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Homecoming: Culinary Memories and Journeys through Kuching, Sarawak
Get PDFThis article details the author’s journey through her hometown of Kuching, Sarawak, and the multisensorial experience of revisiting familial homes and key culinary heritage sites around the city. The everyday and the mundane are highlighted as key features which hold together the rich mosaic of the culinary traditions and history of Kuching. Kuching has recently been recognised as a UNESCO Creative City of Gastronomy, which acknowledges its unique blend of historical and contemporary culinary practices. This article examines what this means for a city where hawker food culture is the lifeblood of Kuching, but also where a burgeoning gastronomic scene is increasingly drawing attention on the international stage. It argues for a revaluation of the traditional binaries between local food vendors (hawkers) and professional chefs, suggesting that both contribute to the city’s culinary landscape. This approach will help form a comprehensive and inclusive understanding of Kuching as a UNESCO Creative City. It will also guide future efforts to establish sustainable and locally based food supply chains in the city
Partnering with older adults for digital research tool development: Demystifying an engaged research process
Get PDFThe inadequacy of traditional research methods, underscored by the COVID-19 pandemic, highlighted the urgent need for innovative approaches, particularly to research involving older adults. This article reflects on the complexities of establishing and sustaining research partnerships with older adults for digital research tool testing and development. The article offers an explicit report of the outreach process for holding researchers accountable and demystifying the research process
Transcending Boundaries: Bangtan Sonyeondan (BTS) as a Transnational Icon of Cosmopolitanism
No full textCosmopolitanism studies regained popularity in the 1990s. Case studies on individuals are finally emerging, mainly on celebrities, but they are still dominated by Western actors and limited to charitable movements for the poor and the ill. To fill this gap, we bring the South Korean music group Bangtan Sonyeondan (BTS) into the discourse. The research questions are, in what respects does BTS represent a cosmopolitan outlook? What kind of behaviours and actions do they demonstrate? How do their behaviours and actions influence others? We adopt cosmopolitanism and the transnational actor concept to answer these questions. We use a descriptive-qualitative approach through the use of primary and secondary sources. As a result, we found that anti-racism and anti-discrimination are the two main issues that represent BTS’ cosmopolitan views. Their practices are reflected in their daily conversations, music, donations, and advocacy. They spread their influence to large-scale fans through various media
Climate Change, Identity Conflicts and the Politics of Cosmopolitanism in Nigeria
Get PDFThis article analyses how identity-based conflicts in Nigeria and national policy solutions to these conflicts affect the goals of cosmopolitanism. Cosmopolitanism refers to the idea of an individual defined as a citizen of a single global community. Marxist political economy theory guided the analysis. The article provides insights into the dynamics of indigene-settlers’ claims and contentions, and their causal linkages to climate change and herder-farmer conflicts, and argues that the politicisation of the conflict has implicated national policy solutions in such a way that they result in the devaluation of Nigerian citizenship and discriminatory tendencies that weaken solidarity between ethnic groups. Yet, building stronger ties amongst citizens and groups is a prerequisite for effective collective action against threats posed by climate change. The article concludes that climate solutions and policy responses to identity conflicts must be reconceptualised to re-enter the ideals of cosmopolitanism while recognising indigenous rights and identities
Introducing ‘New Cosmopolitanisms’
Get PDFIn May 2023, the editorial board of Cosmopolitan Civil Societies hosted an online conference on ‘New Conceptualisations of Cosmopolitanism’. Discussions were rich and varied, across two days and several panels. The event was an experiment for the journal. This Special Issue is the result. There are ten papers in this Special Issue, falling into three broad fields of debate: four on themes of cosmopolitics, ethnonationalism and the national state; three on aspects of work, gender and cosmopolitan identification; and three on issues of climate action, land use and environmentalism. The editorial introduction seeks to summarise papers and draw out some common themes for wider debate
Digital Construction led Growth Asymmetries in Europe: The need for Collaborative Culture
Get PDFThis study delves into the exploration of asymmetries in the field of Digital Economics (DE) and specifically, within the digital construction sector, unraveling intricate relationships that guide its evolutionary journey. To unveil the complex relationship between GDP growth rates and Digital Construction (DC) we leverage the Digital Economy and Society Index (DESI), employing a panel dataset encompassing 27 European Union (EU) countries over the period 2017-2022. As a foundational tool for our empirical analysis, we perform Quantile via Moments regression, thus introducing this novel methodology to digital construction research. The findings reveal a consistent and statistically significant positive impact of DC on GDP growth rates, across the entire spectrum of economic conditions, but the effect is more pronounced at the upper quantiles of output. This result implies that stronger economies can use more efficiently the benefits of the Digital Construction compared to the weaker economies, thus signaling the need of the latter for structural reforms, to improve the integration rate of digitalization in the construction sector. The pronounced influence of the Human Capital component of DC underscores the pivotal role of nurturing human skills to effectively integrate digital construction techniques into infrastructure development, within a collaborative culture
