Food and Governmentality in the Green City: The Case of German Food Policy Councils

As an essential urban matter, food has always been highly relevant in issues of social and environmental justice. Current debates around food call for a better understanding of the relationship between global and local food production and social and environmental justice. Specifically, discussions on urban greening concepts are considering whether and how social justice and sustainability goals can be achieved. This has become a pressing issue due to a growing awareness of negative effects and social imbalances in the production, consumption, and disposal of food. The article explores the normative foundations and constructions of "good and just food" that are considered appropriate to a sustainable food system and the power techniques related to personal and environmental responsibility that feature in the work of the German food policy councils seeking to initiate a transformation process. Using a governmentality approach based on Foucault, this article seeks to fill gaps in the literature regarding food policy councils and, thereby, contribute to our understanding of the local manifestations of global policy projects that address environmental and social justice in green cities

Keeping it in three dimensions: measuring the development of mental rotation in children with the rotated colour cube test (RCCT)

This study introduces the new Rotated Colour Cube Test (RCCT) as a measure of object identification and mental rotation using single 3D colour cube images in a matching-to-sample procedure. One hundred 7- to 11-year-old children were tested with aligned or rotated cube models, distracters and targets. While different orientations of distracters made the RCCT more difficult, different colours of distracters had the opposite effect and made the RCCT easier because colour facilitated clearer discrimination between target and distracters. Ten-year-olds performed significantly better than 7- to 8-year-olds. The RCCT significantly correlated with children’s performance on the Raven’s Coloured Progressive Matrices Test (RCPM) presumably due to the shared multiple-choice format, but the RCCT was easier, as it did not require sequencing. Children from families with a high socio-economic status performed best on both tests, with boys outperforming girls on the more difficult RCCT test sections

The coloured cube test and the coloured mental rotation test: two new measures of spatial ability and mental rotation

This research introduces two new measures of mental rotation (MR) for 4- to 11-year-old children. Instead of the complex achromatic three-dimensional (3D) cube aggregates used with adults (Shepard & Metzler, 1971), or the flat two-dimensional animals used with children (Quaiser-Pohl, 2003), the new tests uses 3D colourful cubes, either as a standalone, or as a cube aggregate but with fewer elements. The test format is similar to the Raven’s Coloured Progressive Matrices Test (RCPM) which also served as a validation tool. The first new test, the Rotated Colour Cube Test (RCCT), consists of multicoloured single cubes in different orientations. Three age groups of 7- to 10-year-old children (N=100) were increasingly successful in identifying cubes, with boys from socio-economic background that did not receive state benefits performing better in the more challenging test sections. While cubes that were different to the target in terms of cube face colour made the test easier, differently oriented cubes increased task difficulty. RCCT and RCPM were correlated, with the RCCT being the easier test. The second new test development, the Coloured Mental Rotation Test (CMRT), investigated differences in set-size, angularity, and axis of rotation of coloured cube aggregates in 4- to 11-year-old children (N=80). Several higher-order interactions all involved set-size and showed that 4-cube aggregates were the most economical and best 3D object for children’s MR in all age groups. Interestingly, the linear decrease in performance with increasing angularity of 4-cube aggregates was already observed in 4-to 5-year but also still in 10- to 11-year-old boys, as well as in 6- to 7- and 8- to 9-year-old girls. It was concluded that the magical number 4, a capacity limit in attention and short-term memory (Cowan, 2001), can also be observed in MR, due to the Good Gestalt of the 4-cube aggregates

rf-studies of vortex dynamics in isotropic type-II superconductors

We have measured the surface impedance of thick superconductors in the mixed state over a broad 2 kHz - 20 MHz frequency range. The depinning cross-over is observed; but it is much broader than expected from classical theories of pinning. A striking result is the existence of size effects which invalidate the common interpretation of the low-frequency surface inductance in terms of a single penetration depth. Instead, a two-mode description of vortex dynamics, assuming free vortex flow in the bulk and surface pinning, accounts quantitatively for the spectrum of the complex apparent penetration depth.Comment: 20 pages, 6 figures, 28 reference

Temporäre lokale Ökonomien als Ausdruck des gesellschaftlichen Wandels: eine synoptische Übersicht

Mit dem Begriff "temporäre lokale Ökonomien" lässt sich die Gesamtheit aller auf die Entwicklung eines Quartieres und einer Region bezogenen wirtschaftlichen Aktivitäten in einem temporären Arrangement zusammenfassen. Diese kennzeichnet die spannungsreiche Kombination von ökonomischem Handeln und Alltagsleben in einem stadtregionalen Kontext. Ziel dieses Beitrags ist es, die temporären lokalen Ökonomien in ihren fachlichen Diskursen überblicksartig darzustellen und anhand einer beispielhaften Kurzdarstellung (Bikini Berlin) Einblicke in stadtregionale Entwicklungslinien zu geben. --SW: Temporäre lokale Ökonomien; stadtregionale Entwicklung; Pop-up-Stores; BerlinThe term "temporary local economies" can be used to summarise all of the economic activities related to the development of a location and a region in a temporary arrangement. This characterises the exciting combination of economic activity and everyday life in an urban and regional context. The aim of this paper is to provide an overview of temporary local economies in their academic perspectives and to give insights into urban regional development lines using an exemplary brief case study (Bikini Berlin). --SW: Temporary local economies; Urban and regional development; Pop-up stores; Berli

Comment to the paper : Collapse of the vortex-lattice inductance and shear modulus at the melting transition in untwinned YBa2_2Cu3_3O7_7, by Matl \QTR{em}{et al.}

In a recent paper, Matl et al present a high-frequency study of the complex resistivity of a pinned vortex lattice in YBaCuO . They focus on the inductive-to-resistive transition which is investigated as a function of temperature at a constant field $B_0=2$ T, so that the transition is associated with the vanishing of vortex pinning strength. To our view, their conclusions rely on a rather brittle experimental body and the collapse of C66 results from an involved analysis of the finite frequency corrections to $\rho (\omega)$. These corrections are not necessary since the complex frequency spectrum has been previously interpreted by the two modes model, first proposed for low Tc materials. We think that it is more adequate to interpret the present data and should be at least considered.Comment: 4pages tex. submitted to PR