Degrees of Engagement: Using Cultural Worldviews to Explain Variations in Public Preferences for Engagement in the Policy Process

Scholars have been studying the concept of public engagement and its role in the policy process for some time. Scholars have argued that understanding the interests and motivations of the public and engaging them in the decision‐making process can lead to better policy designs and, ultimately, better policy outcomes. However, studies of public engagement often assume that people have a desire to get involved in the policy process. This paper tests this key assumption using the case of nuclear facility siting in the United States to ask: what factors influence an individual's stated willingness to want to engage in the policy process? Using data from a national web survey fielded in 2013, we ask the public if and to what extent they would likely engage in the siting process if given the opportunity. Findings indicate that the likelihood of engagement varies rather substantially across individuals. We find that an individual's cultural belief system and existing level of political activity account for some of this variation. These findings suggest that public engagement programs may vary across groups and communities. In other words, the prospects of engagement are likely to appeal to some members of the population and not others.     

Neighbourhood food environments revisited: When food deserts meet food swamps

This study uses service area–based coverage and various count regression methods to assess neighbourhood-level healthy and unhealthy food environments, and food access associated with different socio-economic groups in Edmonton, Canada. We identify three types of vulnerable neighbourhoods according to different food environments: food deserts (i.e., neighbourhoods lack sufficient access to healthy foods); food swamps (i.e., neighbourhoods have excess access to unhealthy foods); and those with overlaps of food swamps and food deserts. We also identify neighbourhoods with superior access to healthy foods (i.e., food oases). Additionally, our results from regression analyses indicate: (1) child population is negatively associated with both healthy and unhealthy food resources; (2) good access to public transportation is associated with good coverage of all healthy food outlets and convenience stores; and (3) deprived neighbourhoods with higher percentages of minority populations have better coverage of both healthy and unhealthy foods in general. The results from this study can help the City of Edmonton identify the key neighbourhoods with high potential for local business and the hotspot neighbourhoods that require particular support. Tailored strategies are proposed to effectively and efficiently improve food environments with limited resources.     

非物质文化遗产的主体与保护主体之解析

非物质文化遗产保护是一项全人类、全社会卷入的公共文化事业,需要各方面主动扮演相应的角色、发挥各自的优势、承担特定的责任。把各个方面建构成积极有为的身份,就成为非遗保护的一项颇有建设价值的理论工作。其中,以"主体"身份看待相关的各个方面,是一项有益的尝试。界定非遗的主体与非遗保护的主体,实际上也是探索建立非遗保护这项公共文化事业的分工合作的身份框架。     

About time: age,period, and cohort effects on support for Quebec sovereignty

Can age, period and cohort effects help explain support for Quebec sovereignty? Previous work on this question has focused mostly on the effects of age and cohort. We contribute to this debate by adding a period perspective. As such, our study is the first to investigate the impact of age, cohort and period effects in a single study of opinion towards sovereignty in Quebec. We take advantage of an original dataset that includes survey data collected between 1985 and 2012. We use these data to examine the impact of age, birth year and survey year on support for this constitutional option among francophone Quebeckers. Our results are in line with previous work: we show that younger Quebeckers are more likely to support sovereignty, and that some cohorts – namely, respondents born between 1945 and 1959 – are also more likely to favour this option. Perhaps more surprisingly, we find that specific events are comparatively the most important factor to explain fluctuations in Quebeckers' attitudes towards sovereignty.     

身份、流动与权力:街头摊贩的空间实践

城市公共空间的意义与秩序,建构于使用者利用空间并遇到相关主体的日常场景中。论文以空间实践为理论视角,搭建涵盖身份、流动、权力的分析框架,发掘开封小吃夜市摊贩的身份属性与流动特征,探寻边界和节奏同权力运作的关联。研究认为：①回族摊贩为夜市赋予民族特性和地方性特色,回族社区是塑造从业身份的引力场;②摊贩通过短距离流动将集体社会文化属性嵌入空间,造就夜市和清真寺的空间邻近关系;③夜市的正规性附着于空间边界,场所的可占据性呈现于时间节奏,反映出权力运作依赖于空间资源的有限性与区位条件的差异性。空间实践能够为解释空间变迁中意义与秩序的形成逻辑提供理论框架,此案例分析可为公共空间的长效治理提供政策启迪。     