Editorial: Special Issue - Economics in Digital Construction
No full textWelcome to this special issue of our CEB journal, dedicated to exploring the multifaceted economic dimensions of digital construction within the Architecture, Engineering, Construction, and Operation (AECO) sector. As digital technologies increasingly spread throughout this sector, they bring about transformative impacts not only on how projects are designed and managed but also on the broader economic landscape. The rapid adoption of technologies like Building Information Modelling (BIM) and digital asset management systems has set a new paradigm in project efficiency and data utilisation. These advancements promise substantial economic benefits, ranging from increased productivity to enhanced decision-making capabilities, which, in turn, can spur significant growth in the broader economy. However, efficient and fair distribution and diffusion of these benefits in society is not always given, as stronger economies can more efficiently utilise the benefits of Digital Construction compared to weaker economies. Consequently, there is a need signaled for structural reforms in the latter, to improve the rate of integration of digitalisation in the construction sector (Kapogiannis, et al., 2023). Climate change is also a factor that now poses challenges for the construction sector, with digitalisation a key element able to address these challenges
Engagement of local government to promote maternal and newborn health services: the case of Faridpur district in Bangladesh
Get PDFIn rural Bangladesh, local government institutions, especially union parishads, play a key role providing essential services for community development. They help connect people with primary healthcare, along with providing nutrition and water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) services that reduce the burden of poverty. However, most union parishad officials are not engaged in the promotion of maternal and newborn health (MNH) services in rural areas. Lack of information about their mandated role and responsibilities prevents them from providing MNH services for poor and marginalised communities. Even if they are informed, without the necessary skills to fulfil their role and responsibilities local government officials are struggling to promote quality MNH services within the public facilities in rural areas. To address this problem, Save the Children International engaged local government institutions in a systematic manner to ensure their engagement and contribution to MNH services for rural communities
A Wounded Democracy: Analysis of the Determinant Factors of Democratic Backsliding in Brazil
Get PDFDespite its prominence in the international political landscape and its widespread adoption throughout the world, democracy is seldom a stable regimen, and often repeatedly stressed and tested by attempts to wield autocratic power. Anti-democratic attacks assume particular forms and may lead to varied outcomes, from the strengthening of enduring democracies, to democratic backsliding or its complete rupture. Among several similar cases, Brazil recently underwent an attempt against its democracy, which climaxed in an attempted coup d’état on January 8th, 2023. This paper aims to examine democratic backsliding as a phenomenon, through an analysis of the coup attempted in Brazil in 2023 as a case study. It was perceived that the presence of a would-be autocrat with a populist strategy in command of the executive branch of government played an important role in promoting democratic backsliding. While the Brazilian democracy sustained some lasting damage to its institutions, it has resisted this attack by autocracy
Design–build with a development phase: An initiation and the first trials
Get PDFDesign–build (DB) is a much used project delivery system with operational variations for different needs and situations. Yet, novel applications have to be strived for as all of the current applications have some drawbacks. Accordingly, this study focuses on a DB procedure that exploits the parties’ collaboration in order to improve the economic efficiency of construction projects. It is called “design–build with a development phase” (DBd). In the procedure, the owner and the selected contractor continue the development of the project solution in co-operation, adhering to the principle of benefit sharing, which is enabled by the benchmark solution, formed as a result of price-inclusive contractor selection. More precisely, this paper presents the DBd procedure and how it was initially constructed and eventually applied in a few infrastructure projects. The paper also reports the related experiences, which were positive based on the improved value for money in the trial projects. Thus, the paper contributes by disproving the dominant view, which has been guiding the formulation and use of the current project delivery practices, that price-inclusive competition and collaborative development thereafter could not be matched successfully
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