Ten policies for pollinators Dicks, Lynn V.; Viana, Blandina; Bommarco, Riccardo ...
Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science),
11/2016, Letnik:
354, Številka:
6315
Journal Article
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What governments can do to safeguard pollination services
Earlier this year, the first global thematic assessment from the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem ...Services (IPBES) evaluated the state of knowledge about pollinators and pollination (
1
,
2
). It confirmed evidence of large-scale wild pollinator declines in northwest Europe and North America and identified data shortfalls and an urgent need for monitoring elsewhere in the world. With high-level political commitments to support pollinators in the United States (
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), the United Kingdom (
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), and France (
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); encouragement from the Convention on Biological Diversity's (CBD's) scientific advice body (
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); and the issue on the agenda for next month's Conference of the Parties to the CBD, we see a chance for global-scale policy change. We extend beyond the IPBES report, which we helped to write, and suggest 10 policies that governments should seriously consider to protect pollinators and secure pollination services. Our suggestions are not the only available responses but are those we consider most likely to succeed, because of synergy with international policy objectives and strategies or formulation of international policy creating opportunities for change. We make these suggestions as independent scientists and not on behalf of IPBES.
Drawing on insights from feminist and Science and Technology Studies writing on care and vulnerability, this paper will critically explore conceptualisations of responsibility, care and vulnerability ...in relation to contemporary approaches to Responsible Innovation (RI). Drawing on examples of some of the social and ethical challenges of precision medicine, we highlight the on-going, distributed and complex nature of innovation and responsibilities in relation to markets, patient and carer experience and data practices associated with these new technologies to highlight some of the limits of RI. We end by reflecting on the implications of our analysis for the social and ethical challenges of precision medicine and RI more generally.
•Frameworks for Responsible Innovation do not encompass diffuse, ongoing processes of innovation or the care-work behind this.•We consider these processes in precision medicine, highlighting the work this involves for users and practitioners.•We explore vulnerabilities produced by the market, user experiences and the data practices of precision medicine.•We conclude by reflecting on the broader issues of responsibility and innovation suggested by our analysis.
Despite recent advances in ostomy care, the incidence of stoma and peristomal skin complications including peristomal moisture-associated skin damage (MASD) remains as high as 80% of patients living ...with ostomies. We evaluated a cyanoacrylate liquid skin protectant (CLSP) for the treatment and healing of peristomal MASD in patients with an ileostomy, ileal conduit, or colostomy.
Five patients (24-85 years old) with peristomal MASD related to an ileostomy (n = 2), ileal conduit (n = 2), or colostomy (n = 1) were evaluated in this case study. All were treated with a CLSP in an attempt to reduce peristomal MASD caused by effluent leakage, which resulted in painful denudation of the peristomal skin. All patients received 1 to 2 applications of the CLSP prior to replacement of the pouching system. Prior to CLSP application, patients underwent assessment focusing on the causes of ostomy pouching system undermining and leakage. Interventions to prevent recurrent undermining and leakage, usually focused on modifications of the pouching system, were completed when indicated.
For these 5 patients, complete resolution of peristomal MASD was observed at 2 to 8 days following CLSP treatment. More severe peristomal MASD cases required 7 to 8 days for complete resolution while less severe peristomal MASD resolved within 2 to 3 days. Patients showed less frequent pouching system changes, healing of peristomal skin, and reduced peristomal MASD associated with the CLSP treatment and addressing underlying etiology. On a pain scale of 0 to 10, patients reported less pain with an average of more than 7 out of 10 prior to the CLSP treatment and less than 4 out of 10 after treatment.
Indigenous peoples now engage with many decentralized approaches to environmental management that offer opportunities for integration of Indigenous Ecological Knowledge (IEK) and western science to ...promote cultural diversity in the management of social-ecological system sustainability. Nevertheless, processes of combining IEK with western science are diverse and affected by numerous factors, including the adaptive co-management context, the intrinsic characteristics of the natural resources, and the governance systems. We present a typology of Indigenous engagement in environmental management, derived through comparative analysis of 21 Australian case studies, and consider its implications for the integration of IEK with western science. Sociological and rational choice institutionalism underpin our analytical framework, which differentiates on three axes: (1) power sharing, incorporating decision making, rules definition, resource values and property rights; (2) participation, incorporating participatory processes, organizations engaged, and coordination approaches; (3) intercultural purpose, incorporating purposes of environmental management, Indigenous engagement, Indigenous development and capacity building. Our typology groups engagement into four types: Indigenous governed collaborations; Indigenous-driven co-governance; agency-driven co-governance; and agency governance. From our analysis of manifestations of knowledge integration across the types, we argue that Indigenous governance and Indigenous-driven co-governance provides better prospects for integration of IEK and western science for sustainability of social-ecological systems. Supporting Indigenous governance without, or with only a limited requirement for power sharing with other agencies sustains the distinct Indigenous cultural purposes underpinning IEK, and benefits knowledge integration. We conclude by advocating that the typology be applied to test its general effectiveness in guiding practitioners and researchers to develop robust governance for Indigenous knowledge integration in environmental management.
