La France et l’Espagne connaissent depuis plus de vingt ans des processus de recompositions territoriales, dont l’un des enjeux est la création de nouveaux territoires intermédiaires à l’échelle locale (structures intercommunales, “Pays” en France, comarcas en Espagne). Entre commune/municipio et département/provincia, ces derniers sont censés favoriser une refonte de l’organisation territoriale, mais aussi le développement de nouveaux modes de gestion territoriale, plus intégrés et plus horizontaux. À partir des exemples des régions Rhône-Alpes et Catalogne, parmi les premières à développer ces nouveaux espaces locaux, cette thèse interroge leur caractère intermédiaire et le type d’intermédiarité qui les caractérisent. L’analyse révèle la fragilité des mailles intermédiaires en construction, liée à l’échec de leurs potentielles fonctions d’intermédiarité et à la faiblesse née de leur caractère intermédiaire : elles connaissent une neutralisation interne et externe, et peinent donc à trouver leur légitimité par rapport aux niveaux existants et à d’autres nouveaux découpages locaux. La multiplication de ces derniers, qui révèle autant qu’elle explique l’échec des mailles étudiées, montre cependant que c’est moins l’échelle ou le niveau intermédiaire qui sont en cause que les modalités de leur construction. En s’appuyant sur un vaste corpus législatif et sur des enquêtes de terrain (Pays Roannais, comarques du Bages et d’Osona), en croisant de multiples échelles spatio-temporelles dans l’analyse de ces découpages locaux, ce travail invite à systématiser, dans le cadre d’une possible convergence européenne, les études géographiques des systèmes d’administration territoriale. / For more than twenty years, France and Spain have undergone various processes of territorial reshaping, among which the creation of new intermediate authorities at the local scale (inter-city structures, Pays in France, comarcas in Spain). Halfway between commune/municipio and département/provincia, these government units are intended to favor the reform of the territorial organization as well as the design of better integrated and more horizontal territorial management policies. Based on the case studies of pioneer regions Rhône-Alpes and Catalunya, among the first to develop these new local spaces, this work questions the level of intermediateness that characterizes these local units under construction. It shows that the failure of their potential intermediate functions is due to their intermediate nature which itself makes them very fragile. They are subject to both internal and external neutralization and struggle to assert their legitimacy vis à vis existing government levels and other new local territories. The dramatic increase of the latter shows that it is the way the intermediate local units under study are built rather than their mere intermediate scale that explains their failure. Based on a large corpus of legislative material, on field studies (Pays Roannais, comarques of Bages and Osona) and on a multi-level cross-analysis in both space and time, this work aims to systematise the geographical approach of local government systems, a methodology particularly relevant in the perspective of converging local policies at the European level.

學習表現為教育社會學中的重要議題，其中城鄉間的學習表現差距受到重視。過去研究認為家庭背景與地區的教育資源是影響學生學習表現的主要因素，然而這些研究缺乏班級因素與同儕效果的分析。因此本研究使用台灣教育長期追蹤資料庫（Taiwan Education Panel Survey, TEPS）在2001年與2003年的國中生樣本，以階層線性模型（Hierarchical Linear Modeling, HLM）分析國一班級同儕學習投入對國三數學表現的影響，學習投入以學生為課業所付出的時間為指標。分析結果發現：(1)學生數學表現的總變異中有24%來自班級因素的影響，76%為學生因素。(2)國三數學表現、個人學習投入與班級同儕學習投入有城鄉差距。(3)在控制其他變項下，個人學習投入、班級同儕學習投入對數學表現有正向效果。(4)班級所在地區的都市化程度透過班級同儕學習投入間接影響國三數學表現。 / Academic performance has been an important topic of research on educational sociology for a long time, while urban-rural differences have been already well documented in literatures. In the past, the literature indicated that the key factors to affecting academic performance are family background and the educational resources. But these researches have ignored the factors of class level and peer effects. In this study, the data are from Taiwan Education Panel Survey (TEPS) in 2001 and 2003, use Hierarchical Linear Modeling (HLM) to assess how peer engagement affects junior high students’ mathematics performance. The time students spend in studying is an index of engagement. The main finding are: (1) This research model accounts for 76% of the variation in student level and for 24% of the class variation in class level with regard to mathematical performance. (2) Students in the urban and rural city show a differences in their mathematics performance, student’s own engagement and peer engagement. (3) When controlling variables, student’s own engagement and peer engagement have positive effect on mathematics performance. (4) Urbanization levels indirectly affect mathematics performance through peer engagement.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI)

No Abstract / Thesis / Bachelor of Arts (BA)

No description available.

