Julian Clark

Citizen science in hydrology and water resources: opportunities for knowledge generation, ecosystem service management, and sustainable development

The participation of the general public in the research design, data collection and interpretation process together with scientists is often referred to as citizen science. While citizen science itself has existed since the start of scientific practice, developments in sensing technology, data processing and visualisation, and communication of ideas and results, are creating a wide range of new opportunities for public participation in scientific research. This paper reviews the state of citizen science in a hydrological context and explores the potential of citizen science to complement more traditional ways of scientific data collection and knowledge generation for hydrological sciences and water resources management. Although hydrological data collection often involves advanced technology, the advent of robust, cheap and low-maintenance sensing equipment provides unprecedented opportunities for data collection in a citizen science context. These data have a significant potential to create new hydrological knowledge, especially in relation to the characterisation of process heterogeneity, remote regions, and human impacts on the water cycle. However, the nature and quality of data collected in citizen science experiments is potentially very different from those of traditional monitoring networks. This poses challenges in terms of their processing, interpretation, and use, especially with regard to assimilation of traditional knowledge, the quantification of uncertainties, and their role in decision support. It also requires care in designing citizen science projects such that the generated data complement optimally other available knowledge. Lastly, we reflect on the challenges and opportunities in the integration of hydrologically-oriented citizen science in water resources management, the role of scientific knowledge in the decision-making process, and the potential contestation to established community institutions posed by co-generation of new knowledge.

Entrepreneurship and diversification on English farms: Identifying business enterprise characteristics and change processes

Despite the growing importance attached to entrepreneurship as a policy concept in European Union (EU) agriculture, little assessment has been made of its practical application. This paper makes a preliminary consideration of the issues in relation to on-farm diversification. First the literatures on agricultural diversification and innovation are reviewed to establish entrepreneurial traits in (1) business change processes, and (2) business enterprise characteristics. The business enterprise characteristics are then used to identify entrepreneurial diversified businesses from a sample of 118 agricultural enterprises in England. Some 15 entrepreneurial farm businesses were identified and their managers interviewed to reflect on the underlying change processes that they had adopted during 1997–2001; the effects of diversification in terms of socio-economic benefits at business and regional levels; and the effectiveness of agricultural business advice services in supporting entrepreneurial behaviour. Respondents confirmed the importance of networking processes to managing change in their businesses. Importantly all had benefited from diversification, through increased net income, reduced dependence on agricultural subsidies and greater income stability during the survey period. Regional economic benefits were more difficult to quantify, although positive employment generating effects were evident among businesses. Importantly respondents commented on their disengagement from sectoral extension agencies in contrast to their enthusiastic use of generic business support. Consequently, consideration is made of adjustments in extension and advisory provision to enhance on-farm entrepreneurial diversification.

Europeanisation and Discourse Building: The European Commission, European Narratives and European Neighbourhood Policy

Europeanisation is a legitimising process through which the European Union strives to gain meaning, actorness and presence internationally. However, this process continues to be described in less than complimentary ways as ambiguous, incomplete, unsettled, or impotent. We contend that it is the contradictory demands of negotiating order at the ‘internal’ and ‘external’ levels both operationally and normatively which critically affect the EUs ability to achieve presence and actorness in international affairs. In this paper we focus upon the role of the European Commission in the external projection of Europeanisation towards the Mediterranean with an emphasis upon the discursive construction, performance and survival of Europeanisation. We show the ways in which the external projection of Europeanisation produces fuzziness and messiness in which the Mediterranean emerges as both a chaotic conception and site of chaos.

Citizen Science for Water Resources Management: Toward Polycentric Monitoring and Governance?

Novel and more affordable technologies are allowing new actors to engage increasingly in the monitoring of hydrological systems and the assessment of water resources. This trend may shift data collection from a small number of mostly formal institutions (e.g., statutory monitoring authorities, water companies) toward a much more dynamic, decentralized, and diverse network of data collectors (including citizens and other non-specialists). Such a move toward a more diverse and polycentric type of monitoring may have important consequences for the generation of knowledge about water resources and the way that this knowledge is used to govern these resources.

Potential environmental implications of nano-enabled medical applications: critical review

The application of nanotechnology and nanoscience for medical purposes is anticipated to make significant contributions to enhance human health in the coming decades. However, the possible future mass production and use of these medical innovations exhibiting novel and multifunctional properties will very likely lead to discharges into the environment giving rise to potentially new environmental hazards and risks. To date, the sources, the release form and environmental fate and exposure of nano-enabled medical products have not been investigated and little or no data exists, although there are a small number of currently approved medical applications and a number in clinical trials. This paper discusses the current technological and regulatory landscape and potential hazards and risks to the environment of nano-enabled medical products, data gaps and gives tentative suggestions relating to possible environmental hotspots.

