Making Women's Voices Count in Community Decision-Making on Land Investments

The adverse impacts of commercialization and largescale land acquisitions in the global South are often disproportionately borne by women. The loss of access to farmland and common areas hit women harder than men in many communities, and women are often excluded from compensation and benefit schemes. Women's social disadvantages, including their lack of formal land rights and generally subordinate position, make it difficult for them to voice their interests in the management and proposed allocation of community land to investors. While the development community and civil society have pushed for standards and safeguard policies that promote the meaningful involvement of rural communities generally in land acquisitions and investments, strengthening the participation of women as a distinct stakeholder group requires specific attention.This working paper examines options for strengthening women's participatory rights in the face of increasing commercial pressures on land in three countries: Mozambique, Tanzania, and the Philippines. It focuses on how regulatory reform—reforms in the rules, regulations, guidelines, and procedures that implement national land acquisition and investment laws—can promote gender equity and allow women to realize the rights afforded by national legal frameworks and international standards. The paper stems from a collaborative project between World Resources Institute and partner organizations in the three countries studied

Making Deals in Court-Connected Mediation: What\u27s Justice Got to Do With It?

When mediation was first introduced to the courts, the process was hailed as “alternative.” Mediation gave disputants the opportunity to discuss and resolve their dispute themselves; the role of the third party was to facilitate the disputants’ negotiations, not to dictate the outcome; and because the disputants were able to focus on their underlying interests in mediation, the process could result in creative, customized solutions. The picture of mediation is changing, however, as the process settles into its role as a tool for the resolution of personal injury, contract, and other nonfamily cases on the courts’ civil dockets. Attorneys dominate the mediation sessions, while their clients play no or minimal roles. Mediators are selected for their ability to value cases and to assess each side’s strengths and weaknesses. Mediators also increasingly bypass or marginalize the joint session in order to move quickly to caucuses. Moreover, a surprisingly small percentage of the settlements produced by these mediation sessions are creative or even nonmonetary. Mediation’s shift strongly suggests that the bargaining paradigm that dominates and delivers settlements in most civil cases is capturing the mediation process. Significant theory and research in negotiation and decision making support the move toward attorney dominance, evaluative intervention, the marginalization or abandonment of joint sessions and traditional monetary settlements. If mediation is viewed simply as a means to enhance the deal-making that occurs in the negotiated settlement of most civil cases, the process’ evolution appears to represent a successful adaptation to the realities of our civil system of “litigotiation.” Many commentators and mediators, however, argue that mediation is a process that goes beyond assisting current approaches to bargaining and decision making. These commentators urge that the disputants want and deserve something more. There is disagreement, however, regarding the identity of the additional benefit that mediation can offer to disputants. This Article argues that particularly within the context of the courts, mediation should be expected to deliver to disputants an experience of justice, more commonly referred to as procedural justice. Although some commentators have suggested that our courts are moving toward a transactional model, it is not the metaphor of the marketplace that provides the courts with their social and political legitimacy. Research in the field of procedural justice clearly reveals that citizens want the courts to resolve their disputes in a manner that feels like justice is being done. This yearning for the experience of justice is so profound that disputants’ perceptions regarding procedural justice affect their perceptions of the distributive justice that is delivered by a dispute resolution process, their compliance with the outcome of the dispute resolution process, and their perception of the legitimacy of the institution providing or sponsoring the process. Ultimately, insuring that mediation comes within a procedural justice paradigm serves some of the courts’ most important goals - delivering justice, delivering resolution, and fostering respect for the important public institution of the judiciary. Knowledge of procedural justice research can enable an experience of justice to co-exist with deal-making in court-connected mediation. This research indicates clearly that disputants want and need the opportunity to tell their story and control the telling of that story; disputants want and need to feel that the mediator has considered their story and is trying to be fair; and disputants want and need to feel that they have been treated with dignity and respect. This Article applies these research findings, as well as the theories that explain the importance of these process characteristics, in order to conclude that some of the changes that streamline bargaining - the dominant participation of disputants’ attorneys and the reduced role of the disputants, the eventual use of evaluative interventions, and the prevalence of monetary (noncreative) outcomes - are not necessarily inconsistent with procedural justice considerations. Indeed, if used appropriately, some of these changes may even have the potential to enhance disputants’ perceptions of procedural justice. This Article thus argues that deal-making and procedural justice can co-exist and even complement each other. The analysis in this Article also shows, however, that other changes designed to ease legal negotiation - the de facto exclusion of disputants from mediation sessions, the abandonment or marginalization of initial joint sessions, and the early and aggressive use of legally evaluative interventions - are inconsistent with procedural justice. These particular adaptations raise serious concerns regarding the ability of court-connected mediation to deliver an experience of justice along with a settlement

