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This volume examines dynamic interactions between the calculative and speculative practices of commerce and the fruitfulness, variability, materiality, liveliness and risks of nature. It does so in diverse environments caught up in new trading relationships forged on and through frontiers for agriculture, forestry, mining and fishing. Historical resource frontiers are understood in terms of commercial knowledge systems organized as projects to transform landscapes and environments. The book asks: how were environments traded, and with what environmental and landscape consequences? How have environments been engineered, standardized and transformed within past trading systems? What have been ...
The book presents papers from leading proponents of realist, relativist, and constructivist positions in epistemology and the philosophy of language and ethics.
This study in geomorphology regards systems as open but at the same time operationally closed, as self-organized, structure-building and potentially self-referential. Uses state-of-the-art systems theory as a bridge to Human Geography and related studies.
This book deals with the potentials of social-ecological systems analysis for resolving sustainability problems. Contributors relate inter- and transdisciplinary perspectives to systemic dynamics, human behavior and the different dimensions and scales. With a problem-focused, sustainability-oriented approach to the analysis of human-nature relations, this text will be a useful resource for scholars of human and social ecology, geography, sociology, development studies, social anthropology and natural resources management.
Why did the people of the Zambesi Delta affected by severe flooding return early to their homes or even choose to not evacuate? How is the forced resettlement of small-scale farmers living along the foothills of an active volcano on the Philippines impacting on their day-to-day livelihood routines? Making sense of such questions and observations is only possible by understanding how the decision-making of societies at risk is embedded in culture, and how intervention measures acknowledge, or neglect, cultural settings. The social construction of risk is being given increasing priority in understand how people experience and prioritize hazards in their own lives and how vulnerability can be r...
Hendrik Vollmer explores how disruption triggers social change, refocusing members of a collective on matters of membership, status and coalition.
Unearths the forgotten history of a catastrophic flood, examining its profound impact upon the environment and society of modern China.
Historical disaster research is still a young field. This book discusses the experiences of natural disasters in different cultures, from Europe across the Near East to Asia. It focuses on the pre-industrial era and on the question of similarities, differences and transcultural dynamics in the cultural handling of natural disasters. Which long-lasting cultural patterns of perception, interpretation and handling of disasters can be determined? Have specific types of disasters changed the affected societies? What have people learned from disasters and what not? What adaptation and coping strategies existed? Which natural, societal and economic parameters play a part? The book not only reveals the historical depth of present practices, but also reveals possible comparisons that show globalization processes, entanglements and exchanges of ideas and practices in pre-modern times.
This volume was first published by Inter-Disciplinary Press in 2013. Can we adopt human rights concepts, long used to frame problems of social justice, to define environmental justice? Can existing social institutions provide models and tools for achieving environmental justice? This volume views old models of agency through new lenses and examines how several social institutions, such as law, education and health care, address specific environmental problems. The volume presents arguments for human obligations towards the environment and future generations. Scholars assess the limitations of existing models and others point to recent failures in protecting the interests of indigenous groups or species. And on a hopeful note, examples are given of institutions that promise some success in effecting environmental goals. As this discussion of citizenship suggests, much like environmental justice, a global context both in definition and application is required.
This book presents a collection of papers discussing especially social factors that support individuals, organizations, markets, and societies confronted with socio-economic crises. The papers were written mainly by international sociologists dealing with social resilience from different viewpoints and offering new theoretical perspectives as well as empirical facts. Why are so many researchers, politicians, and practitioners thinking and writing about resilience today? Social scientists have started only recently to deal with social resilience in various spheres. Since not long ago, resilience was strongly connected with the question of what makes individuals or ecosystems to overcome threats like disruption, catastrophes, external shocks etc. Thus, a new research perspective on resilience is offered.