Celebrating Economies of Change: Brave Visions for Inclusive Futures

This issue has been inspired by a path-breaking conference held by the Canadian Society for Ecologi-cal Economics (CANSEE), which took place this past May 2019 in Waterloo, Ontario. Entitled Engaging Economies of Change, the conference aimed to ex-pand existing research networks in the economy-environment nexus by building connections beyond the academy in order to meaningfully engage with the practicalities of building and implementing change. This issue captures the rich content shared during the event, as well as descriptions of the pro-cesses and efforts made to create a welcoming and respectful space where academics and community activists could build alliances and discuss common challenges. The conference organizers – all graduate students and activists themselves -- called this ‘building a brave space’.This research was supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canad

African Immigration Research

Outlines the findings, activities, and impact of an oral history research project about African immigrants' experiences in the Bronx and their social, cultural, economic, political, and intellectual institutions and contributions. Makes recommendations

Conflicts, integration, hybridization of subcultures: An ecological approach to the case of queercore

This paper investigates the case study of queercore, providing a socio-historical analysis of its subcultural production, in the terms of what Michel Foucault has called archaeology of knowledge (1969). In particular, we will focus on: the self-definition of the movement; the conflicts between the two merged worlds of punk and queer culture; the \u201cinternal-subcultural\u201d conflicts between both queercore and punk, and between queercore and gay\lesbian music culture; the political aspects of differentiation. In the conclusion, we will offer an innovative theoretical proposal about the interpretation of subcultures in ecological and semiotic terms, combining the contribution of the American sociologist Andrew Abbot and of the Russian semiologist Jurij Michajlovi\u10d Lotma

Impacts of \u3ci\u3eYartsa Gunbu\u3c/i\u3e Harvesting on Alpine Ecosystems in the Barun Valley, Makalu-Barun National Park, Nepal

Around 2003, the highly valuable medicinal fungi Ophiocordyceps sinensis (Nepali: yartsa gunbu) began to be commercially harvested in the remote Barun valley of the Makalu-Barun National Park and Buffer Zone, eastern Nepal. Since then, an estimated 3,000 collectors per year have visited the valley each harvesting season, placing new pressures upon its subalpine and alpine landscapes. A review of the yartsa gunbu literature suggested that its harvesting throughout highland India, Nepal, Bhutan, and China has brought important economic benefits, but that it has often been accompanied by a corresponding increase in negative environmental impacts such as alpine shrub destruction, wildlife poaching, and improper garbage disposal. Adverse social impacts reported have included an increase in violence, occasional murder, and the erosion of traditional values. In an attempt to determine if similar phenomena were occurring within the Barun valley, east Nepal, we conducted a month-long study of yartsa gunbu harvesting practices between May and June of 2016. Unlike other regions of the Himalaya, we found that violence and social unrest due to harvesting competition were unheard of in the Barun, which we link to the (a) lower market value of yartsa gunbu harvested there when compared to other regions, and (b) the recognized role of yartsa gunbu as a supplemental and livelihood diversifying income generation opportunity instead of a sole source of new income. Since its collection and sale were legalized by the Government of Nepal in 2001, the concurrent development of locally responsive yartsa gunbu harvesting policies and practices can also be linked to the general absence of environmental disturbance that we found

Adaptive management of Ramsar wetlands

Abstract The Macquarie Marshes are one of Australia’s iconic wetlands, recognised for their international importance, providing habitat for some of the continent’s more important waterbird breeding sites as well as complex and extensive flood-dependent vegetation communities. Part of the area is recognised as a wetland of international importance, under the Ramsar Convention. River regulation has affected their resilience, which may increase with climate change. Counteracting these impacts, the increased amount of environmental flow provided to the wetland through the buy-back and increased wildlife allocation have redressed some of the impacts of river regulation. This project assists in the development of an adaptive management framework for this Ramsar-listed wetland. It brings together current management and available science to provide an informed hierarchy of objectives that incorporates climate change adaptation and assists transparent management. The project adopts a generic approach allowing the framework to be transferred to other wetlands, including Ramsar-listed wetlands, supplied by rivers ranging from highly regulated to free flowing. The integration of management with science allows key indicators to be monitored that will inform management and promote increasingly informed decisions. The project involved a multi-disciplinary team of scientists and managers working on one of the more difficult challenges for Australia, exacerbated by increasing impacts of climate change on flows and inundation patterns

