Developing the Next Generation of Community-Based Scholars

As we train the next generation of scholars, we should be cognizant that the academy is increasingly being asked to justify its value to broader society. We discuss ways in which students can prepare for the changing directions of the academy as they participate in a community geography research training program. Our results reveal the impacts of our program, contextualize lessons learned from creating community-based research experiences, and provide data to support a framework for other scholars to develop community-based research training programs.     

Rethinking corporate‐community engagement in the petro‐economy of the Niger Delta

This study applies the political ecology perspective in reframing corporate‐community engagement and adapts the community‐directed intervention (CDI) strategy using Global Memorandum of Understanding (GMoU) framework in relation to 30 rural communities that are likely to be affected by gas exploration and production activities in the Niger Delta region. The study draws attention to the indigenous structures and capacities of communities to implement CDI initiatives for possible replication in areas facing similar development challenges. Adopting the CDI framework as represented by the GMoU model could reconfigure social relations of power between companies and communities and fast‐track development and prevent or, at least, reduce corporate‐community tensions and conflicts in the petro‐economy of the Niger Delta.     

Mind mapping as an interactive tool for engaging complex geographical issues

Students and communities engaging with complex geographical issues require tools to assist them structure and contextualise data. This paper examines the use of mind mapping as a tool in geographical education. Case studies are presented from a sample of undergraduate and cross-cultural educational settings demonstrating the use of mind mapping in communication, analysis and problem solving. In critiquing this educational tool, we conclude that mind mapping is particularly effective with communities whose cultures are strong on visual communication but weaker on written communication and in cross-cultural situations where use of written English would disadvantage learners.     

Community Stories: Explaining Resistance to Street Tree-Planting Programs in Detroit,Michigan, USA

Non-profit organizations are key actors in urban and community forestry (UCF) initiatives, and sometimes city residents resist their efforts. Between 2011-2014, 24 percent of residents offered a street tree in Detroit, Michigan, USA submitted a “no-tree request.” Differing views on decision-making emerged as a main reason for resistance to tree planting. This study used interviews with city residents, and those within a non-profit organization, between 2014-2016 to understand reasons for conflict over decision-making between these groups. Heritage narratives, or selective representations of the city’s history and character, helped explain conflict over tree planting. Residents who wanted greater decision-making power in tree planting assumed they would be responsible for stewardship, reflecting their historical experiences within the city. The organization’s dominant heritage narrative emphasized that residents held misperceptions of trees based on negative past experiences, and required education on benefits of trees. Recommendations for integrating heritage narratives into UCF efforts are provided.     

Media Institute on Geographic Concepts

Abstract

A new political geography has emerged that stresses the political conflict behind the production of space. This orientation in the subdiscipline constitutes a turn away from traditional political geography, where the emphasis had previously been on the spatial distribution of political phenomena. The “new” political geographic theory has been applied to the study of environmental issues, turning the attention of scholars to the political struggle behind the construction of nature as well as space. This article reviews how the new political geography of the environment (NPGE) perspective has impacted the study of such environmental phenomena as hazards, siting issues, human-land relationships, resources, development, and international environmental governance. It concludes by suggesting how the NPGE perspective can inform pedagogy in environmental education.     

Introduction to Focus Section: Out in the World: Geography's Complex Relationship with Civic Engagement

Geographers have long been at the forefront of participating in and exploring the intersection of geographic knowledge and community-engaged research. This Focus Section highlights key debates and challenges facing geographers who participate in community-engaged work, explorations of pedagogical and ethical practices, departmental and institutional challenges, and examples of thoughtful applications of geographic knowledge to community-based work. It also seeks to generate knowledge and discussion of how geographers can employ civic engagement to advance geographic learning and enhance the profile of the discipline within and beyond higher education institutions. By focusing on such issues, this collection of articles contributes in vital ways to meet the challenges that higher education institutions face in demonstrating the relevance of academic learning to societal issues. This introduction to the Focus Section reviews the historical context of civic engagement in geography, provides a broad-scale look at the state of civically engaged research in U.S. institutions of higher learning, and highlights the contributions of each of the individual articles included in this Focus Section.     

MOUNTAIN GEOGRAPHY

ABSTRACT. Although mountains have been studied for centuries, they are the subject of only a slender body of formal literature. Instead, those who study high places in specific regions construct working definitions and continually recraft bibliographies. Studies of mountains often focus on comparatively limited themes: physical processes, ecology, or sacred spaces, for example. As scholars become interested in environmental degradation and the development of mountains, there is all the more need to develop a mountain geography literature that expands the study of mountains to include the political, economic, cultural, and social dimensions of their environments and peoples. Three areas‐cultural geography, political ecology, and conservation theory‐are suggested for additional research.     

