Analysis of Citizen Participation in Urban Planning of Comala,Colima,Mexico-A Secondary Publication

The objective of this study was to determine the degree of citizen participation in urban planning processes in the municipality of Comala,Colima,Mexico to have a broader vision of the citizens and the environment in which they live.An instrument was designed specifically to perform this study and the instrument was validated by calculating Cronbach’s Alpha.The results showed that citizens were highly involved in issues concerning their urban environment,and the main problems of the public spaces were also identified.

The Three Principles of Institutional Safeguards for Women's Participation in Legislation in China

The participation of women in legislation is an important aspect and means of safeguarding women’s rights.Feminist theory,based on criticism of both the“citizenship identity theory as rights”and the“citizenship identity theory as responsibilities,”proposes the“citizenship identity theory as subjectivity.”Observing the current practice of women’s participation in legislation in China,two institutional safeguard principles can be summarized:the“minimum proportion”and the“influence evaluation.”However,each of these principles has its inherent limitations.Therefore,it is necessary to supplement them with the principle of“subjective participation”in a reflective manner.This principle requires women to participate substantively in the legislative process as subjects,express women’s needs and demands,input women’s perspectives and experiences,and reconstruct the distribution of rights and responsibilities in the existing legislation.The three principles complement each other and work together to comprehensively constitute the institutional structure of women’s participation in legislation,thereby promoting the reproduction of corresponding action structures.

Computer support system for residential environment evaluation for citizen participation

Though the method of citizen participation in urban planning is quite well established, for a specific segment of residential environment, however, existing participation system has not coped adequately with the issue. The specific residential environment has detailed aspects that need positive and high level involvement of the citizens in participating in all stages and every field of the plan. One of the best and systematic methods to obtain a more involved citizen is through a citizen workshop. To get a more “educated” citizen who participates in the workshop, a special session to inform the citizen on what was previously gathered through a survey was revealed to be prerequisite before the workshop. The computer support system is one of the best tools for this purpose. This paper describes the development of the computer support system for residential environment evaluation system, which is an essential tool to give more information to the citizens before their participation in public workshop. The significant contribution of this paper is the educational system framework involved in the workshop on the public participation system through computer support, especially for residential environment. The framework, development and application of the computer support system are described. The application of a workshop on the computer support system was commented on as very valuable and helpful by the audience as it resulted in greater benefit to have wider range of participation, and deeper level of citizen understanding.

The Analysis of Volunteer Service in Increasing Citizen Participation

Many scholars have gradually realized that volunteer service can not only manifest the social value,but also become an effective way to enlarge citizen participation.Mainly from the aspects of the rationality of the increasing of citizen participation in volunteer service,this paper analyses the significance of volunteer service in the modernization transformation of China and puts forward some suggestions for the development of China' s volunteer service in the future.

An Empirical Study on Hainan Citizens'Participation in Urban Community Governance under the Background of Free Trade Port Construction

Hainan is in the period of high-speed development and transformation of government management.To build a free trade port with Chinese characteristics requires a modern social governance system that confirms to the trend of the times,and community governance is important part of whole social governance system.Citizens'cooperative participation in grass-roots community governance has the functions of creating a good living environment,reducing social conflicts,improving residents'sense of well-being and attracting all kinds of talents.Based on the perspective of multi cooperative social governance,this paper empirically investigates the current situation of Hainan urban resident's participation in community governance,explores the reasons for the lack of citizen participation in community governance,and puts forward suggestions for improving citizen participation in community governance.

Logic of Citizen Participation in Sustainable Development

Sustainable development,a concept which has been built with the sustainability of economic progression as a main thrust,has been a widely preferred model to traditional developmental models.However,the real meaning of what sustainable development is and should include has been an object of debate.On the one hand,differing from traditional economic developmental models,economic progress does not necessitate the practice of ‘sustainable development'.On the other hand,current levels of science and technology are still unable to solve several problems that arise with economic development.Sustainable development has transferred the responsibility of environmental destruction to that of developing countries.Lastly,instead of utilizing the best technology and leadership into formulating excellent environmental-protection policies,it is more important to create widespread awareness to the public on the need to protect the environment and thereby engage their participation in decision-making to actually realize what is truly ‘sustainable development'.