Ethnicity, gender and household effects on becoming NEET: an intersectional analysis

Surprisingly little attention has been given to an integrated understanding of the interaction between ethnicity, gender and parental household’s employment status affecting young people’s educational and labour market outcomes. Drawing on data from Understanding Society, the article compares youth probabilities of becoming NEET (not in employment, education or training) in the UK, focusing on the outcomes for young men and women from different ethnic groups and from four types of ‘households of origin’: workless, one-earner, single-parent-earner and two-earner. The article shows that while, on average, young people with workless parents have a higher likelihood of becoming NEET compared to individuals from households with at least one employed parent, this does not apply universally to all ethnic minority groups, nor equally to young men and women. Having workless parents is much less detrimental for second-generation Indian and African men, and for second-generation Bangladeshi men and women, than for white British individuals. An intersectional analysis illustrates the universal and differentiated effects of disadvantage among youth

Global Employment Trends for Youth

[Excerpt] Young women and men are among the world’s greatest assets. They bring energy, talent and creativity to economies and create the foundations for future development. But today’s youth also represent a group with serious vulnerabilities in the world of work. In recent years slowing global employment growth and increasing unemployment, underemployment and disillusionment have hit young people the hardest. As a result, today’s youth are faced with a growing deficit of decent work opportunities and high levels of economic and social uncertainty. This report adds to growing evidence of a global situation in which young people face increasing difficulties when entering the labour force. One of the principal findings of the report is that a global deficit of decent work opportunities has resulted in a situation in which one out of three youth in the world is either seeking but unable to find work (the unemployed), has given up on the job search entirely (the discouraged) or is working but still living below the US$2 a day poverty line (the working poor). This second version of the GET Youth (see also GET Youth 2004) updates the key world and regional youth labour market indicators, but offers original research as well, including a careful estimation of the number and share of youth who work but are living in households of less than US$1 or 2 a day (the so-called youth working poor). The working poor youth estimate can serve as a proxy for income-related underemployment and therefore fits nicely within the framework presented in the report for identifying youth who are most at risk to suffering from degrees of exclusion from decent work and therefore a framework for identifying whom would benefit most from targeted interventions. Without the right foothold from which to start out right in the labour market, young people are less able to make choices that will improve their own job prospects and those of their future dependents. This, in turn, perpetuates the cycle of insufficient education, low-productivity employment and working poverty from one generation to the next. The report, therefore, adds urgency to the UN call for development of strategies aimed to give young people a chance to make the most of their productive potential through decent employment

Exploring motives for participation in a perpetual easement program: Going beyond financial incentives

Private land conservation has become an important element of the global conservation portfolio. Often, landowners are encouraged to participate in private land conservation with financial incentives. However, there is a concern that financial incentives may be limited given the ephemeral nature of funding. Financial incentives also have the potential to crowd-out participation from landowners motivated by altruistic factors rather than financial ones. These concerns underscore the importance of understanding drivers of participation in conservation programs. While there is a plethora of studies examining motivations for participation in term-limited conservation programs, there are far fewer that look at landowners' reasons for participating in perpetual programs. We examined landowners' non-financial motivations for participation in a United States Fish and Wildlife perpetual easement program using several analytical approaches. We first looked at correlations between the likelihood of participation in the easement program and survey respondent's beliefs, values, norms, and perceived behavioral control using a Bayesian regression analysis. Next, using a cluster analysis we segmented our landowner sample into two groups, tested for differences between the group theoretical constructs, and looked for patterns in geographic distributions of the clusters. Our results suggested that individuals who accepted responsibility for habitat protection and recognized habitat threats were more likely to have participated in the easement program. We did not find significant demographic patterns in our cluster analysis but did see differences across the tested theoretical constructs of theory of planned behavior and value-belief norm theory. Further exploration of variation revealed potential for conservation opportunities and allowed us to make recommendations for future policy actions