Saying all the right things? Gendered discourse in climate-smart agriculture

Amidst debates about the role of ‘climate-smart agriculture’ (CSA), the intersection of concerns about climate change and agriculture offer an opportunity to consider how gender is considered in global policymaking. The latest module in the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations, World Bank and International Fund for Agricultural Development Gender and Agriculture Sourcebook – ‘Gender and Climate Smart Agriculture’ – offers an opportunity to reassess how gender factors into these global recommendations. This contribution argues that the module makes strides toward more gender-aware policymaking, but the version of CSA discussed in the module sidesteps the market-led and productivity-oriented practices often associated with CSA. As a result, though the module pushes a more feminist agenda in many respects, it does not fully consider the gendered implications of corporate-led and trade-driven CSA.     

Climate-smart agriculture: what is it good for?

Leading international organisations presently argue that a transition to ‘climate-smart agriculture’ (CSA) is an obligatory task to ensure food supply for an anticipated nine billion people by 2050. Despite the rubric’s newfound importance, the conceptual underpinnings of CSA are often left unclear. Focusing on the World Bank’s framework, this paper critically interrogates the principles and concepts that underpin CSA. It argues that while CSA provides greater policy space for more holistic approaches to agriculture, it nonetheless operates within an apolitical framework that is narrowly focused on technical fixes at the level of production. This depoliticised approach to the global food system tends to validate existing policy agendas and minimise questions concerning power, inequality and access. By highlighting four strong tensions that permeate the CSA framework, the paper extols the need to greatly widen the scope of debate. To this end, it proposes an alternative ‘climate-wise’ framework to foreground the inherently political dimensions of food and agriculture in an era of climatic change.     

A Pragmatic Approach to Designing Changes Using Convergent Interviews: Occupational Violence Against Paramedics as an Illustration

Developing a change program to address complex problems can appear overwhelming. This study presents how an inductive diagnostic technique known as convergent interviewing can provide a summary of the critical issues that could be addressed by a change program. A systems perspective is used to show how the issues raised by the diagnostic process can be targeted in order to have the most effect and be pragmatically implementable. The use of the tool is illustrated by analysing an employee problem that needs to be addressed in public services, the high rates of occupational violence against paramedics. The resulting inductive systems model can be used for diagnosis or for informing a variety of change interventions. Convergent interviews are relatively easy to use, powerful, and applicable to many situations. This tool is particularly useful for developing innovations regarding a specific problem, changes that could be a source of substantial public value.     

The EU’s Emissions Trading System,Part 1: Taking Stock

This is part 1 of a paper that revisits the European Union’s Emissions Trading System (EU ETS) in an attempt to take stock of how the system has worked and evaluate it from the standpoint of radical political economy. The paper briefly discusses the basics of the scheme, including its design as a financial instrument and its performance during the first trading period (2005–2007). It then moves to elaborating on the workings of the scheme during phase 2 (2008–2012) and on the initiation of phase 3 (2013–2014). This analysis discusses the adjustments and the extensions of the scheme, compliance results and allowance trades and prices with a critical eye. The paper reveals the unsatisfactory results of the scheme (even in its own proclaimed aims), which include allowances surplus, allowance trades for pure financial purposes, low and volatile price of allowances, windfall profits, extensive use of Kyoto project-based credits, and several malfunctions and instances of fraud. These findings set the ground for part 2 of the paper which offers a critical assessment of ETS from the standpoint of radical political economy, putting emphasis on the needs and interests of the unprivileged working people.     

Trajectories of land acquisition and enclosure: development schemes,virtual land grabs,and green acquisitions in Indonesia's Outer Islands

While the size and speculative nature of land transactions in the wake of energy, food and climate crises have surprised observers, the reasons for partial implementation of many land developments remain largely unexamined. This contribution investigates trajectories of land acquisition and enclosure by analyzing four acquisition processes in Indonesia – those associated with rice, oil palm, Jatropha and carbon sequestration – considering their implications for comparative studies elsewhere. The paper finds that current patterns of land usechange represent a continuation of ongoing land transformation processes. Itdescribes the logic leading to partial realization of large-scale schemes. Highlighting the importance of interactions between formal and vernacular rural land development processes, the essay concludes that many large-scale schemes are better understood as virtual land acquisitions.     

“以学生为中心”教育模式在大学英语教学中的应用

随着国际高等教育的不断发展,大学英语课程教学的发展面临瓶颈,实现"以教师为中心"向"以学生为中心"的教育理念、教育方式的转变是解决当前问题的核心因素。     

浅谈税收干部在税收管理、执行政事上的问题与对策

随着税收管理改革的深入 ,广大税务干部必须转变思想观念 ,严格执法 ,提高素质 ,改进工作方法 ,加强监督约束机制     

中国民营企业三次创业将面临的变革

中国民营企业在第三次创业中,正面临着从个人、家族式企业向经理式企业转变;从投机主义的短期行为向稳健发展的长期行为转变;从本土化、封闭型向国际化、开放型转化;企业经营目标与经营理念的转变等一系列变革.为实现上述转变必须创造良好的内外部条件,使民营企业的发展步入良性发展的轨道.     

科技进步在推动资本主义社会发展中的作用

自从资本主义产生以来,在科学技术方面已经发生了三次质的变革.科学技术每一次变革都推动了资本主义社会的发展变化.第二次世界大战后,科学技术的巨大进步,使生产力诸要素产生了不同于以往的质的飞跃,极大地推动了西方资本主义国家生产力的发展.20世纪80年代以来,在发达资本主义国家以信息技术为中心的高科技革命迅速发展,它推动着延续了一个多世纪的工业经济正在转变为信息经济.以此为基础,整个社会也正在转变为信息社会.正确认识科学技术在资本主义生产中的二重作用,对于我国社会主义现代化建设和科技发展,可以提供有益的借鉴.     

经济全球化条件下“两制关系”的新变化及其发展趋势

社会主义与资本主义两种不同社会制度的对立统一关系在经济全球化条件下进入了 新阶段,出现了环形式、新特点,新发辰赵势。多层次形式的非制度性冲突与合作,更加激烈的非制 度性利益争夺与摩擦,更加隐蔽、间接和复杂的制度性矛盾和斗争,将伴随未来经济全球化发展全 过程。随着经济全球化趋势的不断扩大和深化,融合与斗争两种趋势的双向延伸和辐射,将使两制 间的较量与斗争在全球范围内更加长期、复杂、艰苦,使两制间的合作与融合更加长期、全面、主动。 两种发展趋势同时存在,而压倒一切的则是它们之间的交流与合作。