Influence of Personal Preferences on Link Dynamics in Social Networks

We study a unique network dataset including periodic surveys and electronic logs of dyadic contacts via smartphones. The participants were a sample of freshmen entering university in the Fall 2011. Their opinions on a variety of political and social issues and lists of activities on campus were regularly recorded at the beginning and end of each semester for the first three years of study. We identify a behavioral network defined by call and text data, and a cognitive network based on friendship nominations in ego-network surveys. Both networks are limited to study participants. Since a wide range of attributes on each node were collected in self-reports, we refer to these networks as attribute-rich networks. We study whether student preferences for certain attributes of friends can predict formation and dissolution of edges in both networks. We introduce a method for computing student preferences for different attributes which we use to predict link formation and dissolution. We then rank these attributes according to their importance for making predictions. We find that personal preferences, in particular political views, and preferences for common activities help predict link formation and dissolution in both the behavioral and cognitive networks.Comment: 12 page

Meeting the challenge of risk-sensitive and resilient urban development in sub-Saharan Africa: Directions for future research and practice.

At the heart of the papers in this Special Issue is the call for research and practice to move to understand and act on the direct and indirect interlinkages between urban development and risk accumulation processes; a broader conception of risk on a continuum from everyday to extreme events and a critical view of urban risk governance as a project that implicates multiple formal and informal actors at difference scales. Out of this focus emerges a research frontier that demands sustained, detailed studies of the links between multi-faceted and multi-scalar development processes and risk but also the re-thinking of scale and jurisdiction as ordering concepts; a stronger understanding of the linkages between environmental/public health risks and small and extreme disasters, and relative changes in manifestations of these forms of risk and in their social differentiation; and better theorisation of governance innovations. For practice, the issue stresses the over-riding need to move beyond a narrow focus on hazard or disaster events and the immediate actors involved to engage a much wider set of actors in integrated planning processes; to develop data to enable holistic policy-making and to build on the emergence of demand-led planning to re-frame the practices of risk-sensitive and resilient urban development

SDG16: peace, justice and strong institutions - a political ecology perspective

This chapter assesses the implications of UN SDG 16: ‘Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions’ for both forests and people. Particular focus is placed on three thematic areas: 1) peace and the reduction of armed conflict, 2) the rule of law, accountability, transparency, and access to justice and 3) inclusiveness and participation. Conflict is widely variable in its effects, and may either prevent agricultural expansion or drive illicit crop production, and foster migration in or out of forested areas; while peace is often accompanied by state-supported mining and expansion of commercial crops. Regarding rule of law, forest policy in many countries favours political elite, large-scale industry actors and international trade. Hence, if SDG implementation strengthens state institutions, the ‘rule of law’ and transparency linked with international trade, it is likely to reinforce existing inequalities, unless it is counter-balanced with legal reforms that strengthen local rights to land and resources. While there has been much recent progress in promoting ‘participatory’ forest management, this is often tightly controlled by the state, contributing to local administrative burdens without redistributing power and benefits. In sum, the impacts of SDG 16 on forests and people depend on how it shapes power and resource distribution

The embeddedness of global production networks: The impact of crisis on Fiji's garment export sector

In this paper the author explores how changing geopolitical conditions reconfigure network embeddedness and theorises the conditions of network disconnection and transformation. Through a case study of the changes in interfirm relationships within the Fiji – Australia garment-production network after Fiji’s 2000 political coup d’état, the author develops a relational and dynamic view of embeddedness, highlighting its multifaceted and multiscalar character and emphasising the interrelationships between embeddedness, trust, and power

Bargaining and Influence in Conflict Situations

[Excerpt] This chapter examines bargaining as an influence process through which actors attempt to resolve a social conflict. Conflict occurs when two or more interdependent actors have incompatible preferences and perceive or anticipate resistance from each other (Blalock 1989; Kriesberg 1982). Bargaining is a basic form of goal-directed action that involves both intentions to influence and efforts by each actor to carry out these intentions. Tactics are verbal and/or nonverbal actions designed to maneuver oneself into a favorable position vis-a-vis another or to reach some accommodation. Our treatment of bargaining subsumes the concept of negotiation (see Morley and Stephenson 1977). This chapter is organized around a conceptual framework that distinguishes basic types of bargaining contexts. We begin by introducing the framework and then present an overview of and analyze theoretical and empirical work on each type of bargaining context

Communicating about systems and complexity:from contingency to praxis

The chapter is part of a special Gedenkschrift publication honoring the work of Professsor Brenda Zimmerman in the field of complexity thinking. The term, Gedenkschrift, borrowed from German, can be translated as celebration publication. It is a memorial publication honoring a respected person, especially an academic, created and presented posthumously. The tribute tracks the influence of Brenda's work in formulating the heuristic developed by the author for teaching systems thinking in practice (STiP) as part of the postgraduate programme on STiP at the Open University

Grasping the Links in the Chain: Understanding the Unintended Consequences of International Counter-Narcotics Measures for the EU

No abstract available

New mobilities across the lifecourse: a framework for analysing demographically-linked drivers of migration

Migration, along with fertility and mortality, is one of the fundamental drivers of population change. Taking the lifecourse as the central concern, the authors set out a theoretical framework and define some key research questions for a programme of research that explores how the linked lives of mobile people are situated in time-space within the economic, social and cultural structures of contemporary society. Drawing on methodologically innovative techniques, these perspectives can offer conceptually significant and policy relevant insights into the changing nature and meanings of migration across the lifecourse