Differences Between Women? Intersecting Voices in a Female Narrative

The ‘intersectionality’ approach in feminist theory postulates that differences between women, such as age, ethnicity, class, nationality, sexuality, etc. do intersect. However, intersectionality starts to get blurred when examined concretely because the list of differences is always endless. There is frequently silence about concrete questions such as: who defines when, where and which of these differences are rendered important in particular conceptions, and which are not? This article examines how categories of difference and identity interplay and intersect by analysing a narrative life-interview with a female migrant to Vienna. It aims to make visible some of her specific identifications and differentiations and how these are located in time and space, by focusing on her self-presentation and the categories of difference such as gender, class and ethnicity that she introduces. Through this the article aims to contribute to discussions of the dynamism of subjectivities and power relations

Kritik des Black Feminism an feministischer Theoriebildung

'Der vorliegende Artikel diskutiert die Einflüsse von Black Feminism auf feministische Theoriebildung. Unter Black Feminism wird im Folgenden afrikanisch-amerikanischer Feminismus verstanden, wobei dessen Hauptkritik an 'weißer' feministischer Forschungspraxis an deren unreflektierter Ausgrenzung und Dominanz ansetzt. Dabei geht es den Black Feminists vor allem um die Vernachlässigung von Differenzen zwischen Frauen. Ihre Kritik führte seit Mitte der 80er-Jahre dazu, dass innerhalb feministischer Theoriebildung die Kategorie Geschlecht um die Kategorien Ethnizität, Klasse, Sexualität, u.a. erweitert werden musste. Die Debatte in der feministischen Wissenschaft bewegte sich damit über die Geschlechterdualität hinaus hin zu einer Diskussion um die Differenzen zwischen Frauen. Damit steht sie allerdings vor neuen, beinahe unlösbaren Problemen: Wenn nicht mehr von einem gemeinsamen Kollektiv 'Wir Frauen' die Rede sein kann, ist die 'Geschäftsgrundlage' des Feminismus gefährdet. Es werden entsprechende aktuelle Debatten, Strategien und Vorschläge innerhalb der amerikanischen feministischen Theoriebildung vorgestellt.' (Autorenreferat

Can cross-border bargaining coordination work? Analytical reflections and evidence from the metal industry in Germany and Austria

To contain downward pressures on labour standards, Europe's unions have attempted to coordinate their bargaining strategies. Little is known about whether such coordination can actually work. Analytical accounts have deduced its feasibility from national experiences with decentralized forms of coordination, while empirically only anecdotal evidence on its effectiveness is available. This article contributes to the analytical debate by pointing out the different logics of national and transnational bargaining coordination. Empirically, it tests the prospects for cross-border coordination by analyzing how Austrian collective agreements in the metal industry related to their German counterparts from 1969 to 2003. We conclude by discussing the implications for EU-level bargaining coordination

Getting a grip on negotiation processes: Addressing trade-offs in mountain biking in Austria, Germany and Switzerland

Space for recreation is an important service provided by forests close to urban and rural areas alike. Mountain biking, as one recreational activity, is increasingly becoming widespread, which can lead to challenging trade-off situations, as some benefits from forests come at the cost of another forest benefit and vice versa. For instance, illegally constructed mountain bike trails lead to trade-offs between environmental protection and other forest utilizations such as wood production. We thus study how such trade-off situations can be negotiated to find an outcome, such as a legal mountain bike trail, which is accepted by stakeholders. In doing so, we select case studies where we expect to find similar trade-off situations that lead to the negotiation process about mountain bike trails. Specifically, we analyse the cases' negotiation processes (action situations) by applying Ostrom's Institutional Analysis and Development Framework. Our findings show the importance of collective actors, a clear delineation of responsibilities and of compensation and funding measures as well as structured workshops and collective site inspections for addressing trade-offs and for arriving at acceptable outcomes in our cases

Institutional and policy frameworks shaping the Wooden Multi-Storey Construction markets : A comparative case study on Austria and Finland

In the urbanizing society faced with the climate change challenge, wood has major potential as a low-carbon and renewable construction material. Yet, Wooden Multi-storey Construction (WMC) remains a niche even in countries with rich forest resources. This paper compares the institutional and policy setting and assesses the WMC growth prospects in Austria and Finland, based on expert interviews, Delphi surveys, and the review of secondary materials. Clear differences were detected in the policy frameworks and institutional settings between the two countries. The Austrian fairly informal and largely private sector driven approaches to promote the growth of the WMC sector seem to have had a rather similar effect on the markets, as the formal policy measures, typically driven by the public sector in Finland. In both countries, the interviewed experts suggested additional, but partly different, policy measures and institutional changes to accelerate WMC market diffusion. In spite of the increase in WMC activity within the past ten years, the WMC market share is likely to remain rather low by 2030 in both countries, as the institutional frameworks are not expected to change abruptly. However, the future market prospects appear to be somewhat more positive in Finland compared with Austria.Peer reviewe

