Sustainable governance for small desert settlements

'Sustainable governance for small desert settlements: Combining single settlement localism and multi-settlement regionalism', a paper presented to the Desert Knowledge Symposium & Business Showcase, Alice Springs, Northern Territory, Australia, 1-3 November 2006

A way of reasserting and sharing identity: acrylic paintings of the Central Desert. A critical approach

Many different discourses about the “new” Aboriginal art forms, especially Acrylic Paintings of the Central Desert, have been constructed during the last 30 years. These constructions have attempted to explain the role, the meaning and the reception of that art form, both in a local arena (concerning the communities in which it is produced) and in an (inter)national one. Such explanatory discourses are used to exceed the specific object of study – the works of acrylic on canvas – becoming general and descriptive views of the whole art-production of Aboriginal society, as well as of their culture and their identity. Moreover, these constructions came from two different fields that traditionally – from the end of 19th century and the beginning of the 20th onwards – have competed for the imposition and hegemony of their views: one related to the artistic sphere (mainly art criticism) and the other related to anthropological and ethnological studies. This article suggests an approach to the Acrylic Paintings of the Central Desert as an element of identity, reasserting as well as a place for Aboriginal cross-cultural understanding. From a critical point of view, many core topics -tropos- from classical discourses about Acrylic Painting -such as the Dreaming, the land, aesthetics, the role of socialization and the power of the representational system of geometric forms- will be discussed. In order to achieve the former, the mutually excluding polarization between Art and Anthropology has been avoided thus bringing together both perspectives. Furthermore, the aim is to recover the too-long-forgotten voices of the artists involved by disregarding the mainstream colonial discourse

Four wheel drive tourism and economic development opportunities for remote areas

Desert areas account for around 70% of Australia’s landmass but are home to less than 3% of the population. The economies of many desert areas have been described as marginal or peripheral. Tourism is an important economic activity for desert destinations and one sector, four wheel drive tourism, has been gaining increasing attention. This paper examines the spending patterns of four wheel drive visitors to desert regions of the Northern Territory of Australia and compares them to non-four wheel drive leisure visitors for a five year period from 2000 to 2004. In addition to assessing the amount of expenditure (overall and per day), the research investigates whether there were differences in expenditure items and the dispersal of expenditure among destinations. This information can help inform decisions about levels of investment for attracting the four wheel drive market which might be justified, and the types of product opportunities that might arise from a growing market

The Case for Social Enterprise

The bottom of the pyramid (BoP) approach popularised Prahalad (2004) as well as other writers such as Hart (2005) and London (2007), calls for the engagement of business with the bottom segment of the global income pyramid, and has attracted considerable attention and debate. The BoP lens is applied chiefly to communities experiencing ‘extreme poverty’ in low income countries with little reference to the growing number of people living in ‘relative poverty’ in high income countries. For the purpose of stimulating academic debate this paper seeks to explore the role of the so-called fourth sector, a domain for hybrid business ventures of social (and, in the case of this paper, Indigenous) entrepreneurs, at what we refer to as ‘the bottom at the top of the income pyramid’ in Australia. Using examples of Indigenous and social entrepreneurship within disadvantaged communities, we seek to highlight the scope for fourth sector enterprises at the lower end of the income spectrum within developed countries. It is suggested that the business models found within the fourth sector offer promising, alternative approaches for addressing the economic as well as social and cultural needs of those living on the fringes of today’s increasingly fragmented high-income societies

Indigenous entrepreneurship: Closing the gap on local terms

Within the federal government ‘Closing the Gap’ policy context this paper reports on local entrepreneurial activities by local Yolngu people in East Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory. Particular attention is directed to members of the Rirratjingu clan in the town of Yirrkala. We describe how the activities of a local social enterprise offer pathways for the creation of income, employment and social capital within the local community and where the protection of cultural vitality and integrity is axiomatic. The findings point to the need for more flexible policy approaches, to enable the establishment and growth of Indigenous business activities outside the economic mainstream. We echo the calls in the literature for policy support for what has been described as the ‘hybrid economy’, which allows for participation in both economic and cultural activities

Four Weel Drive Tourism and Economic Development Opportunities in Remote Areas

Desert areas account for around 70% of Australia’s landmass but are home to less than 3% of the population. The economies of many desert areas have been described as marginal or peripheral. Tourism is an important economic activity for desert destinations and one sector, four wheel drive tourism, has been gaining increasing attention. This paper examines the spending patterns of four wheel drive visitors to desert regions of the Northern Territory of Australia and compares them to non-four wheel drive leisure visitors for a five year period from 2000 to 2004. In addition to assessing the amount of expenditure (overall and per day), the research investigates whether there were differences in expenditure items and the dispersal of expenditure among destinations. This information can help inform decisions about levels of investment for attracting the four wheel drive market which might be justified, and the types of product opportunities that might arise from a growing market

Ngapartji Ngapartji: The consequences of kindness

There was this beautiful thing that happened, a brief but difficult moment in the project when Trevor broke down during one of the early performances in Melbourne. It happened during one of the first seasons of the work and took cast and audience to a very emotional place, making a huge impression and and helping configure all future performances