西方政治生态学的地理学研究进展与启示

随着全球生态环境问题的日益凸显,政治生态学以关注造成环境问题的政治因素为研究内核,成为不同学科共同探索的研究领域。地理学以人地关系为立足点,深化政治生态学研究的空间性和政治性。论文首先通过对西方政治生态学理论脉络进行梳理,发现政治生态学根源于早期环境批判思想、西方马克思主义、后结构主义以及后人类主义理论,并与地理学的发展相辅相成。其次,对近30年西方地理学与政治生态学的相关研究成果进行分析发现,现有的研究议题主要聚焦于生态经济与绿色发展、生态治理与环境保育、生态身份与微观政治及生态客体与能动性4个方面。在此基础上,论文总结了相关研究对中国地理学进行政治生态学研究的借鉴意义,并进一步提出立足中国本土进行政治生态学研究未来需要关注的方向。     

Up Against the Law: Legal Structuring of Political Opportunities in Neighborhood Opposition to Group Home Siting in Massachusetts

Abstract

Conflicts over siting of group homes for people transitioning out of homelessness or struggling with addiction illustrate the multiscalar dynamics at play between locally-based activism and supra-local laws. In Massachusetts, the state-scale legal environment limits the effectiveness of opposition to group housing; nonetheless, such opposition occurs at the municipal level. Drawing on media accounts, official documents, and interviews with stakeholders in conflicts over group home siting in Worcester, Massachusetts, I investigate the dynamics between neighborhood place claims, the responses of the local state, and the state-wide laws governing group home siting. Examining the legal frameworks relevant to social movement grievances demonstrate that law structures the political opportunities available for protest and local government response.     

Early Instruction in Geography: An Exploration in the Ecology of Kindergarten and First-Grade Geography Education

Abstract

Student drawn maps have been relatively neglected as an evaluation tool, despite their potential utility for assessing geographic knowledge. Comparison of students' sketch maps at the beginning and end of the year can inform the teacher about how students' representations of the world change over the course of instruction. Used as a pretest, they can be used to diagnose areas of strength and weakness within a class; as a posttest they can be used to assess students' achievement and the effectiveness of instruction. In this paper we provide an easy method for sorting and summarizing sketch map data, which is illustrated using maps collected from two sixth grade classes. We also outline a framework to guide teachers in generating questions to ask about their own students' maps.     

The Permeable City: Toronto's Spatial Shift at the Turn of the Millennium

This article presents an analysis of the relationship between urban governance restructuring, and global, national, and local action through a case study of the Toronto city‐region. The Toronto city‐region recently underwent a massive reorganization of its governance structures, functions, and jurisdictional boundaries. This restructuring raises questions about why these changes occurred at this particular juncture in the region's history. Why did the city that had always been known in the academic and political discourse as the “city that works” stop “working”? What global and national forces might have accounted for such a radical restructuring? And what did local action contribute? These questions are explored in both historical and contemporary contexts by drawing on insights from regulation theory, urban regime theory, and an analysis of Canada's changing fiscal federalism. This approach informs the role that institutions — regardless of their origin or territorial scope — play in sustaining a local accumulation system, and how this “local” accumulation grounds a national regulatory mode and regime of accumulation. The approach also explores the relationship between regime and regulation theories in the context of policy formation and institution building. The study concludes that the current policy set is incapable of resolving the region's crisis tendencies. Notwithstanding external forces, the current policy set is not inevitable. Globalization does not predetermine all spatial‐economic outcomes.     

The city,the (Member) state,and the European Union

This contribution to a Debate on “The Nation-State and the city” foregrounds the recently adopted Urban Agenda for the European Union. It discusses the new role of cities in the European policy making process and its relevance for relations between State and City in the light of EU membership.     

国际水政治研究进展与政治地理学展望

国际河流因涉及国家间的资源归属和主权事务而具有强烈的政治属性。尽管国际水政治相关的权力和空间议题已成为国际学界的热点之一,但尚未在国内政治地理学者中得到充分关注。结合质性系统性综述与文献计量学方法,对1990—2020年Web of Science核心合集中235篇与CNKI数据库中158篇国际水政治文章进行回顾。结果表明,国际水政治研究呈现多学科介入的特点,中文研究侧重国际关系和国际法议题,英文研究则以政治地理学和政治生态学为主要理论基础。总体而言,在水冲突与合作、话语批判、水-社会关系三大研究主题下,既有研究不仅通过多元主体和话语建构回应“领域陷阱”的局限性,还从辩证和关系视角丰富水的本体论和认识论,从而推进了国际水政治的研究议程。本文认为,政治地理学者可从空间、领域、尺度等角度进一步深化国际水政治研究,为全球治理和可持续发展贡献地理学的理论和思考。     

Cracking the Code: a legal geography and political ecological perspective on vegetation clearing regulations

ABSTRACT

In 2014, the New South Wales (NSW) state parliament passed legislation implementing a new Code of Practice (‘Code 10/50’) granting property owners in bushfire-prone areas the right to clear all trees within 10 m, and all vegetation within 50 m, of residences without prior approval from authorities. The Code is a significant departure from previous regimes which often required permits for vegetation clearance. The Code was introduced in direct response to bushfire threat in the wake of the 2013–14 bushfires in NSW. However, the Code has been plagued by controversy, with accusations of abuse in areas with little or no bushfire history, and a lack of any substantial environmental protections, particularly prior to a review in August 2015. In this paper we examine the debates surrounding the enactment of the Code and consider the way in which particular justifications for the Code permeated parliamentary deliberations. Our investigation relies on unpacking how the Code emerged in order to shed light on how a very controversial policy came into being. We adopt a legal geography approach, together with insights from political ecology, to demonstrate that changes in regulatory processes have the potential to fundamentally alter our landscapes.     