Community gardens as third places

As the world population becomes increasingly urbanised and mobile, “third places” take on greater importance for incorporating new residents into their neighbourhood and reducing social isolation. The third place concept has been applied to a range of public space research and embraces informal public meeting places outside of home (first place) and work (second place). This article critically investigates the connection between community gardens and third place, applying a framework based on the characteristics of third places to qualitative case studies of three Australian community gardens. The article highlights the role community gardens can play as third places in alleviating some of the challenges associated with population mobility. The findings show that two of the case study community gardens exhibit all characteristics of third places facilitating informal interactions between people of the neighbourhood while one does not for reasons considered. Findings also suggest that third place community gardens act as dynamic sites of placemaking, helping to connect people to the place. Community gardens can function as third places with a communal purpose inclusive across socially diverse neighbourhoods, within and beyond the garden boundaries. The article suggests appropriate design and location features for community gardens that best facilitate third place interactions.     

Geographies of Swimming Pool Provision: Lessons from Glasgow 1804–2014

Swimming is a popular form of recreation and exercise in the UK and US. Swimming can take place outdoors but, particularly in the UK, largely takes place in designated indoor pools. Existing research tends to focus on ‘public’ or ‘municipal’ pools leaving broader spatial geographies of swimming pool provision under explored. In response to concern about swimming pool closures, this paper draws from extensive archival research into all swimming pools in the City of Glasgow, Scotland, since the first opened in 1804. Formal and informal programmes of pool building and closure were revealed. Rather than decreasing, public provision has remained constant for the last 100?years but become progressively more spread out in relation to the city’s changing size. Broadening exploration beyond the ‘public’ category exposed a vast drop in school pool numbers around the year 2000 due to a Private Finance Initiative project that consolidated the secondary school estate and outsourced school building management. The lessons: researching all types of swimming pool through time greatly enriches understandings of the changing meaning and extent of public service provision.     

Banning the barmaid: time,space and alcohol licensing in 1900s Glasgow

This article examines the decision of Glasgow’s magistrates at the beginning of the twentieth century to prohibit the employment of barmaids in the city's public houses, tracing the origins and advocates of the ban as well its effects on the licensed trade and the women who worked behind bars. It responds to Mariana Valverde’s recent work on the relationship between time and space in the operation of law, analysing the ways in which the magistrates sought to differentiate between licensed premises and practices so as to police the gendered boundaries of urban work and leisure culture. By attending to these vital processes of differentiation, in conclusion, it argues for research in social and cultural geography that explicitly connects the experience and management of the temporality of drinking practices to the production and regulation of licensing’s perhaps more obviously spatial geographies.     

Indigenous Exceptionalism under Fire: Assessing Indigenous Soldiers in Combat with the Australian,Canadian, New Zealand and American Armies during the Second World War

The literature on Indigenous participation in the Second World War from Canada, the United States, Australia and New Zealand has tended to portray Indigenous soldiers as exceptionally able and courageous in battle. While heart-warmingly laudatory and an understandable product of genuine evidentiary challenges in researching this subject, the image constructed is partial and unrealistic. At best it is misleading; at worst it conflates indigeneity and combat proficiency in ways that reinforce racial stereotypes of Indigenous people as ‘natural’ warriors prevalent during the war. This article argues that we discard the exceptionalism enshrouding Indigenous combat performance in favour of a more culturally nuanced approach.     

Nunavik and the Multiple Dimensions of Inuit Governance

ABSTRACT

Over the last five decades, the emergence of a sophisticated and multidimensional set of governance institutions in the predominantly Inuit regions of Canada and the circumpolar north has had a profound impact on the lives of Inuit peoples and the states in which they live. The region of Nunavik in northern Québec has played an important role in the political development of the Canadian and circumpolar Inuit, serving as both an institutional innovator and a key source of leadership at the regional, national, and international levels. Using a multilevel governance framework, this article explores the vertical and horizontal dimensions of Inuit governance in Canada and the circumpolar north. In particular, the article will focus on Nunavik’s contribution to and place in this multidimensional governance structure.