1,720,966 research outputs found
A New Agenda for International Development Cooperation: Lessons Learnt from the Buen Vivir Experience
No full textThe debate on growth and development that has been going on over the last decades has clearly highlighted a number of flaws and contradictions that the theory, as well as the practice, of International Development Cooperation (IDC) has failed to address in a convincing and effective way. IDC, once the prime tool for promoting a change in the livelihoods of the poorest and most vulnerable, is increasingly under scrutiny and does not seem to
have provided an effective response to the current crisis. Buen Vivir (good life), Latin America’s new concept for collective well-being, which has emerged over recent years from the traditional cosmovisions of Andean indigenous peoples and translated into political and institutional practice, offers elements of reflection on economy, environment and social life that are useful for reframing the way ‘well-being’ is conceived within the current development setting: a fresh perspective on the most urgent global concerns is particularly useful as the debate regarding the successors to the Millennium Development Goals post-2015 starts to heat up. The new approach to IDC developed in Ecuador in recent years represents an attempt to put some of these elements into practice. However, beyond the experiences in Latin America, that can claim a closer link, albeit not without tensions, with the indigenous peoples with which the Buen Vivir culture has its roots, these suggestions can show an interesting convergence with alternative views on development emerging from the reflections and practices of Western social movements
Traditional systems and development interventions in LVIA experience in Moyale, pastoral area of Southern Ethiopia
No full textPastoral development has been a field of fierce confrontation and
experimentation throughout the last fifty years. The 12-years experience of an integrated project carried out by an international NGO in Southern Ethiopia is presented, focusing
on two inter-related aspects: animal health and natural resources management. The
peculiar aspects of the area are described, considering the traditional management systems and their integration in the modern context. Based on some specific project activities
(modern water schemes development, community-based animal health program, vaccination campaigns) outcomes and problem raised are discussed, coming out with some general considerations
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe 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
Full text link“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
Abitare e costruire in un Paese antico. Sicurezza e identità: il progetto di mitigazione sismica della città appenninica come rafforzamento dei suoi caratteri identitari
Full text linkL’Italia è un “Paese antico”. Un territorio ricco di storia, tradizione, patrimonio; allo stesso tempo un territorio, molto spesso, dell’abbandono, della mancanza di manutenzione, del dissesto. Esiste un forte dualismo tra la necessità di salvaguardare i caratteri identitari dei suoi luoghi ed il bisogno di agire per soddisfare la domanda di sicurezza della popolazione in un territorio fragile, esposto al rischio sismico ed idrogeologico.
Le aree interne italiane rappresentano perfettamente due facce della stessa medaglia: mentre da un lato queste posseggono grande potenziale in termini di risorse naturali e culturali, dall’altro una progressiva migrazione verso i poli urbani, dove l’accessibilità ai servizi di base è senza dubbio più facile, ha prodotto molti paesaggi dell’abbandono. Molti centri storici, a causa della mancanza di una tutela attiva, sono soggetti ad un processo di degrado e rovina. Il patrimonio storico, architettonico, culturale di queste zone è in forte pericolo, e se questa tendenza non sarà invertita, questo lento declino continuerà, accentuato ancor di più dai frequenti eventi sismici e dalle sconsiderate azioni dell’uomo.
In questo contesto di fragilità territoriale, e allo stesso tempo di grande ricchezza storico-culturale, si delineano gli obbiettivi di questa ricerca: la messa in sicurezza ed il rafforzamento dell’identità. Ridurre il degrado del territorio e della sua eredità architettonica è un obbiettivo primario della Strategia Nazionale per le Aree Interne (2014-2020) e l’intento di questo lavoro è contribuire in questa direzione, attraverso la creazione di un protocollo di intervento per il recupero e la salvaguardia delle costruzioni storiche di molti piccoli centri urbani messi in pericolo dalla mancanza di una manutenzione attiva.Italy is an “ancient land”. It is a territory rich in history, tradition and heritage yet at the same time a land very often abandoned to its own devices, damaged and lacking upkeep. There is a strong dualism between the necessity to safeguard the identifying features of its sites and the need to take action in response to people’s demands for safety in a fragile territory exposed to seismic and hydrogeological risk.
Its inner areas represent perfectly two sides of the same coin: while on the one hand these districts bear great potential in terms of natural and cultural resources, on the other hand a progressive migration towards the urban areas, where the accessibility of basic goods and services is unquestionably easier, has left behind many abandoned landscapes. Many historical centres, through a lack of upkeep, have undergone a process of decay and collapse. The historical, architectural and cultural heritage of these areas is at great risk and if this tendency were not to be reversed, this slow decline will continue, accentuated by frequent seismic events and inappropriate anthropic actions.
In this context of territorial fragility, although at the same time of great historical and cultural wealth, we can outline our research objectives: the securing and enhancing of identity. Stemming the territory’s decline and the deterioration of its architectural legacy is a prime objective of the National Strategy for Inner Areas (2014-2020) and the intention of our essay is to contribute to the creation of an action protocol for the recovery and safeguard of historic construction currently endangered by the lack of active maintenance
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe 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
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe 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
- …
