1,720,958 research outputs found
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Get PDFThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Get PDF“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Get PDFWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Imperialism and the Geopolitics of COVID-19 in Venezuela
Get PDFThe impact of COVID-19 in Venezuela has merely compounded an already existing health crisis within the country. Like the rest of the Venezuelan economy and society, the breakdown of the healthcare system is largely due to the legacy of class conflict and the contradictions of Bolivarian oil-dependent development policy, which finally came to breaking point with the end of the commodity super-cycle. And yet, despite the domestic sources of the crisis, the current unfolding of the COVID-19 pandemic in Venezuela is inherently geopolitical in nature. Central to this story is the manner in which Venezuela’s domestic and electoral dynamics have become inextricably embedded within the ‘imperialist chain’ centred on Washington. The conflict between chavista and opposition forces, the constitutional crisis of 2017, the unilateral declaration of Juan Guaidó as ‘interim president’ in 2019, and an intensified sanctions regime are all differentially conditioned by US imperial strategy. This paper will unpack the interconnections between the domestic and international dynamics of Venezuela’s socio-political crisis, explore the ways in which COVID-19 has been weaponised by the Trump administration, and attempt to understand the prospects for radical political renewal under conditions of increasing geopolitical conflict
The social contradictions of regional development in the ALBA-TCP: the case of food production
Get PDFThe Latin American regional institution of the ALBA-TCP (Alianza Bolivariana para los Pueblos de Nuestra América-Tratado de Comercio de los Pueblos) has garnered much deserved scholarly attention due to its radical rhetoric, novel forms of geopolitical cooperation and forms of regional development. However, extant studies of ALBA provide little insight into the concrete actors at the helm of its development policies. To expand our understanding of this regional organisation, this article offers a critical political economy perspective into the class dynamics of food production within ALBA, via empirically grounded research findings. Mobilising Nicos Poulantzas’ theory of the capitalist state, as well as subsequent innovations in neo-Poulantzian theory, the analysis reveals how the spatial organisation of food production exhibits a markedly statist character. With specific focus on a series of ALBA-created rice-producing factories located in Venezuela, I show how the prevailing relations of production within these factories assumes a state-capitalist form, which runs counter ALBA’s philosophy of social empowerment. Overall, the ALBA region’s organisation of ‘shared development’ remains highly fragmented and un-coordinated in the context of food production, vastly underwritten by the circulation of Venezuelan oil rents, and ultimately subsumed under the power of the bureaucratic state. There is, therefore, a conspicuous gap between the discourse of ALBA and the reality of its political economy
Spaces of agrarian struggle : ALBA, La Via Campesina and the politics of 'food sovereignity'
Get PDFThis thesis offers an in-depth analysis of the political project of ‘food sovereignty’
within the Latin American regional institution of ALBA (Alianza Bolivariana para
los Pueblos de Nuestra América: Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America).
As a means of navigating ALBA’s agrarian transformation, the thesis employs a
broadly historical materialist approach to the analysis of class struggle and sociopolitical
change in the context of realizing a new food sovereignty regime. Drawing
primarily on a neo-Poulantzian perspective, the analysis opens up the question of the
bureaucratic state itself – as a condensation of class relations and hegemonic
discourses – through the tripartite lens of rights, territory and sovereignty. Such
coordinates are key areas of contestation for food sovereignty protagonists, who not
only struggle against the power of landed capital but also the concentrated force of
state power. To ground these theoretical parameters, the empirical data draws upon
fieldwork carried out in Venezuela (the economic and ideological center of the ALBA
bloc). Through an examination of social movements, peasant producers and activists,
educational/pedagogical institutions promoting the practices of food sovereignty, and
workers within ALBA’s rice producing factory network, the study offers a
multifaceted account of the complex and contradictory transition away from capitalist
agriculture and towards a new food regime embedded within structures of popular
empowerment. From this analysis, the thesis uncovers a number of critical findings
that are not often acknowledged within the ALBA literature; namely, that while the
role of the ‘post-liberal’ state has been a key actor in the improvement of social
wellbeing, popular classes find their greatest challenge in the form of the strong,
bureaucratic state. Such a contradiction – between state-as-ally and state-as-nemesis –
speaks directly to the Poulantzian problematic of ‘democratic socialism’, and the
challenge of engaging with state institutions in order to dissolve their very logic. The
study therefore offers important lessons with respect to the limits and prospects of
building ‘socialism in the 21st century’
Book Review: Mariya P. Ivancheva, The Alternative University: Lessons from Bolivarian Venezuela, Stanford University Press, 2023, 216pp.
Get PDFAmong the pantheon of left-wing Latin American governments that swept the continent in the early 21st century, arguably the most radical, most beguiling, most contradictory, and most tragic, is the Bolivarian Revolution in Venezuela. Given its unique (though not necessarily ‘special’) place within this political conjuncture, no shortage of ink has been spilled on the deep-seated transformations carried out in the name of the Venezuelan people, as well as the domestic and international conflicts that followed in their wake (see, most recently, Marino 2018; Samet 2019; Cooper 2019; Wilde 2023; Lubbock 2024). Among the many themes examined by scholars, activists and other observers is the role of higher education reform within the Bolivarian Republic, and the ways in which Hugo Chávez Frias, the charismatic leader of the ‘Bolivarian turn’, sought to build a new society by cultivating new knowledge among the people
Spaces of agrarian struggle : ALBA, La Via Campesina and the politics of 'food sovereignity'
No full textThis thesis offers an in-depth analysis of the political project of ‘food sovereignty’
within the Latin American regional institution of ALBA (Alianza Bolivariana para
los Pueblos de Nuestra América: Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America).
As a means of navigating ALBA’s agrarian transformation, the thesis employs a
broadly historical materialist approach to the analysis of class struggle and sociopolitical
change in the context of realizing a new food sovereignty regime. Drawing
primarily on a neo-Poulantzian perspective, the analysis opens up the question of the
bureaucratic state itself – as a condensation of class relations and hegemonic
discourses – through the tripartite lens of rights, territory and sovereignty. Such
coordinates are key areas of contestation for food sovereignty protagonists, who not
only struggle against the power of landed capital but also the concentrated force of
state power. To ground these theoretical parameters, the empirical data draws upon
fieldwork carried out in Venezuela (the economic and ideological center of the ALBA
bloc). Through an examination of social movements, peasant producers and activists,
educational/pedagogical institutions promoting the practices of food sovereignty, and
workers within ALBA’s rice producing factory network, the study offers a
multifaceted account of the complex and contradictory transition away from capitalist
agriculture and towards a new food regime embedded within structures of popular
empowerment. From this analysis, the thesis uncovers a number of critical findings
that are not often acknowledged within the ALBA literature; namely, that while the
role of the ‘post-liberal’ state has been a key actor in the improvement of social
wellbeing, popular classes find their greatest challenge in the form of the strong,
bureaucratic state. Such a contradiction – between state-as-ally and state-as-nemesis –
speaks directly to the Poulantzian problematic of ‘democratic socialism’, and the
challenge of engaging with state institutions in order to dissolve their very logic. The
study therefore offers important lessons with respect to the limits and prospects of
building ‘socialism in the 21st century’
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Get PDFWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
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