Borderland Lifeways in the American Exclave of Point Roberts,Washington

Point Roberts, Washington is a geographical anomaly that opens a window into the lived experience of borders. Created by the imposition of an antecedent geometric boundary on an undulating coastline, Point Roberts has transitioned from a resource extraction frontier to a summer tourist destination for Canadians to a transnational borderland that defies notions of the bounded state as the container for society. The community is defined by the international border, which both connects and isolates it. Point Roberts relies on a mixture of services from both countries and fills a unique transnational economic niche, reflecting the complementarity between rural and urban and the United States and Canada. Point Roberts is a hybrid borderland: a privileged exurb for U.S. citizens working in Vancouver, a U.S. service center for Canadians, and a seaside retirement community with pockets of isolation and neglect.     

Disciplinary structure and development strategy of human geography in China

Journal of Geographical Sciences - Human geography is a discipline that studies the formation and evolution of the geographical distribution pattern of human activities. The main research objects...     

LIVESTOCK VERSUS “WILD BEASTS”: CONTRADICTIONS IN THE NATURAL PATRIMONIALIZATION OF THE PYRENEES

ABSTRACT. The Pyrenees are becoming an environmental reservoir. The acute human depopulation experienced during the twentieth century and the progressive appropriation of large parts of the mountainous territory by the state in order to implement conservation policies have resulted in the return, via reintroduction or natural regeneration, of bears, wolves, beavers, river otters, marmots, mouflon, feral goats, and deer, among other species. This development, however, has not occurred without social and scientific controversy and leads to questions about territorialization and governmentality. Herders perceive wild animals as unregulated public property subsidized by the work of the local populace. Agriculturalists see their fields trespassed on a daily basis by animals they cannot kill because of their protected status. Ranchers, under extremely strict sanitation regulations, see their animals coming into contact with these unchecked wild populations. The work and living space of the mountain communities has fallen under the jurisdiction of external institutions and constituencies that value conservation and ecotourism above local subsistence.     

人文地理学学科体系与发展战略要点

本文属于《中国学科及前沿领域发展战略研究（2021—2035）》地理科学学科规划的系列成果之一,写作组在对人文地理学学科发展进行系统梳理与分析判研的基础上,在本文中侧重介绍未来15年的中国人文地理学学科体系与发展战略要点。人文地理学是研究人类活动地理分布格局形成和演变规律的一门学科。随着人类发展临近和进入后工业化阶段,人类活动的经济社会过程对人文地理分布规律的影响越来越重要,社会科学研究思维和方法已成为探讨和理解变化的人文地理过程和格局的重要途径,人文地理学研究方法论也呈现出自然科学和社会科学综合集成的特色。人文地理学研究的成果产出,揭示了人类活动地理分布格局和演变的科学规律,成为调控和优化国土空间开发保护格局的科学基础,在国土空间规划、区域战略和区域政策制定、空间治理现代化等方面有着广泛的应用,人文地理学的科学研究与决策应用之间具有紧密的关系。根据学科发展现状、趋势及主要产出结果,中国人文地理学可按照5个分支学科群进行学科战略布局,包括综合人文地理学、经济地理学、城市地理学、乡村地理学、社会文化地理学和政治地理学。各分支学科在新时期地理科学学科体系下,具有其优先发展领域与重点方向,相互协调,不断创新。     

布里顿的批判性旅游地理思想再考

布里顿(Stephen G.Britton)最早运用马克思主义政治经济学,将旅游置于资本主义全球化的社会生产和消费体系中进行批判,回答了旅游到底是什么的问题,为深刻认识旅游发展现象与本质提供了重要的研究路径.作为批判性旅游地理研究的先驱人物,他指出旅游是一种重要的资本积累方式,从中可以看到旅游发展如何创造了空间和地方的...     

A Debt to the West: Recent Developments in the International Financial Situation of East-Central Europe

East-Central Europe is undergoing a rapid political and economic transformation. The unprecedented depth and speed of the economic reforms have produced serious questions about the stability of the region, and its future relations with western Europe and the world economy. This paper surveys and evaluates the size and character of existing debt stocks owed to the West by Hungary, Poland, and Czechoslovakia. The future political and economic stability of East-Central Europe and the European Community depends, to a large extent, on the ability of the Western financial system to respond to the long-term needs of the region.