The territoriality paradigm in cultural tourism

A typical geographers' approach to tourism is to emphasise the analysis of spatial flows and space uses and the synthesis of territorial coherence between people, place and product. The renewed interest in the territorial aspects of tourism can be seen as a response to globalisation on the one hand and the search for unique, authentic and grass-rooted experience on the other. In recent tourism studies the focus and methods shift from a description of patterns to the analysis of processes of change that are induced by tourism (touristification). Understanding the forces that are transforming cultural landscapes (urban and rural) into tourismscapes is a crucial condition for visionary planning and responsible management of regions and places. Some reflections on the future research agenda in geo-tourism will be included

Unbundling dynamic capabilities for inter-organizational collaboration

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore two distinct subsets of dynamic capabilities that need to be deployed when pursuing innovation through inter-organizational activities, respectively, in the contexts of broad networks and specific alliances. The authors draw distinctions and explore potential interdependencies between these two dynamic capability reservoirs, by integrating concepts from the theoretical perspectives they are derived from, but which have until now largely ignored each other – the social network perspective and the dynamic capabilities view. Design/methodology/approach The authors investigate nanotechnology-driven R&D activities in the 1995–2005 period for 76 publicly traded firms in the electronics and electrical equipment industry and in the chemicals and pharmaceuticals industry, that applied for 580 nanotechnology-related patents and engaged in 2,459 alliances during the observation period. The authors used zero-truncated Poisson regression as the estimation method. Findings The findings support conceptualizing dynamic capabilities as four distinct subsets, deployed for sensing or seizing purposes, and across the two different inter-organizational contexts. The findings also suggest potential synergies between these subsets of dynamic capabilities, with two subsets being more macro-oriented (i.e. sensing and seizing opportunities within networks) and the two other ones more micro-oriented (i.e. sensing and seizing opportunities within specific alliances). Practical implications The authors show that firms differ in their subsets of dynamic capabilities for pursuing different types of inter-organizational, boundary-spanning relationships (such as alliances vs broader network relationships), which ultimately affects their innovation performance. Originality/value The authors contribute to the growing body of work on dynamic capabilities and firm-specific advantages by unbundling the dynamic capability subsets, and investigating their complex interdependencies for managing different types of inter-organizational linkages. The main new insight is that the “linear model” of generating more innovations through higher inter-firm collaboration in an emerging field paints an erroneous picture of how high innovation performance is actually achieved

Geoweb 2.0 for Participatory Urban Design: Affordances and Critical Success Factors

In this paper, we discuss the affordances of open-source Geoweb 2.0 platforms to support the participatory design of urban projects in real-world practices.We first introduce the two open-source platforms used in our study for testing purposes. Then, based on evidence from five different field studies we identify five affordances of these platforms: conversations on alternative urban projects, citizen consultation, design empowerment, design studio learning and design research. We elaborate on these in detail and identify a key set of success factors for the facilitation of better practices in the future

Persistent Nonviolent Conflict With No Reconciliation: The Flemish and Walloons in Belgium

Mnookin and Verbeke describe the nonviolent but very serious conflict in Belgium between the Flemish (Dutch) of the North and the Walloons (French) of the South. The Flemish economy is more prosperous than the Walloon economy, and the Flemish constitute a majority of the Belgian population. Nevertheless, the Walloons enjoy a financial subsidy from the Flemish and share equally in the political power of the nation due to antimajoritarian restrictions built into the government structure. Even though significant and persistent, this conflict remains nonviolent due to several factors, including largely separate geography, language and social structure; a low-stakes conflict; relatively small wealth disparities; a federal system largely enabling separate political systems; and a pragmatic tradition. Mnookin and Verbeke argue that the disputants can continue to coexist with a civilized separation short of divorce. They further point out that the very factors that help keep this conflict nonviolent also serve to provide little incentive to work toward a more cooperative relationship

Market differentiation potential of country-of-origin, quality and traceability labeling

Product labeling has gained considerable attention recently, as a means to both provide product-specific information and reduce quality uncertainty faced by consumers, as well as from a regulatory point of view. This article focuses on whether and to what extent origin, quality and traceability labeling is an appropriate way to differentiate food products. The focus is on fresh meat and fresh fish, two mainly generic food product categories with a high degree of credence character. Insights into the potential for market differentiation through origin, quality and traceability labeling are provided and discussed using primary data collected during the period 2000-2005 by means of four consumer surveys. In general, direct indications of quality, including mandatory information cues such as best-before dates and species names, but also including quality marks, are found to be more appealing to consumers in general than origin labeling, and the latter more than traceability. The different studies yield the conclusion that the market differentiation potential of origin and quality labeling pertains mainly to a product’s healthiness appeal, and this potential seems stronger for meat than for fish. The differentiation potential of traceability per se is rather limited. Instead, traceability is needed as the regulatory and logistic backbone for providing guarantees related to origin and quality

The rise of ergativity in Hindi: assessing the role of grammaticalization

This article investigates the origins and development of the ergative patterning in Hindi. Following traditional Indo-Aryan scholarship, two evolutions are discerned: (i) the reanalysis of a passive as an ergative construction, and (ii) the development of an ergative case marker ne. Three different hypotheses have been postulated in the literature to account for the latter change, two of which suggest a grammaticalization path: the first argues for a case marker as a possible source, the second points towards a lexical source. The third hypothesis maintains that language contact is involved in the change. We scrutinize all three hypotheses and conclude that the ne-clitic is borrowed from Old Rajasthani and introduced in analogy to other clitics, which were already in use as reinforcers of existing case functions. We argue furthermore that the rise of the ergative marker can only be adequately explained in relation to the constructional change in (i). Drawing on the traditional account which traces the origins of the ergative construction back to a former passive construction through reanalysis, we argue that it was actually this constructional reanalysis that allowed the introduction of an ergative marker in the language