Innovation governance in the forest sector : Reviewing concepts, trends and gaps

Innovation in the forest sector is a growing research interest and within this field, there is a growing attention for institutional, policy and societal dimensions and particular when it comes to the question of how to support innovativeness in the sector. This Special Issue therefore focuses on governance aspects, relating to and bridging business and political-institutional-societal levels. This includes social/societal factors, goals and implications that have recently been studied under the label of social innovation. Furthermore, the emergence of bioeconomy as a paradigm and policy goal has become a driver for a variety of innovation processes on company and institutional levels. Our article provides a tentative definition of & ldquo;innovation governance & rdquo; and attempts a stateof-art review of innovation governance research in the forest sector. For structuring the research field, we propose to distinguish between organizational/managerial, policy or innovation studies. For the forestry sector, specifically, we suggest to distinguish between studies focusing on (i) innovative governance of forest management and forest goods and services; on (ii) the governance of innovation processes as such, or (iii) on specific (transformational) approaches that may be derived from combined goals such as innovation governance for sustainability, regional development, or a bioeconomy. Studies in the forest sector are picking up new trends from innovation research that increasingly include the role of societal changes and various stakeholders such as civil society organizations and users. They also include public-private partnership models or participatory governance. We finally should not only look in how far research approaches from outside are applied in the sector but we believe that the sector could contribute much more to our general scientific knowledge on ways for a societal transformation to sustainability.Peer reviewe

Social innovation and its impacts in disadvantaged rural areas: a new evaluation framework

An agreed and well-consolidated evaluation framework for the assessment of social innovation (SI) and its impacts has not been developed yet, despite tentative made by scholars (e.g., Nicholls et al. 2015). The EU funded H2020 project SIMRA \u2013 Social Innovation in Marginalised Rural Areas (www.simra-h2020.eu) \u2013 aims to conceptualize an evaluation framework for SI initiatives in disadvantaged rural areas of Europe and non-EU Mediterranean countries. Within SIMRA, SI is defined as \u201cthe reconfiguring of social practices, in response to societal challenges, which seeks to enhance outcomes on societal well-being and necessarily includes the engagement of civil society actors\u201d (Polman et al., 2017). The evaluation framework has been co-constructed with project partners and a panel of international stakeholders in the fields of agriculture, forestry and rural development (Nijnik et al. 2019). It is structured into dimensions and sub-dimensions. It follows the phases of a SI initiative, from the trigger that generates the idea, to the reconfiguring process, and to its impacts. Eight tools for data collection have been developed, tested in pilot cases, and applied in 11 case studies. Empirical results allowed to set 166 indicators: 73 indicators describe the SI dimensions; 63 indicators analyse the process, the project and the whole SI initiative by following relevance, efficiency, effectiveness, impact and sustainability evaluation criteria (OECD, 1991 and 2010); 30 indicators focus on the key aspects of the SI SIMRA definition. Social Network Analysis helps in visualizing the increasing collaborative network of actors involved in the SI process, from core group composed by innovators and followers, to the reconfigured network with new project partners. The approach integrates qualitative-pure methods (e.g., focus group) with quantitative ones. The proposed evaluation framework would like to contribute to current debates, both within the scientific and practitioners\u2019 communities, on evidence-based policy and self-evaluation by rural development agencies

Encoding context determines risky choice

Both memory and choice are influenced by context: Memory is enhanced when encoding and retrieval contexts match, and choice is swayed by available options. Here, we assessed how context influences risky choice in an experience-based task in two main experiments (119 and 98 participants retained, respectively) and two additional experiments reported in the Supplemental Material available online (152 and 106 participants retained, respectively). Within a single session, we created two separate contexts by presenting blocks of trials in distinct backgrounds. Risky choices were context dependent; given the same choice, people chose differently depending on other outcomes experienced in that context. Choices reflected an overweighting of the most extreme outcomes within each local context rather than the global context of all outcomes. When tested in the nontrained context, people chose according to the context at encoding and not retrieval. In subsequent memory tests, people displayed biases specific to distinct contexts: Extreme outcomes from each context were more accessible and judged as more frequent. These results pose a challenge for theories of choice that rely on retrieval as guiding choice

Obesity-induced alterations in the gut microbiome in female mice fed a high-fat diet are antagonized by dietary supplementation with a novel, wax ester–rich, marine oil

Dietary supplementation with calanus oil, a novel wax ester–rich marine oil, has been shown to reduce adiposity in high-fat diet (HFD)–induced obese mice. Current evidence suggests that obesity and its comorbidities are intrinsically linked with unfavorable changes in the intestinal microbiome. Thus, in line with its antiobesity effect, we hypothesized that dietary supplementation with calanus oil should counteract the obesity-related deleterious changes in the gut microbiota. Seven-week-old female C57bl/6J mice received an HFD for 12 weeks to induce obesity followed by 8-week supplementation with 2% calanus oil. For comparative reasons, another group of mice was treated with exenatide, an antiobesogenic glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonist. Mice fed normal chow diet or nonsupplemented HFD for 20 weeks served as lean and obese controls, respectively. 16S rRNA gene sequencing was performed on fecal samples from the colon. HFD increased the abundance of the Lactococcus and Leuconostoc genera relative to normal chow diet, whereas abundances of Allobaculum and Oscillospira were decreased. Supplementation with calanus oil led to an apparent overrepresentation of Lactobacillus and Streptococcus and underrepresentation of Bilophila. Exenatide prevented the HFD-induced increase in Lactococcus and caused a decrease in the abundance of Streptococcus compared to the HFD group. Thus, HFD altered the gut microbiota composition in an unhealthy direction by increasing the abundance of proinflammatory genera while reducing those considered health-promoting. These obesity-induced changes were antagonized by both calanus oil and exenatide