Participation and Communication in the Time of Social Media:A Chimera or an Opportunity

Communication and participation immediately present themselves as a combination capable of developing mutual symbiosis and reinforcement.However,it would be superficial to deduce that the ease of communicating through social media has solved the problem of participation.Instead,it is necessary to start from the awareness of the problems of this binomial in order to attempt to follow virtuous paths and avoid blind alleys.The paper presents the research/action carried out in several civic participation experiences,both real and virtual,promoted by NGOs and the local public administrations of several Italian cities(Verona,Messina,Bolzano,and Rome).The results highlight the opportunities and problems of participation through social media.Specifically,those opportunities are:(1)the possibility of involving a larger number of people who could not participate without social media;(2)the sharing not only of the results of the participation but also the processes behind the participation allows for an active protagonism of the people;and(3)the care of the real and virtual places of participation facilitates the active involvement of people.On the other hand,the problems are:(1)the lack of awareness of online media space generates a redundancy in communication;(2)the difficulty of emerging in the online public media space causes disaffection and disinterest;and(3)the scarce capability to be producers of online media content generates a fake participation.

China's Expanding Participation in the UN Peacekeeping Operations

The UN-led peacekeeping operation is a lodestar within the field of current international security.As an important example of her peaceful diplomacy,China has consistently and continuously supported the UN-led peacekeeping operations since 1998 when China joined the UN peacekeeping Operation Special Committee.The Chinese peacekeepers accomplished their UN-authorized missions successfully.With their impressive professionalism,high spirits,combat capabilities,and outstanding achievements,the Chinese peacekeepers have been highly acknowledged by the UN organizations,the host nations and the international media.

Experiments with a University e-Participation Platform

Currently, the ICT put at our disposal is increasingly more powerful tools that can help increase citizen participation, transparency, and legitimacy in decision-making. We understand that these participation tools can break down into a set of tasks. In this dissertation, we review some of these tasks and how we can integrate them into a series of processes in public higher education institutions. By establishing the tasks, we can set up an online architecture for electronic participation and support for decision-making within the university community. One of the consolidated database architectures we have used for this study is MyUniversity-URJC. This proposal is achievable by utilizing the Universities’ technological infrastructure and, mainly, the digital culture of its users.

The Scope of China's Service Sectors Permitting Foreign Participation

Finance It is permitted to establish Sino-foreign joint-venture financial companies, wholly foreign-owned financial companies, and Sino-foreign joint-venture banks, provided that both sides in the joint venture are financial institutions, and the foreign side has a representative office in China.

The Literature Review of Teacher’s Feedback and Students’ Participation in Class

Teacher’s feedback has been studied by a large number of researchers by scholars from various angles.Along with teach⁃er’s feedback,students’participation in class,another vital topic concerning education,has also caught people’s attention in re⁃cent years.This paper is the literature review of teacher’s feedback and students’participation in class.The review of teacher’s feedback focuses on its definition,classification and function;and the literature review of students’participation in class centers around its definition,value and the method to improve students’participation in class.

美国“Citizen Archivist”项目研究:驱动因素、业务内容、启示借鉴

通过对美国"CitizenArchivist"项目进行研究,为我国档案事业发展提供借鉴与参考视角。概述了美国"Citizen Archivist"项目开展情况,认为传统支撑、政策鼓励、技术驱动、思维拓展是项目开展的主要驱动因素,以信息链视角分析了项目"公民档案保管员"的主要工作内容,认为工作内容实现了信息形态从低级到高级的演变。对我国档案事业发展有4个方面启示:推动档案意识的再启蒙与觉醒,推进档案整理与利用社会化,激发个体档案记录行为,利用公益化机构推动档案整理模式革新。

How Do People Understand Urban Air Pollution? Exploring Citizens’ Perception on Air Quality, Its Causes and Impacts in Colombian Cities

