ESIF on overall local authority performance. This paper focuses on the impact of the ESIF on Portuguese municipality performance and development. In particular, it investigates whether the ESIF improved the performance of Portuguese local government and which factors best explain its effect on municipality development. The analysis considers all 308 Portuguese local authorities for the period 2000–2014. Various policy implications flowing from the empirical results of this analysis are explored.     

Single female tenants in South Delhi – gender,class and morality in a globalizing city

Based on ethnographic data gathered over 12 months of fieldwork with unmarried women living alone or in flat-shares in different middle class South Delhi localities, this article traces the way shifting gendered norms – often epitomized by growing numbers of single women households – are negotiated within class specific and highly localized contexts of the residential neighborhood. Despite growing economic opportunities for middle class and elite women, cultural anxieties surrounding the notion of ‘delayed’ marriage and women living outside of the familial or marital home persist and obstruct attempts at establishing independent households. Single women experience difficulties finding apartments to rent; have to contend with hostile intrusions from neighbors; or feel obliged to self-monitor their behavior within their neighborhoods. As South Delhi’s liberalised urban landscape has become home to an increasingly globalized, consumerist middle class, disciplinary measures such as curfews, regulations over houseguests and increased surveillance simultaneously indicate a middle class recalibrating its gendered social coordinates by proving its commitment to values of female propriety. While popular discourses draw juxtaposed imaginaries of the ‘modern’ and the ‘traditional’ in their depictions of increasing individualism and a loosening of ‘traditional’ role expectations, this article demonstrates the need to consider the different structural conditions and local inflections in which struggles over women’s agency take place. Looking beyond the supposedly universalizing forces of globalized consumer modernity, the residential neighborhood hereby provides a view into the lived experiences of – at times incongruous – mechanisms at play in societies undergoing social change.     

William Scott Owen, 1853–1920: an English-born land agent in mid Wales

William Scott Owen figured prominently in Montgomeryshire history by being deeply involved with the lives of working people and active in local politics. He was an incomer from the south of England and a stalwart of the Anglican faith and the Tory party. He spent the whole of his working life in Montgomeryshire and came to be deeply respected in a part of Britain noted for its Nonconformity and Liberalism. Scott Owen was agent on the Gregynog Estate, which lies in the south east of the county, much of it now belonging to the University of Wales. This study of his life provides a vivid picture of the county in the late Victorian and Edwardian period and discusses why he became so well regarded.