Intellectual Property Management in Health and Agricultural Innovation: A Handbook of Best Practices, Vol. 1

Prepared by and for policy-makers, leaders of public sector research establishments, technology transfer professionals, licensing executives, and scientists, this online resource offers up-to-date information and strategies for utilizing the power of both intellectual property and the public domain. Emphasis is placed on advancing innovation in health and agriculture, though many of the principles outlined here are broadly applicable across technology fields. Eschewing ideological debates and general proclamations, the authors always keep their eye on the practical side of IP management. The site is based on a comprehensive Handbook and Executive Guide that provide substantive discussions and analysis of the opportunities awaiting anyone in the field who wants to put intellectual property to work. This multi-volume work contains 153 chapters on a full range of IP topics and over 50 case studies, composed by over 200 authors from North, South, East, and West. If you are a policymaker, a senior administrator, a technology transfer manager, or a scientist, we invite you to use the companion site guide available at http://www.iphandbook.org/index.html The site guide distills the key points of each IP topic covered by the Handbook into simple language and places it in the context of evolving best practices specific to your professional role within the overall picture of IP management

Our Space: Being a Responsible Citizen of the Digital World

Our Space is a set of curricular materials designed to encourage high school students to reflect on the ethical dimensions of their participation in new media environments. Through role-playing activities and reflective exercises, students are asked to consider the ethical responsibilities of other people, and whether and how they behave ethically themselves online. These issues are raised in relation to five core themes that are highly relevant online: identity, privacy, authorship and ownership, credibility, and participation.Our Space was co-developed by The Good Play Project and Project New Media Literacies (established at MIT and now housed at University of Southern California's Annenberg School for Communications and Journalism). The Our Space collaboration grew out of a shared interest in fostering ethical thinking and conduct among young people when exercising new media skills

Progressing Issues of Social Importance Through the Work of Indigenous Artists: A Social Impact Evaluation of the Native Arts and Cultures Foundation's Pilot Community Inspiration Program

In 2014, the Native Arts and Cultures Foundation (NACF) launched a new initiative, the Community Inspiration Program (CIP), which is rooted in the understanding that arts and cultures projects have an important role to play in motivating community engagement and supporting social change.This report considers the social impacts of the 2014 CIP projects—what effects did they have on communities and on the issues, conversations, and connections that are critical in those communities? Its secondary purpose is to provide the NACF with ideas for how to improve its grant making in support of arts for community change.In our usage, for a CIP project to have "social impact," it should make a difference in communities. "Social change" is the idea of moving in a desired direction on an issue of community importance and social relevance. Thus, a project has social impact if it progresses social change

An analysis of the Nez Perce communication strategies in the Council of Walla Walla, 1855

Dissertation (Ph.D.)--University of Kansas, Communication Studies, 1983

Women as social entrepreneurs in the hospitality and tourism industry: Does empowerment play a role?

This paper which is a work in progress presents a qualitative study exploring the nature, motivations and extent to which female entrepreneurs use their H&T businesses as platforms for engagement in various forms of social entrepreneurship (SE) leading to value creation, economic and community development. Although SE is seen as a key contributor to the creation and diversification of entrepreneurial activity, women empowerment and local economic development, there is limited research on the role of female H&T entrepreneurs in emerging non -western destinations. We focus on the following research questions: a) Can female entrepreneurs in H&T be considered as social entrepreneurs? b) How does the structure and organization of society shape the nature of female participation in SE? c) What are the challenges involved in mobilizing female entrepreneurs to effectively engage in SE? d) How does SE maximise value creation and higher levels of satisfaction for all participants? Concepts from women-owned H&T enterprises, SE and women empowerment are drawn upon. We argue that women are embedded in male dominated traditions/customs, community associations and government bureaucracies that may either empowered or dis-empower them. Using the case of Cameroon, we examine how embeddedness enhances the capacity of women to engage in SE in the H&T industry, thereby contributing to local economic development. Empirically we adopt a mixed methods approach using multiple case studies: a survey questionnaire, five focus groups meetings (two women -only, one male-only, and two mix of male and female entrepreneurs) and twenty-five in-depth interviews with selected female entrepreneurs (18), (non)governmental organisations (03) and beneficiaries (04) of social enterprise ventures between May 2014 and February 2015. The findings clarify the role of women in SE in H&T and policy implications for maximising social value creation through the participation of women in SE