Similarly to other Latin American countries, urban air quality is a major concern in Colombia. The purpose of the present study was to explore citizens’ perception on local air pollution, its causes and impacts. A questionnaire was individually applied to a sample of 994 participants. Relationships between demographic features and the perception on air quality were analyzed using a logistic regression, its odds ratio (OR), and a Chi-square test. Eighty percent of the respondents perceive their local air quality as either bad or fair, 65% recognize particulate matter as the main local air pollutant, and 90% recognize negative impacts on people’s health as the main consequence of air pollution. In contrast to other studies where age and economic status are variables highly related with public perception on the level of atmospheric pollution, in this study only the size of the cities has a statistically significant relationship with the perception on local air quality regarding the level of pollution(OR ≥ 1, confidence intervals > 1 and p-values < 0.05). While area sources such as mining and infrastructure construction are identified as the main sources of pollutant emissions in small towns (less than 50,000 inhabitants), in big cities, road traffic is identified as the main source contributor to atmospheric pollution. Opposite to data from official reports, and regardless of the size of the city, households are perceived as the place with greatest contribution to personal air pollution exposure. Results show that citizens are aware of the state of air quality and its health impact is a major concern. Such findings suggest people’s opinions can be used as provisional indicators in cities without data, as well as to monitor the results of local air quality management. As a complementary process, or at the same level of importance given to technical-based policy, citizen participation can contribute to a collective construction of urban air pollution control strategies.

Designing a Citizen Science Project for Forest Landscapes: A Case from Hofmann Forest in Eastern North Carolina

Citizen science is a participatory research design that utilizes both non-professional researchers and professional researchers to collect, analyze, and disperse data. Citizen scientists seek to discover answers and draw solutions to scientific questions. The Hofmann Open Water Laboratory (HOWL) project, established in 2016, focuses its collaborative-based efforts in eastern North Carolina. HOWL citizen scientists monitor water quality, and quantity, that flows on and off the Hofmann Forest. HOWL provides opportunities to citizen scientists and gathers data to meet the project outcomes, which include understanding the importance of Hofmann Forest in the inner coastal plain of North Carolina, building science education skills for citizen science participants, and enhancing community relationships between the forest and citizens. This article outlines several approaches for developing citizen science projects in a forest context, drawing on experiences from HOWL. The paradigm can be used to meet the needs of any forest landscape’s research and management goals, while employing a participatory research approach. The guidelines present suggestions for productive and enduring processes for citizen engagement and project sustainability. Each project will need participants to set goals, build a diverse collaboration, and establish on-going evaluation processes to determine successful and failed components that ensures the project moves forward effectively. The citizen science efforts near the Hofmann Forest in Eastern North Carolina provided an excellent case study of the development of citizen science on the forest and adjacent lands. HOWL attempts to meet participant and socio-ecological outcomes, such as encouraging public action in natural resource and forest management, as well as enhancing scientific knowledge and skills. The project helps synthesize our experiences in this effort and the social science literature, providing reasonable guidelines for those seeking to establish their own citizen science efforts within a forest context.

US High-tech Firms Participating In China's 'Tri-gold Program'

The ’tri-gold program’ aiming at improving information exchange for China’s national economy has been put into practice. The ’Gold bridge’ project forms the infrastructure for the information exchange of the national economy. It makes great contributions to the control and decision-making of the country’s macro-economy, to the promotion of social productivity, and to relieving the bottleneck pressure on the parts of energy, communications and environment. The ’Gold Customs’ project aims at realizing paperless foreign trade. The ’Gold card’ project involves modern payment means, such as

On the Whole-Process People’s Democracy and the Construction of Citizens’ Cultural Quality

The Whole-Process People’s Democracy has become an important proposition of the socialist modernization democratic theory with Chinese characteristics,and has important value for the development of the new form of human civilization.The Whole-Process People’s Democracy is not only a“democracy”system,its focus is to achieve“people’s democracy”,its unique feature is to surpass“non process”democracy with the“Whole-Process”,and create a new governance path of a new form of human civilization.Of course,the emphasis of people’s democracy on the consciousness of people’s subjective participation in the whole process also puts forward corresponding requirements for the cultural quality construction of Chinese social citizens in the new era,so it is also of great significance to pay attention to the cultivation of citizens’public spirit.