The spatialising politics of EUropean political practice: transacting 'eastness' in the European Union

Building on recent academic exchanges theorising sociospatial relations, we argue that it is not sociospatial concepts or metaphors per se that delineate the substance of such relations—rather it is the different politics by and through which these concepts are conceived, represented, and mobilised by elite actors. We make an empirically founded contribution to these exchanges by examining the context of the European Unions (EU) sociospatialities, illustrated specifically through central European elite activities in the wake of the 2004 accession to the EU. We show how central European elite assertions of sociospatial concepts were embroiled in complex ways with enactments of these sociospatialities—that is, how the assertion and performance of concepts such as space, territory, and positionality by elite actors created novel forms of politics which, subsequently, have become pivotal to the reconfiguration of contemporary EUropean space.

Social risk assessment and social capital: A significant parameter for the formation of climate change policies

Abstract Public policy issues arising from climate change projections are becoming increasingly important in terms of the range and the scope of their effects. In order to effectively confront them it is important to address social, environmental and economic aspects as fully as possible in decision-making processes. In this context, social risk assessment techniques have begun to be applied to explore citizens’ risk perceptions of climate change projections. The present study aims to contribute to this area by examining the influence of four social capital parameters (social trust, institutional trust, social norms and social networks) on public risk perceptions of climate change. An empirical study was conducted for this purpose in Greeces fourth largest city, Heraklion. Results demonstrate that social capital is a significant explanatory parameter for citizens’ risk perceptions. Specifically, individuals with lower levels of social capital tend to perceive higher risks from climate change impacts. The most important parameter explaining this result is the low level of institutional trust, revealing that Heraklions citizens do not believe that existing public institutions will be able to effectively manage projected climate change impacts.

Evaluating adaptive governance approaches to sustainable water management in north-west Thailand.

Adaptive governance is advanced as a potent means of addressing institutional fit of natural resource systems with prevailing modes of political–administrative management. Its advocates also argue that it enhances participatory and learning opportunities for stakeholders over time. Yet an increasing number of studies demonstrate real difficulties in implementing adaptive governance ‘solutions’. This paper builds on these debates by examining the introduction of adaptive governance to water management in Chiang Mai province, north-west Thailand. The paper considers, first, the limitations of current water governance modes at the provincial scale, and the rationale for implementation of an adaptive approach. The new approach is then critically examined, with its initial performance and likely future success evaluated by (i) analysis of water stakeholders’ opinions of its first year of operation; and (ii) comparison of its governance attributes against recent empirical accounts of implementation difficulty and failure of adaptive governance of natural resource management more generally. The analysis confirms the potentially significant role that the new approach can play in brokering and resolving the underlying differences in stakeholder representation and knowledge construction at the heart of the prevailing water governance modes in north-west Thailand.

The Global Economic Crisis and the Cohesion of Europe

Three EU-based human geographers argue for the need to contextualize the meaning of the current economic crisis in Europe, pointing to precedents in European history. More specifically, they view Europe (as both a set of practices and ideas) as a product of successive crises that have yielded an unexpectedly resilient structure for the European Union, which retains sufficient flexibility to permit different EU members to adapt their economies to the crisis on their own terms without descending into the disintegrative pull of protectionism. The authors also show how the uneven effects of the economic crisis threaten a renewed east-west divide, and highlight the ongoing relevance of the European Union as a transnational fiscal regime with important implications for EUropes future. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: F130, F150, G010, N130, N140. 1 figure, 1 table, 58 references.

Social capital and the public acceptability of climate change adaptation policies: a case study in Romney Marsh, UK

There is now a growing literature emphasizing the critical importance of social variables in the formulation of coastal management policies seeking to tackle climate change impacts. This paper focuses on the role of social capital, which is increasingly identified as having a significant role in climate change adaptation and mitigation strategies. We focus on public perceptions of the social costs and benefits arising from two management options (managed retreat/realignment and hold-the-line), the resulting level of policy acceptability, and how this acceptability is mediated by social capital parameters within coastal communities. These issues are examined by means of a quantitative social survey implemented in Romney Marsh (east Sussex/Kent, UK), an area facing significant impacts from climate change. We tested two models through path analysis with latent structures. The first correlates respondents’ perceived costs and benefits with the level of public acceptability of the two policy options. In the second model, we introduce social capital variables, investigating the impacts on perceived social costs and benefits of the policy options, and the overall effect on the level of public acceptability. Our findings demonstrate: (1) perceived social costs and benefits of proposed policy options influence the level of public acceptability of these policies; (2) these social costs and benefits are connected with the level of public acceptability; and (3) specific social capital parameters (i.e. social trust, institutional trust, social networks and social reciprocity) influence perceived policy costs and benefits, and also have a significant impact on the level of public acceptability of proposed policy options.