We examine the role of residential environments (urban/rural) in understanding the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and the restrictions in nationwide movement on several socio-economic attitudes. We conducted large-scale surveys in four European countries (France, Germany, Spain, and the United Kingdom) before and after nationwide lockdowns were implemented. We investigate how the pandemic affected: (i) economic (economic insecurity), (ii) political (trust in domestic and international institutions), and (iii) social attitudes (loneliness), by controlling for the degree of urbanization, obtained from the geocodes of the survey respondents. Our results show that taking the degree of urbanization into account is not only relevant but is also essential. Compared to urban areas, in rural areas lockdowns led to a greater increase of economic insecurity and to a greater decrease in trust in domestic institutions. We also show that these results are particularly valid for women and households with children.

Some earlier studies have explored the peripheralization of sparsely populated municipalities and the urban-rural divide, both in Sweden and abroad. However, few studies have explored if central actors in the Swedish crisis management system puts these municipalities in their peripheralization according to the ones who conduct the crisis management in the sparsely populated municipalities. Therefore, this study aims to help fill that knowledge gap by capturing the attitudes and experiences from the ones working with crisis preparedness in those municipalities, regarding the handbooks and the other support the Swedish Civil Contingencies Agency offers. The study is conducted by semi-structured interviews with those who work with crisis preparedness on a municipal level, in sparsely populated regions. After the interviews a narrative method, together with analysis tools from Michael Foucault’s theories about power dynamics is applied. Although many good things were said about the handbooks, the results presented two narratives. The first about the peripheralization of the rural areas and the other about an understanding of the urban perspective. An application of the analysis tools made it clear that power dynamics where visible in the narratives. The urban areas have the power to create norms and exclude the rural perspective, while at the same time making it fair and reasonable according to the ones who are affected by it. Which clearly illustrates the power dynamics at play.

This dissertation focuses on utopian versus dystopian perceptions of rural indigenous African societies with regard to the modern metropolis. Since the evolution of the modern metropolis, rural African societies have undergone significant and complex cultural changes that have dislodged rural cultures from being perceived in terms of the traditional notion of fixity. This has lead to the modern city being seen as either utopian or dystopian by rural African societies. The dissertation questions the “utopianess” of the modern metropolis with a special focus on its central idea of “progress”. Special attention is given to artists who explore this cultural phenomenon in the utopian–dystopian paradigm. The dissertation goes further to address the cultural impact of recent technological developments on rural and urban societies, the researcher’s perceptions of this impact and how this has contributed to the dynamics that characterise the cultures of contemporary rural and urban migrants / Art History, Visual Arts & Musicology / M.A. (Visual Arts)

This is a study of coming to know what it is to be Paamese. The work seeks to present an anthropological understanding of ontological concerns that constitute a Paamese perception of subjectivities. I take my lead from Paamese perceptions that the internal capacities of subjects or “things” (e.g. persons, villages, islands, and movement itself) are revealed through relations with others. This correlates with anthropology’s methodology of testing its analytical strategies through the ethnographic practices of others in order to reach more accurate representations. Paamese, as is common elsewhere in Vanuatu and Melanesia, have an extremely fluid attitude towards sociality and easily accommodate urban dwelling without leaving Paama behind. I suggest that a nuanced multi-positioned approach in which several aspects of Paamese sociality are considered from a point of limitation employed by Paamese to focus an event, such as a marriage exchange, will present a better understanding of how these subjectivities, that is Paamese people and Paama Island, adhere such that they do not part company wherever they go. Paamese suggest that each event should be considered as if following a single branch in the canopy of a tree – a scalable perception that offers the promise that a multi-faceted approach will reveal a replicable form. I take this approach to specificity seriously and employ a looping aesthetic, measi, adapted from Paamese sand-drawing in order to consider the shifting concerns expressed by Paamese perceptions of out (place), āmal (agnatic clans), sise (road), vatte (origin), ara (blood) and asi (bone). I suggest that these, parts, can be considered together as a holography for how to come to know what it is to be Paamese.

