Search results for "development studies"
showing 10 items of 69 documents
Socio-economic differentiation in the post-communist rural Baltics : the case of three kolkhozes
2016
ABSTRACTThis paper uses longitudinal quantitative data to examine socio-economic differentiation in the rural Baltic areas after decollectivization. It argues that the rural social structure in the post-Soviet Baltics is best determined by two criteria: source of income (income from farming entrepreneurship or income from salaries) and land holdings. Four rural groups are identified: people getting their main income from farming can be differentiated into large landowners engaged in the commercial production of agricultural goods and people with small or medium-sized farms; and people earning their main income from wages can be separated into people with no farming activities and people who…
Border diplomacy and state-building in north-western Ethiopia,c. 1965–1977
2017
In the first half of the twentieth century, the north-western lowlands of imperial Ethiopia were the typical interstitial frontier of the Ethiopian–Sudanese borderlands. Starting in the early 1960s, a cash crop revolution paved the way to the transformation of the Mazega into a settlement frontier and the emergence of a dispute with Sudan for demarcation of the international border. This article explores the entanglement between the political economy of frontier governance and border diplomacy in the contested area. It highlights how the management of the border dispute was deeply affected by the contradictory interests of the various layers of government and “twilight” entities that projec…
Towards an integrated approach to emergency management: interdisciplinary challenges for research and practice
2015
This article presents an interdisciplinary vision for large-scale integrated emergency management that has been inspired by the transition from platform centric to integrated operations in the oil and gas fields, which uses remote emergency control centres collaborating virtually with local responders. The article discusses some of the most salient research challenges for integrated emergency management, including the role of mobile technology, human-centred sensing, citizen participation and social media, and the socio-cultural determinants of disaster management. The purpose of this article is to frame an integrated emergency management approach that adopts a multi-disciplinary approach, …
Positive Forces and Vicious Mechanisms Behind Innovative Activity in a Lagging Region
2005
Literature about economic growth of less developed regions is traditionally concentrated on problems related to gaps and on the ways by which such regions might “run after” or even catch-up the more advanced economies. In these approaches, therefore, the central issue very often consists in the application of growth models constructed on the experiences of development. On the other hand, pure literature on development refers mainly to Third World realities and deals essentially with problems linked to economic and social development of low income countries. Last but not least, traditional literature about technological change generally analyses growth processes of industrialised countries a…
Educational Pathways and Gender Differences in Labor Market Entry in France
2015
International audience
Pastoralists are peoples: Key issues in advocacy and the emergence of pastoralists' rights
2017
This article deals with the rights-based approach to development that in the last decade has informed discourse on pastoralism. It focuses on the organisations that have engaged in pastoral advocacy at the global level, considering the dynamic conceptions of development, human rights and policy that provide their cultural and operative background. It outlines the convergence of indigenous rights with the core challenges of pastoralism, and the emergence of the new concept of 'pastoralists' rights', eventually considered as a separate domain. It argues that the mobility paradigm of pastoral development may not by itself provide an adequate answer to the problems of pastoral communities, unle…
Why do financial inclusion policies fail in mobilizing savings from the poor ? Lessons from rural south India
2017
© The Authors 2017. Development Policy Review © 2017 Overseas Development Institute Combining multivariate and qualitative analyses, this micro-level study suggests an explanation for the persistence of informal savings in rural south India despite publicly run large-scale programmes to promote bank savings. Gold, in particular, but also Rotating Saving and Credit Associations (ROSCAs) and private lending, remain the dominant forms of savings. We argue that cultural norms and social institutions, such as social class and caste, shape the nature of savings, and also the propensity and opportunities to save. Gold serves multiple purposes, financial, economic, socio-cultural and political. Fur…
Focus on Women in Microfinance Institutions
2013
Abstract We provide empirical evidence on focusing on women in microfinance and its consequences for microfinance institutions (MFIs). Based on a global dataset, the results indicate that a focus on women is associated with group-lending methods, international orientation, smaller loans, and non-commercial legal status. We find that a focus on women significantly improves repayment but does not enhance overall financial performance because of higher relative costs. Moreover, the higher relative costs do not stem from servicing women per se but from the smaller loans offered to women and the group-lending methodology practised by MFIs focusing on women.
The effectiveness of rural versus urban nonprofit organisations in the Democratic Republic of Congo
2017
The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is a country with high natural resources, but it has suffered from decades of civil wars and social turmoil, being heavily aid-dependent. In the DRC, several Nonprofit Organisations (NPOs) are major players in fighting poverty and enhancing welfare. This research aims to analyse the effectiveness of small NPOs in improving poor peoples’ lives through health, education, and economic activities. Two NPOs working in the DRC, one in a rural and the other in an urban area, are compared by researching the aid sites and surveying 201 households (aid beneficiaries). Our case observations and the survey results facilitate analysing the mission accomplishment, e…
The ‘actually existing’ cultural policy and culture-led strategies of rural places and small towns
2016
Abstract Questions regarding the relevance of culture-based development strategies are even more relevant to ask when such strategies are applied to rural places and small towns. In urban contexts, the number of citizens and the volume and variety of the cultural sector, other industries and services are important success criteria. In small Norwegian rural municipalities, these factors are even more critical because the Norwegian rural context is characterized by low population density and low variety and volume in industries and services. Rural places and small towns are, to a large extent, neglected in the culture-led development studies, and likewise, culture is largely neglected in rura…