Interdisciplinarity and research on local issues: evidence from a developing country

This paper explores the relationship between interdisciplinarity and research pertaining to local issues. Using Colombian publications from 1991 until 2011 in the Web of Science, we investigate the relationship between the degree of interdisciplinarity and the local orientation of the articles. We find that a higher degree of interdisciplinarity in a publication is associated with a greater emphasis on Colombian issues. In particular, our results suggest that research that combines cognitively disparate disciplines, what we refer to as distal interdisciplinarity, tends to be associated with more local focus of research. We discuss the implications of these results in the context of policies aiming to foster the local socio-economic impact of research in developing countries.Comment: 24 page

Disaster risk management or adaptation to climate change; How to deal with climate issue in Colombia? Analysis from agenda setting and traveling model perspectives of the elaboration of climate policies.

The main purpose of this work is to understand, in an actor oriented perspective, the context in which climate policy are formulated in a country, Colombia. Using agenda setting and travelling model perspectives, we analyzed the role of actors at international and national level on the rise of climate issue and the shape of climate policies. Results showed that the rise of climate issue in Colombia is, from one side, the product of external and internal factors and on the other side, the product of translation chains from several actors on how to see the problem and how to address it. External factors initiated the reflection of CC (international commitments, international actors' translations) but this is an internal factor (Niña phenomenon) that allow a real appropriation of the topic by government members. Government members used traveling model translations as a power issue; the DNP representing at climate change adaptation versus the UNGRD representing at disaster risk management. At the end of the translation chains, government members re-appropriate international consultants' version (of the issue and solution) into an economical perspective; adaptation to climate change as an economical opportunity or as a way to avoid economical loss

International Arbitration and the Republic of Colombia: Commercial, Comparative and Constitutional Concerns From a U.S. Perspective

This article undertakes the first comparative analysis of Colombian arbitration law in English, setting Colombian statutory and case law side by side with international and U.S. law to provide U.S. parties with the information they need to (1) evaluate the risks and benefits associated with entering into an arbitration agreement with a Colombian party and (2) establish the kinds of procedures needed to provide optimal protection of the arbitral process and any resulting award. Not only does this research discuss important comparative and commercial matters, it also considers how a unique type of constitutional challenge - the acción de tutela - affects arbitration law in Colombia

the use of eminent domain in São Paulo, Bogotá, and Mexico City

En este trabajo el autor ofrece un examen sobre las prácticas de dominio eminente (eminent domain) en tres de las más importantes ciudades latinoamericanas. Aborda conforme lo anterior, de manera crítica, las relaciones entre las reglas legales usadas respecto del dominio eminente y el contexto institucional en el cual son aplicadas dichas reglas, en una perspectiva bidimensional: la primera, la de las relaciones entre los poderes judicial, legislativo y ejecutivo en lo concerniente al dominio eminente, y la segunda, la distribución de autoridad con relación al dominio eminente a nivel de gobiernos nacionales, provinciales o locales. Por esta vía logra el autor un acertado análisis comparativo, contextualizando dichas prácticas de dominio eminente, con la realidad de cada una de esas metrópolis, permitiendo las inferencias aterrizadas de que carecen estudios similares.In this work the author offers a rich and deep examination on the practices of “eminent domain” in three of the most important Latin-American cities. He approaches as the previous thing, of a critical way, the relations between the legal rules that concern of “eminent domain” and the institutional context in which the above mentioned rules are applied, in a two-dimensional perspective: the first one, that of the relations between the power judicial, legislative and executive in the relating thing to “eminent domain”, and the second one, the distribution of authority with relation to “eminent domain” to level of national, provincial or local governments. For this route the author achieves a guessed right comparative analysis, giving context to the above mentioned practices of “eminent domain”, in the reality of each one of this metropolis, allowing the inferences landed that similar studies lack

The Bioeconomy: An engine of integral development for Colombia

After the Green Revolution, Latin American countries opted for development models that helped boost economic growth based on natural resources and import substitution. However, this scheme proved to be weak due to the little diversification and value addition from industry, and to the belief that natural resources are limited and crucial for their sustainability. Many countries found themselves caught up in commodity markets, subject to fluctuations in availability and prices. It is in response to this situation that the concept of Bioeconomy emerges, as it represents a socioeconomic model that reduces dependence on fossil resources and promotes the production and intensive use of knowledge on resources, processes, and biological principles for the sustainable supply of goods and services in all economic sectors (bioenergy, agriculture and bio-inputs, food, fibers, health products, industrial products and bioplastics). Similarly, bioeconomy recognizes the primary role of scientific and technological knowledge as a key driver to define the relationships among agriculture, biomass and industry. In this approach, biomassbased processes are circular and sustainable: the production of residues and waste is reduced to a minimum; new products and services are generated for multiple sectors, which allow the comprehensive and consistent analysis of the challenges within a region, while creating new sources of equitable economic and social growth, from a territorial point of view

Afrodescendants, Law, and Race in Latin America

Law and Society research in and about Latin America has been particularly beneficial in elucidating the gap between the ideals of racial equality laws in the region and the actual subordinated status of its racialized subjects. Some of the recurrent themes in the race-related literature have been: the limits of the Latin American emphasis on criminal law to redress discriminatory actions; the limits of multicultural constitutional reform for full political participation; the insufficiency of land reform and recognition of ethnic communal property titles; and the challenges to implementing race conscious public policies such as affirmative action. Especially illuminating have been the surveys of judicial cases that demonstrate the continued judicial resistance to the notion that racial discrimination exists in Latin America simply because its manifestations are deemed to be inconsequential compared to the “real discrimination” of the racially violent United States. Future research projects could be instrumental in disrupting this Latin American judicial attitude of racial innocence that interferes with the enforcement of anti-discrimination laws. Emerging research could interrogate the presumption that racial violence does not and has not existed in Latin America, and the social disempowerment of not naming the violence as racial. In short, deconstructing the judicial premise that racial violence is particular to the United States and the defining feature of true racism by which strategic comparisons to Latin America’s presumed non-racial violence situate it as non-discriminatory, all point to a productive area for future Law and Society race-related research

Now is NOT the Time for the Columbia FTA

[Excerpt] The U.S.-Colombia free trade agreement is the wrong trade model at the wrong time. Instead of helping workers here or in Colombia, the U.S.-Colombia free trade agreement would reward a country with a history of extreme violence that has utterly failed to protect workers\u27 rights. This agreement, negotiated by the Bush Administration before the financial meltdown of 2008 and the current unemployment crisis, contains too many flawed trade policies of the past. Instead of wasting valuable time and effort advancing this inadequate agreement, President Obama should instead focus on effective job creation measures (including currency rebalancing, infrastructure investment, and robust training and education) and reforming our trade model (so that it strengthens labor rights protections for all workers, safeguards domestic laws and regulations, and promotes the export of goods rather than jobs)