Esta pesquisa teve por objetivo analisar o processo de constituição de uma nova forma de assentamento proposta pelo MST (Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra) no estado de São Paulo, denominada Comuna da Terra, situada em áreas nas proximidades de grandes centros urbanos, buscando identificar no que ela difere de outras formas de assentamento, no sentido de sua organização interna, e qual a sua contribuição para o avanço da luta por reforma agrária e para o desenvolvimento social e econômico brasileiro. O discurso de intelectuais e parcela do governo de que a reforma agrária não seria mais necessária; a crescente importância atribuída ao agronegócio no país, seja pela política econômica seja pela mídia; e a mudança no caráter do sujeito social da reforma agrária em determinadas regiões, foram alguns dos fatores que levaram o MST a formular essa proposta de assentamento. Para compreender a Comuna da Terra foi imprescindível analisar a questão do sujeito social da reforma agrária. Para tanto, foi necessário compreender os processos migratórios no Brasil, e mais especificamente no estado de São Paulo bem como a crescente importância da migração de retorno. Analisamos então o processo histórico que envolve os grandes centros urbanos e as vidas das classes subalternas que aí se encontram, envolvidas num processo de migração e deslocamento constantes. Analisando os projetos de vida dessa população e o projeto político do MST de constituição das Comunas da Terra, como elemento de uma nova concepção de reforma agrária, pudemos perceber que essa proposta aponta para um novo projeto de desenvolvimento para o campo, no qual elementos do urbano sejam incorporados. Ao questionar os rumos da política agrária, ao reivindicar um novo modelo de desenvolvimento para o campo, ao propor a união de movimentos rurais e urbanos, o MST acaba por colocar em debate um novo modelo de desenvolvimento também para o Brasil. A Comuna da Terra é elaborada com a proposta de ser uma forma de assentamento em que haja infra-estrutura, acesso à informação, tecnologia etc. Em que haja também uma organização espacial que propicie uma maior centralidade. Enfim, a Comuna da Terra é elaborada de forma a ter um caráter mais urbano que os assentamentos convencionais. No entanto, ela não se enquadra como espaço urbano/rural a partir de imprecisões ou transições. Não constitui um espaço em transição do rural para o urbano. É um espaço que se propõe a ser rural, posto que de reprodução do modo de vida camponês, e urbano, ou com elementos do urbano, posto que demanda os benefícios que a urbanidade criou ao longo dos séculos. / This research project aims to analyze the creation of a new kind of land reform settlement in Brazil - the Comunas da Terra, or Land Communes. These settlements were proposed by Brazil\'s movement of landless workers, the Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra (MST), and they have been thus far been located in São Paulo state, close to large urban centers. The project attempts to identify the differences between Land Communes and other kinds of land reform settlements, with particular attention paid to their internal organization. The project also seeks to outline the Land Communes\' contribution to the land reform struggle and, in a broader sense, to Brazil\'s social and economic development. A number of factors led the MST to propose the Land Commune model: the discourse, common among intellectuals and some segments of the Brazilian government, claiming that agrarian reform is no longer necessary; the growing importance of agribusiness, as reflected both in economic policy and in media depictions; and, in some regions, the changing nature of the social subjects who engage in the agrarian reform process. This last factor has particular importance. In order to understand Land Communes, one must analyze agrarian reform\'s social subjects. To approach this question, in turn, one must examine Brazil\'s migratory processes, and particularly the role that São Paulo plays in these processes, as well as the increasing importance of rural return migration. This thesis therefore reviews the history of Brazil\'s major urban centers and of the subaltern classes who live in them, classes which have been continually involved in a dynamic of migration and displacement. The thesis then analyzes the life plans of people from these classes, and the MST\'s political efforts to plan the Land Communes, as two factors leading towards a new conceptualization of agrarian reform. Both types of plan - life plans and Land Commune plans - point towards a new model for rural development, a model in which elements of the city are brought into the countryside. In its challenges to current agrarian policies, in its demands for a new rural development strategy, and in its proposals for unity between rural and urban social movements, the MST has in effect opened a debate about a new development model for Brazil itself. The MST\'s Land Commune proposal envisions a type of land reform settlement in which advanced infrastructure, information access, and technology are readily available. Moreover, the proposal aims to create settlements whose spatial organization is considerably more centralized than previous types of settlement. Land Communes, in summary, are created with a considerably more urban character than conventional land reform settlements. But the Land Communes\' hybrid status, as a urban/ rural space, does not come from their planners\' indecisiveness, nor does it reflect a process of transition. Land Communes are not a transitional space in which the rural becomes urban. Rather, they are a space at once rural - because in them a peasant lifestyle is reproduced - and urban, or at least with urban elements - because their inhabitants demand the benefits that, for centuries, urbanity has created.