Category Archives: Research

Research

The Olive Branch: a Symbol of Peace? 

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Pinar Dinc*

According to Greek mythology, there was a contest between two Olympian gods, Athena and Poseidon, to determine who would become the patron deity of the city that was ruled by Cecrops. The Olive tree was Athena’s gift to the city that made her win the competition and become the patron of Athens. The olive branch has also been an important symbol of peace as people associated the planting of olive trees with the dispelling of evil spirits and believed that it would endure peace. Some 2500 years later, it is hard to continue believing so. 

Following the Six-Day War in 1967, Israel captured vast amounts of Palestinian property between 1968 and 1979 and legitimized its actions with the argument that this was a temporary, military requisition for security purposes (Braverman 2009). Reports suggest that since 1967, over a million olive trees have been vandalized in Palestine via cutting, uprooting, stealing, burning, etc. Braverman (2009, pg. 130) explains Israel’s rationale for destructing olive trees in three ways: (1) Making way for the Separation Barrier, (2) abolishing hiding grounds for ‘terrorists’, and (3) for further security measures such as constructing watchtowers, checkpoints, fences, and roads around Jewish settlements.

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Rethinking Dispossession, Displacement and Re-Proletarization: Seasonal Agricultural Workers in Urfa

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Aysegul Arslan*

Amidst the extreme summer heat in the drylands of Urfa province in Southeastern Türkiye, the harvest season is starting at full speed, and thousands of seasonal agricultural workers – entire families – are ready to immigrate to work long hours in the fields. When temperatures regularly reach 40 ℃, agricultural work is extremely exhausting. Even though the exact number of people is unknown, most estimates suggest that at least one million people are engaged in seasonal and temporary informal agricultural labor in Türkiye. Most of them are landless Kurds from the Urfa city of Southeastern Türkiye and the majority neither own nor have access to land to earn their livelihoods. Every harvest season, thousands of landless Kurdish seasonal and temporary agricultural worker families migrate informally from the gecekondu districts, which are houses or shelters constructed quickly without proper legal permissions in Urfa city, to work in both Urfa’s rural areas and other regions in Türkiye. Most landless Kurdish seasonal agricultural workers do not have employment contracts and they are paid below the national minimum wage.

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Struggling to find struggles: developing a research on social movements of Florence

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Cristiano Bartolini

I began my MSc research thesis in June 2021, at the end of the second pandemic wave, which forced the world (back) inside, into our homes. I was frustrated and upset that I would probably not be able to conduct research beyond Europe’s borders – or outside my own room, even. At the start of my master’s, I was looking forward to the thesis, quite naively romanticising, in fact, picturing myself as a young researcher in the middle of rural fields, maybe in Latin America, living near native communities that struggle for social and human rights. After the pandemic hit, I had to surrender this idea and recalibrate my research expectations. I refocused my research aims and decided to start a study on social movements in Florence, my hometown.

I had never really thought of researching in a city: during my studies, I had unconsciously neglected its potential to enact a real change in society. The urban context, to me, was a negative environment from which good changes could not emerge. As various authors argue, the city is the centre of capitalistic life, it is the producer of huge economic surpluses, always looking for new outlets to absorb this endless profit that it constantly generates, and this, eventually, brings a lot of socio-economic problems to residents. Let me explain this with an example that ultimately becomes the background of my research.

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New publication by Francis O’Connor on rebel governance and urban-rural ties

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Insurgent movements have commonly re-located to isolated rural areas with weak state presence where their security was guaranteed by a hostile environment to launch insurgencies. The more recent field of rebel governance also draws on predominantly rural cases. Yet, some groups have chosen to predominantly base their armed mobilisations in cities with much higher security risks where they are obliged to mobilise clandestinely. Clandestinity is often seen as an impediment to insurgent consolidation. This article explores the forms of rebel governance adopted by the M-19 in Colombia to construct networks of social ties needed to embed itself in urban environments. It highlights a case of urban rebel governance without territorial control, thus extending the scope of the rebel governance literature. It addresses the spatial variation of the M-19’s insurgency by analysing its diverging experiences of its clandestine mobilisation in Bogota and Cali, as well as a brief window where it conducted more public urban mobilisation. Based on qualitative interviews conducted with former militants and an extensive qualitative, coding of M-19 primary archival sources, the findings show that M-19 could maintain its urban campaigns because of its parallel rural infrastructures. When the conditions for urban mobilisation deteriorated, its militants could flee to the relative safety of the rural fronts. The article’s findings hint at potential avenues for further research, notably more detailed assessment of the ties between urban and rural units and support networks, and a more explicit comparison between patterns of social tie creation in urban and rural environments.

“Clandestinity and insurgent consolidation: The M-19’s rebel governance in urban Colombia” is a new publication by Francis O’Connor, a Marie Curie Skłodowska Post-Doctoral Fellow in Rural Sociology at Wageningen University in the Netherlands. Read the full article here: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.polgeo.2023.102930

Internship: Governing food sharing in Utrecht

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We are looking for a research intern to conduct scientific research on food sharing and governance in the Municipality of Utrecht as part of the EU-funded project CULTIVATE. Knowledge of Dutch and experience with qualitative research methods and analysis are essential.

CULTIVATE uses a multi-actor approach to build sustainability and resilience in urban and peri-urban areas through a ground-breaking online social innovation support platform – The Food Sharing Compass. Built with and for five key stakeholder groups – food sharing initiatives, policy makers, food supply actors, researchers and citizens – the platform will make it possible to navigate diverse food sharing landscapes and cultures, in order to understand, develop, replicate, expand and strengthen sustainable food sharing in Europe. In essence, CULTIVATE will establish the EU as the global frontrunner in the development of resilient and inclusive food sharing economies, identifying drivers and implementation gaps and challenging existing theories and practices which currently constrain sustainable food sharing.

Internship description: The intern will be participating in research which aims to better understand the evolution of, and help transform, existing policies, regulatory regimes, governance structures and habits to strengthen local food sharing economies, promote sustainable food sharing and prevent and reduce food waste.

The intern will part of the Rural Sociology Group of Wageningen University but the work will be based mainly in Utrecht from September 2023 to January 2024 (4 months, full time).

For questions about the position, please contact Dr Lucie Sovova lucie.sovova@wur.nl

Generally, the intern will support the WUR Research team and other members of the CULTIVATE to collect, organize and analyse information and data to help achieve the scientific objectives of the project, develop effective task management and collaboratively work, publish and disseminate project findings.

We seek highly motivated candidates to:

  • work in an international, innovative and multistakeholder project,
  • develop qualitative research skills while working with different types of stakeholders,
  • communicate and amplify scientific, policy and innovation knowledge around food sharing in Utrecht.

Key responsibilities:

  • Follow research protocols to analyse the urban food sharing governance landscape in the city of Utrecht with special focus on food waste, social and solidarity economies, and urban agriculture with support from the research team.
  • Work closely with university researchers and the Municipality of Utrecht to identify leverage points and pathways for transformative change, using scenario and backcasting tools.
  • Support the organisation of project meetings.

Expertise/Competence/Skills:

  • Excellent Dutch and English language skills are a requirement
  • Capable of working independently and meeting deadlines
  • Proven capacity to synthetize and communicate complex ideas
  • Experience with qualitative research methods, especially interviewing is an asset
  • Experience with data collection and policy analysis is an asset
  • Experience with food sharing initiatives is an asset
  • Experience working in diverse teams is an asset