Using state-space time series analysis on wetland bird species to formulate effective bioindicators in the Barberspan wetland

The Coordinated Waterbird Count dataset (CWAC) is a dataset containing waterbird counts from wetlands across South Africa, going as far back as 1970. These data contain valuable information on population sizes and their trends over time. This information could be used more widely if it was more easily accessible to users. The aim of this dissertation is to bridge the gap between the CWAC dataset and the end users (for both experts and non-experts). In so doing the report also provides valuable insight into the state of wetlands in South Africa using various biodiversity indices, starting with Barberspan wetland as the pilot study site. A state-space time series model was applied to the waterbird counts in the CWAC dataset to determine waterbird population trends over the years. Statespace models are able to separate observation error from true population process error, thus providing a more accurate estimation of true population size. This qualifies state-space models as an ideal tool for population dynamics. The state-space model produced estimates of true population size for each waterbird per year. Three different indices were applied to the estimates, namely, exponentiated Shannon's index, Simpson's index and a modified Living Planet Index. These indices aggregate the count data to a measure of effective number of waterbirds in an ecosystem, a measure of evenness of an ecosystem, and an abundance index respectively. Using these three indices, in conjunction with each other, and individual waterbird species as bioindicators for various wetland traits, the end user is presented with a broad overview of the state of the Barberspan wetland. The implication of this research is beneficial to various wetland conservation organisations globally (AEWA, Aichi, RAMSAR) and locally (Working for Wetlands), as it provides valuable insight into the state of wetlands of South Africa. Furthermore, it helps managers at a local level in their decision making to enable more evidence-based approaches to protect South African wetlands and its waterbirds

From the Black Square to the Red Square: Rebel leadership constructed as process through a narrative on art

© 2016, © The Author(s) 2016. The contribution this paper makes to leadership studies is to advance leadership theory towards a process based perspective based on an appreciation of art. The article does this by using a narrative on art in Russia. The narrative forms the basis for discussing the role that symbolism and aesthetics play in (re)interpreting rebel leadership. The article also explores James Downton’s work alongside the narration to develop a socially constructed process based interpretation of rebel leadership. Building on this interpretation fundamental aspects of process-based leadership so far missing from the literature are highlighted. One such aspect is the ridicule (in this case through caricature) of existing leaders and leadership by the incumbent leader and/or leadership process – a pre-stage to the emergence of rebel leadership. Other aspects include stages of social and organizational liminality and introspection. From here suggestions are made for further theoretical and empirical enquiry and practical implications are highlighted

Environmental justice, capabilities, and the theorization of well-being

Environmental justice (EJ) scholarship is increasingly framing justice in terms of capabilities. This paper argues that capabilities are fundamentally about well-being and as such there is a need to more explicitly theorize well-being. We explore how capabilities have come to be influential in EJ and how well-being has been approached so far in EJ specifically and human geography more broadly. We then introduce a body of literature from social psychology which has grappled theoretically with questions about well-being, using the insights we gain from it to reflect on some possible trajectories and challenges for EJ as it engages with well-being

Carbon Labelling and Low Income Country Exports: An Issues Paper

In response to growing concerns over climate change, consumers and firms in developed countries are considering their carbon footprint. Carbon labelling is being explored as a mechanism for greenhouse gas emission reduction primarily by private actors. This paper discusses the carbon accounting activities and carbon labelling schemes that are being developed to address these concerns with a view to their impact on small stakeholders, especially low income countries. This discussion centres on transportation, and the common presumption that products produced locally in the country of consumption will have an advantage in terms of carbon emissions, and on size. Exports from low income countries typically depend on long distance transportation and are produced by relatively small firms and tiny farms who will find it difficult to participate in complex carbon labelling schemes. However, the popular belief that trade by definition is problematic since it necessitates transportation, which is a major source of emissions, is generally not true. The scientific evidence shows that carbon efficiencies elsewhere in the supply chain may more than offset the emissions associated with transportation. Indeed, the effective inclusion of low income countries in labelling schemes may offer important opportunities for carbon emission reductions due to their favourable climactic conditions and their current use of low energy intensive production techniques. The disadvantages of small size can be reduced by carbon labelling schemes that use innovative solutions to low cost data collection and certification.carbon labelling; exports; low income countries;

Can Carbon Labeling Be Development Friendly? Recommendations on How to Improve Emerging Schemes

Can Carbon Labeling Be Development Friendly? Recommendations on How to Improve Emerging SchemesCarbon accounting and labeling for products are new instruments of supply chain management that may affect developing country export opportunities. Most instruments in use today are private business management tools, although the underlying science and methodologies may spread to issues subject to public regulation. This note seeks to inform stakeholders involved in the design of carbon labeling schemes and in the making of carbon emission measurement methodologies about an overlooked issue: How can carbon labeling be made to be both development friendly and scientifically correct in its representation of developing-country agricultural sectors?trade, carbon, development, carbon accounting, carbon labeling, exports, imports, supply chain, regulations, trade barriers

Social orienting in gaze-based interactions: Consequences of joint gaze

Abstract Jointly attending to a shared referent with other people is a social attention behaviour that occurs often and has many developmental and ongoing social impacts. This thesis focused on examining the online, as well as later emerging, impacts of being the gaze leader of joint attention, which has until recently been under-researched. A novel social orienting response that occurs after viewing averted gaze is reported, showing that a gaze leader will rapidly orient their attention towards a face that follows their gaze: the gaze leading effect. In developing the paradigm necessary for this illustration a number of boundary conditions were also outlined, which suggest the social context of the interaction is paramount to the observability of the gaze leading effect. For example, it appears that the gaze leading effect works in direct opposition to other social orienting phenomenon (e.g. gaze cueing), may be specific to eye-gaze stimuli, and is associated with self-reported autism-like traits. This orienting response is suggested as evidence that humans may have an attention mechanism that promotes the more elaborate social attention state of shared attention. This thesis also assessed the longer term impacts of prior joint gaze interactions, finding that gaze perception can be influenced by prior interactions with gaze leaders, but not with followers, and further there is evidence presented that suggests a gaze leader’s attention will respond differently, later, to those whom have or have not previously followed their gaze. Again, this latter finding is associated with autism-like traits. Thus, the current work opens up a number of interesting research avenues concerning how attention orienting during gaze leading may facilitate social learning and how this response may be disrupted in atypically developing populations

Managing the monsters of doubt: liminality, threshold concepts and leadership learning

In this article we argue that management and business undergraduate students who are engaged in learning about leadership occupy a liminal space or state of between-ness. Drawing on anthropological conceptualizations of liminality in which those undergoing liminal rituals must grapple with symbolic monsters, we point to the experience of doubt and uncertainty as ‘monsters’ with which students must come to terms. We link this to scholarship that characterises dealing with uncertainty as a central element of leadership practice. Drawing on notions of ‘threshold concepts’, we suggest that students experience the monster of doubt as they progress in their learning experience and that there are a number of potential ways students might ‘think like a leadership scholar’. We set out some opportunities for leadership educators to engage students with threshold concepts as they seek to become familiar with ‘doubt’ as central to the study and practice of leadership. Applying a liminality framework to the understanding of threshold concepts helps to identify threshold concepts as crucial to learning, infused with cultural assumptions, and situated within an understanding of the student experience