A Risk Assessment for Cultural Heritage in Southern Iraq: Framing Drivers,Threats and Actions Affecting Archaeological Sites

ABSTRACT

This paper proposes a classification of the risks threatening archaeological sites in southern Iraq and suggests some possible remediation to better preserve them. This has been possible thanks to a research methodology that combines remote sensing and ground control on a sample of 558 sites documented by the Iraqi-Italian QADIS survey project. A three-tier typological framework has been created illustrating the risks jeopardising the cultural heritage of the region. This research showed that the most impacting risks are the ones caused by agricultural activity, despite current narratives which mainly focus on looting and violent destruction. To get at the root of the problem, current laws protecting cultural heritage in Iraq are analysed, as well as how the cultural authorities are organised on the ground. Improving the organisation of the SBAH, engaging the local communities towards the issue of sites’ protection and introducing preventive archaeology are among the solutions proposed.     

我国发展会展旅游业的前景及策略初探

本文对世界(包括我国)会展旅游业的发展情况作了简要的概括和总结,认为会展旅游是一个蕴涵巨大价值的高产出的旅游项目,但目前在我国还没有真正引起足够的重视。但会展旅游业在我国有着光明的发展前景,应当予以大力发展。并揭示了我国会展旅游业发展中所存在的一些最突出的问题,同时指出我国发展会展旅游业应采取的策略。     

旅游地农户生计资本与社区可持续生计发展研究——以秦巴山区安康一区三县为例

在DFID可持续生计框架下,构建旅游地农户生计资本评价模型,测度其生计资本规模及结构变化,并分析乡村旅游社区发展对农户生计资本变化趋向的影响。研究发现：①秦巴山区乡村旅游地农户生计资本得到整体提升,农户生计呈现多元化发展趋势;②乡村旅游影响下的农户金融资本、物资资本、自然资本和人力资本均得到提升,社会资本则处于相对较低水平;通过二元Logistic回归分析,发现社区居民的旅游获利程度、社区参与旅游发展程度、社区旅游发展基础条件等对农户资本趋向好转与优化具有正向显著影响。     

跨地区生计视角下流动人口在流出地住房投资行为的时空特征

基于流动人口流入地福建省的问卷调查数据与流出地河南、安徽两省的调研资料,采用生存分析方法、空间可视化与质性研究方法,探讨流动人口在流出地住房投资行为的时空特征和规律。研究发现：流动人口在流出地村庄内建房或在县城（镇）内购房是一较为普遍的现象,建房率明显大于购房率,且存在较为明显的住房闲置现象;在时间特征上,2005年以前的住房投资行为较少,而2005年以来渐多,购房比建房需经历更长的时间跨度,特定时期内的住房政策能推动流出地的住房投资行为;在空间特征上,流出地的住房投资行为存在区位优化选择倾向,且建房的跨地区生计走廊数量多于购房。最后,基于上述的研究结论,提出相关政策启示。     

How real estate became ‘just another asset class’: the financialization of the investment strategies of Dutch institutional investors

The managers of a growing wall of money are continuously searching for investment opportunities. The financialization literature describes how this mobile capital puts pressure on commodities, debt, public services and economic activities to transform into investable, tradable, financial products. Regarding real estate, these investigations show how opaque, local, non-standardized goods, highly depending on both local legislation and developments, have been transformed into liquid, globally traded financial assets. By analysing the real estate investment strategies of Dutch institutional investors since the 1980s, this paper shows how a quantitative framework increasingly provides the basis for institutional investors’ real estate investment strategies. Direct ownership of properties has been exchanged into shares of properties, that is, fictitious capital, creating an impetus for ‘objectified numbers’ to measure the performance of these indirect investments. As knowledge about real estate has been outsourced, Dutch institutional investors now perceive real estate increasingly as ‘just another asset class’, thereby increasing leverage and volatility. This paper not only shows how finance ‘financialized’ itself by adopting a quantitative investment perspective, but it also offers an empirical account on how investment properties are transformed into financial assets that put pressure on state agencies to mobilize urban planning to deliver more of such assets.     

Hunter–gatherer dispersals in the mammoth-steppe: technological provisioning and land-use in the Enisei River valley,south-central Siberia

Late Pleistocene Siberia was characterized by a unique mammoth-steppe biome. Two prevailing hypotheses exist to explain modern human dispersals in the Siberian mammoth-steppe. Upper Paleolithic human populations were either maintained continuously throughout the late Pleistocene or the peopling of this region resulted from multiple dispersal events. Past attempts at explaining the colonization process have resulted in culture-historical interpretations. This article uses lithic technological data from middle and late Upper Paleolithic sites in the Enisei River valley of south-central Siberia to explain human dispersals from a behavioral perspective. Technological provisioning and land-use strategies are reconstructed to help explain dispersal processes. Results of the study demonstrate that hunter–gatherers were using different adaptive strategies before and after the Last Glacial Maximum, indicating that multiple dispersal events shaped the peopling of Siberia.     

Explaining Shell-Tempered Pottery in Prehistoric Eastern North America

Explanations for the rise in frequency of shell-tempered pottery in the Eastern United States have vacillated between historical and functional accounts. Using evolutionary theory, the historical records of first appearance and diffusion are woven with physical properties of shell-tempered pottery that may have led to its selection. An appreciation of the scale at which change occurs and the units of analysis most appropriate for understanding that change is necessary for an explanation that can account for the widespread use of shell-tempering and the more-or-less coincident rise in its frequency. A hypothesis with empirical consequences is offered as a starting point for understanding this phenomenon.     

世界范围内的环境保护主义:在市民运动和政府决策之间

本文通过概述西方环境保护主义在市民与政府之间的发展历程,认识到环境保护主义在不同的时代有不同的讨论议题与内容,而不同的人群对于谁才是环境保护主义者的精英分子也有不同的看法。1970年前后是环境保护主义的转折点,从那时起,环境保护主义关注的议题由单一的要素转向一个综合的网络,并形成了全球范围的广泛联系,在大众运动和广泛的社会关注之下,环境保护主义的政治力量越来越多地显示出来。     

Urban impoverishment and multiple modes of livelihood in Ghana

Many African countries experienced economic crisis in the 1970s and are currently restructuring their economies under the tutelage of the World Bank and the IMF. The restructuring process has had pervasive effects on the livelihood strategies of many people, as their established means of income generation have been disrupted. While survival of the urban poor has been studied, little is known of strategies of other social groups. Using Ghana as a case study, I argue that although urban poverty predates the implementation of structural adjustment program (SAP), the policies have created a favorable environment for the intensification of multiple livelihood strategies among of salaried employees. The paper finds that multiple livelihood strategies are practiced by a large number of salaried employees, but their involvement depends on many factors, including individual, family and household characteristics; access to capital and resources; opportunities offered by the urban economy; and the nature of formal employment.