Intercultural communication and critical pedagogy: deconstructing stereotypes for the development of critical cultural awareness in language education

This study researches the problem of gender stereotypes that Spanish language undergraduates uphold against Hispanics and develops critical pedagogical approaches through the reading of a literary text for the deconstruction of such stereotypes so that students can think and act in less biased and prejudiced ways. This thesis develops the argument that stereotyping is a form of oppression, and through empirical research in three case studies, this research demonstrates that stereotypical oppression can be addressed by Critical Pedagogyfor the development of „critical cultural awareness‟. This thesis provides answers to three operational sub-questions addressed in each of the three case studies, which contribute to answering the main overarching question in this study of how can Critical Pedagogy help in the deconstruction of stereotypes for the development of „critical cultural awareness‟. This study found that a literary text can bring stereotypical thinking out to the fore for analysis and reflection, and that a reader-response approach to literature can trigger past experiences that reveal essentialising discourses of otherness. The research reviews the effectiveness of the use of an „identity-focused‟ critical pedagogical intervention for the development of a „self-regulation strategy‟ as a mental reasoning exercise to control bias and stereotyping. The results indicate that students tend to transpose stereotypical binaries and create new ones, whilst developing further views of cultural realities as being fluid, dynamic and contradictory, constantly being reconstructed and renegotiated. However, the findings indicate that a „self-regulation strategy‟ may be insufficient to appreciate the oppressive nature of stereotyping. Therefore, a Critical „Pedagogy-of-the-Oppressed‟ intervention is implemented, whereby students describe and „name‟ their own experiences of suffering stereotyping during their year-abroad experiences with narratives of stigmatisation, discrimination, exclusion and marginalisation. A tentative pedagogical model, a teaching tool and a „grammar of interculture‟ emerge from this study for the deconstruction of stereotypes in the development of „critical cultural awareness‟ for practical teaching practice and classroom use

Negotiating Tradition - The pragmatics of international deliberations on Cultural Property

Communicative interactions in international negotiations on cultural property not only provide information about the emergence and proliferation of arguments, rhetorics, and registers, but also permit valuable insights into actors’ positions, strategies and alliances. They significantly influence local and national practices and views related to cultural property debates. What can be gained from a deep analysis of the communicative patterns and strategies that actors engage in – the entailing text and talk of negotiations – is a better understanding of the process itself: how do different actors argue, what kind of strategies and rhetorics do they use, to which instruments and institutions do they refer, and in what way do actors react to each other? An analysis of communicative interactions contributes to the question of how international negotiations work. The analytic inclusion of sociolinguistic practices allows insights into positions, strategies, and perspectives pertaining to cultural property. By looking at not only what actors say, but also at how and in what contexts they do so, it is possible to make more accurate statements about their positions and perceptions in cultural property debates. As these communicative interactions influence outcomes considerably, an approach from linguistic anthropology is not only beneficial for an understanding of specific negotiations, but also for the analysis of broader cultural property issues.Communicative interactions in international negotiations on cultural property not only provide information about the emergence and proliferation of arguments, rhetorics, and registers, but also permit valuable insights into actors’ positions, strategies and alliances. They significantly influence local and national practices and views related to cultural property debates. What can be gained from a deep analysis of the communicative patterns and strategies that actors engage in – the entailing text and talk of negotiations – is a better understanding of the process itself: how do different actors argue, what kind of strategies and rhetorics do they use, to which instruments and institutions do they refer, and in what way do actors react to each other? An analysis of communicative interactions contributes to the question of how international negotiations work. The analytic inclusion of sociolinguistic practices allows insights into positions, strategies, and perspectives pertaining to cultural property. By looking at not only what actors say, but also at how and in what contexts they do so, it is possible to make more accurate statements about their positions and perceptions in cultural property debates. As these communicative interactions influence outcomes considerably, an approach from linguistic anthropology is not only beneficial for an understanding of specific negotiations, but also for the analysis of broader cultural property issues