Homegardens are in situ conservation sources of germplasm diversity for overcoming homogenous germplasm problems in industrial agricultural systems. The Wa people constitute a long-dwelling ethnic ...group mainly in southwestern Yunnan with a unique culture and rich knowledge of traditional vegetables. We hypothesized that traditional vegetable varieties are well conserved in Wa homegardens because Wa culture promotes the preservation of traditional vegetables. We surveyed vegetable varieties and the practices that are involved in the conservation of traditional vegetables in Wa homegardens, which could form the basis for in situ conservation. The methods were used including questionnaires and semi-structured interviews. Sixty homegardens were surveyed through purposive sampling in 6 Wa villages. We documented ethnobotanical information about vegetables in homegardens. Plant species were identified according to the Flora of China. And thematic analyses were conducted for in-depth interviews to identify the conservation factors for traditional vegetables. Fifty-two vegetable species belonging to 16 families and 41 genera were recorded from 60 Wa homegardens. Fifty-five traditional vegetable varieties and thirty-six hybrids were recorded. Among all the villages, 23 + or - 6 (average + or - SD) traditional vegetable varieties per homegarden and 9 + or - 3 (average + or - SD) introduced varieties per homegarden were recorded. Local seeds were stored in 78% of households, with an additional 9% of households' seed supplies coming from neighbors and relatives; the other 13% of households purchased local seeds from markets. In 83% of families, the female head was mainly responsible for the decision-making concerning traditional vegetables in homegardens; in 10% of families, the male head was responsible for decision-making, and a small percentage (2%) was determined by elderly people. Five percent of families made decisions jointly between male and female household heads. This study demonstrated that rich traditional germplasm diversity is harbored in Wa homegardens because of the unique culture and traditional knowledge of Wa communities, which are practiced daily with homegrown food plants. Local vegetable seed conservation and sharing systems help maintain germplasm diversity in the Wa community homegardens. Wa homegardens constitute a practical solution for protecting traditional germplasm diversity and maintaining traditional lifestyles.
Participatory scenario planning (PSP) is an increasingly popular tool in place-based environmental research for evaluating alternative futures of social-ecological systems. Although a range of ...guidelines on PSP methods are available in the scientific and grey literature, there is a need to reflect on existing practices and their appropriate application for different objectives and contexts at the local scale, as well as on their potential perceived outcomes. We contribute to theoretical and empirical frameworks by analyzing how and why researchers assess social-ecological systems using place-based PSP, hence facilitating the appropriate uptake of such scenario tools in the future. We analyzed 23 PSP case studies conducted by the authors in a wide range of social-ecological settings by exploring seven aspects: (1) the context; (2) the original motivations and objectives; (3) the methodological approach; (4) the process; (5) the content of the scenarios; (6) the outputs of the research; and (7) the monitoring and evaluation of the PSP process. This was complemented by a reflection on strengths and weaknesses of using PSP for the place-based social-ecological research. We conclude that the application of PSP, particularly when tailored to shared objectives between local people and researchers, has enriched environmental management and scientific research through building common understanding and fostering learning about future planning of social-ecological systems. However, PSP still requires greater systematic monitoring and evaluation to assess its impact on the promotion of collective action for transitions to sustainability and the adaptation to global environmental change and its challenges.
What does the future hold for the world’s ecosystems and benefits that people obtain from them? While the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) has identified the ...development of scenarios as a key to helping decision makers identify potential impacts of different policy options, it currently lacks a long-term scenario strategy. IPBES will decide how it will approach scenarios at its plenary meeting on 22–28 February 2016, in Kuala Lumpur. IPBES now needs to decide whether it should create new scenarios that better explore ecosystem services and biodiversity dynamics. For IPBES to capture the social-ecological dynamics of biodiversity and ecosystem services, it is essential to engage with the great diversity of local contexts, while also including the global tele-coupling among local places. We present and compare three alternative scenario strategies that IPBES could use and then suggest a bottom-up, cross-scale scenario strategy to improve the policy relevance of future IPBES assessments. We propose five concrete steps as part of an effective, long term scenario development process for IPBES in cooperation with the scientific community.
My article examines the ways in which colonial history intersects with manifestations of subjective and narrative memory in the present. I discuss two Netflix original series to trace the development ...of contemporary responses to intergenerational, intersectional trauma. Hugo Blick’s Black Earth Rising depicts a Rwanda living under the dominion of both external and internal responses to its historical trauma: the corrupt domestic politics of a remade republic confront the power of organizations that erase the details of a past fraught with complexity, while courting a global public’s approval. In Lupin, director George Kay uses the character of Assane Diop to explore the lingering effects of explicitly colonial trauma, and the many-layered ways it continues to play out in racial politics and social divisions – while having recourse to a well-known figure from French popular literature of a different age. Along with a study of the series’ focus on time, memory, and trauma, I address the remaining problematic politics of streaming itself, which – even while claiming to delve into the wrongs wrought by colonial powers upon the developing world – nonetheless prioritizes narratives from the global North in its representation of developing nations, even to the point of limiting those nations’ access to the streaming platforms that claim to offer them global visibility.
The Feeling of Numbers Kennedy, Helen; Hill, Rosemary Lucy
Sociology (Oxford),
08/2018, Letnik:
52, Številka:
4
Journal Article
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This article highlights the role that emotions play in engagements with data and their visualisation. To date, the relationship between data and emotions has rarely been noted, in part because data ...studies have not attended to everyday engagements with data. We draw on an empirical study to show a wide range of emotional engagements with diverse aspects of data and their visualisation, and so demonstrate the importance of emotions as vital components of making sense of data. We nuance the argument that regimes of datafication, in which numbers, metrics and statistics dominate, are characterised by a renewed faith in objectivity and rationality, arguing that in datafied times, it is not only numbers but also the feeling of numbers that is important. We build on the sociology of (a) emotions and (b) the everyday to do this, and in so doing, we contribute to the development of a sociology of data.
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