Examining the Impacts of Key Influencers on Community Development

In this research,we aim to identify and investigate the impacts of key influencers on community formations and developments.We assess the impacts of key influencers by analyzing the activities and structure of the social media presence of a local community.Results of our analysis show that key influencers play important roles in connecting the community,transferring information,and improving overall sentiment of the community members.Our findings suggest that community practitioners can apply social network analysis to identify value-added influencers and discover strategies for improving the community and keeping leadership roles.

Cultural Relevance for Rural Community Development in China: A Case Study in Bai, Jingpo and Huyaodai Communities of Yunnan Province

A three-year study over the Bai, Jingpo and Huayaodai communities in Yunnan Province reveals that the community development is significantly influenced in various ways by such cultural factors as the concepts of development; concepts and traditions of inter-community relationships, consumption, mar- riage and gender; patterns of decision-making and production, resource and income allocation; as well as the role of information dissemination systems, religion and ritual. Based on the analysis over the interactive relevance between each factor and community development, some strategies and methods for dealing with such a cultural relevance in development projects are recommended.

Community-led total sanitation(CLTS)implementation in West Mamprusi Municipal Assembly in Ghana.What do communities think eleven years on?Author links open overlay panel

Objective Access to improved sanitation is a fundamental human right and an important aspect of Public Health.However,an estimated thousands of people in Ghana especially,the West Mamprusi Municipal Assembly(WMMA)still have no access to adequate toilet facilities.This has brought untold health repercussions to the inhabitants,the community,and the environment at large.To address this menace,the community-led total sanitation(CLTS)was implemented.This study aimed to assess communities’perspectives on the implementation of CLTS and to understand the factors influencing its success and failures.Methods A mixed-method approach involving sequential qualitative and quantitative methods was employed in this study.Participants for the quantitative study were randomly selected and surveyed using questionnaires.The qualitative study employed focus group discussion involving purposively sampled participants including assembly members,opinion leaders,and assembly staff.Results The CLTS program in WMMA realized an apparent use of construction and proper use of household latrines leading to a reduction of open defecation free(ODF)and two communities achieving sanitized status in the history of the study area,enabling the training of latrine artisans and natural leaders to facilitate the CLTS expansion and sustainability,improved sanitation and hygiene,strengthened the enforcement of community rules and regulations and many others.Conclusion The CLTS program has received more widespread acceptance in the study area than the previous government policy of constructing public toilets,which was greeted with massive failures due to poor implementation.To ensure that gains achieved through CLTS implementation are sustained longer,it is recommended that chiefs and opinion leaders should be involved in the CLTS programs to ensure checks and enforcement.The entrenchment of bylaws and more education to address enduring myths and misconceptions will sustain the program.Subsidies in the form of sanitation loans for latrine construction materials by the government and supporting non-governmental organizations(NGOs)will be paramount in sustaining ODF.

Gentrifying rural community development:A case study of Bama Panyang River Basin in Guangxi,China

Rural gentrification is deeply characterized by institutional context and spatiotemporal heterogeneity.Based on a diachronic field investigation,this paper constructs an analytical framework for gentrifying rural community development(GRCD)with a“community”theoretical perspective and analytical approach,defines the concept of GRCD,and analyzes the main characteristics,formation mechanism and regulation path of a typical gentrifying rural community in the Panyang River Basin of Bama County,Guangxi.Driven by factors such as the complex flow and heterogeneous living space practices of the host-guest community,the longevity“myth”led by commercial capital and consumption demand,and multiple action logics and desertification community governance,great changes have occurred in the social space and material landscape of the rural longevity community.Such changes include comprehensive reconstruction of the resident population,surface interaction and social separation of the host-guest community,residential structure change and settlement landscape renewal,and delocalization of the healing landscape and lifestyle changes.We propose policy insights in three areas:public and localization institutional arrangements,shared and comfortable gentrifying rural community making,and inclusive and synergistic gentrifying rural community governance.Through these aspects,we provide insights from the Chinese case for the gentrification and community development of rural areas in the Global South.

Is Tourism the (Only) Best “Choice” for Community Rehabilitation and Development?

Economic conditions,societies,and current changes make many communities in Thailand face changes in occupation and life,especially suburban communities which face loneliness and sluggishness.With this problem,renovation and development of communities ensue.Many communities have changed their image to be the“tourism community”,the result of which is generally perceived as either failure or success.According to this phenomenon,the author would like to present a story through a case study of Pak Nam Prasae Community,Klaeng District,Rayong Province.The author had an opportunity to conduct a participatory action research with collaboration for the main objectives which are to support knowledge body that leads the community out of loneliness and sluggishness and to create tourism activities.Nowadays,this community has become a popular tourist attraction,which is promoted as part of the national tourism by Tourism Authority of Thailand.The author would like to present both sides of the development through the tool called“tourism”which was employed by the community as a new approach to maintain,renovate,and develop the community.Even though in the initial stage,promotion and support from the external network were important,the most important thing is the cost of community in certain aspects that support the community to insist,improve,and connect to new networks by itself.On the other hand,the community will have to face with new different issues and challenges,especially in terms of management and share of benefit gained from using the local resources to develop the tourism in the community.According to these two pieces of information,after all,whether“tourism”is the best tool for development is an important issue that the community has to consider.

Building a Community with a Shared Future for Mankind and Promoting the Development of Global Human Rights Governance

In January this year,President Xi Jinping delivered an important speech entitled"Work Together to Build a Community with a Shared Future for Mankind at the United Nations Office at Geneva,in which he systematically elaborated on the major concept of a Community with a Shared Future for Mankind,pointing out the direction for reforming and improving global governance and providing China’s proposition

Toward a Child-Friendly Community:Analytical Framework,Typical Cases,and Strategies

Building a child-friendly community is becoming an important part of the overall blueprint of China’s urban renewal and community development.As the 14 th Five-Year Plan(2021-2025)puts forward goals and content friendly to children for the first time,the corresponding theoretical research should be done in time.This research applies the analytical framework of"public spaces-neighborhood relations"and summarizes four types of childfriendly communities:participation for exploration,gathering for communication,spatial absorption,and disassociation.Four communities in the H District of T City are used as typical cases to present the status quo and characteristics of each type.The three major strategies for building a child-friendly community in the future include adding or transforming emotional community infrastructure for children,providing extensive community cultural supplies for children’s gamified participation,and proactively promoting organizational coordination and institutional guarantee for community development.

Feeding prehistoric coastal community:A study of marine faunal remains at the Jingtoushan site

This article examines the abundant marine mollusc,and fish remains at the Jingtoushan shell midden(8,300 to7,800 cal a BP)in Zhejiang Province,China,to investigate the fishing economy,community development,the palaeoenvironment,and their interactions among the prehistoric populations in the lower Yangtze River Basin and southeastern coastal China.It also attempts to explore the prosperity and decline of coastal settlements in China during the Neolithic Age and the potential reasons for their rise and fall,respectively.Based on the ecological and biological principles of marine animals,standard zooarchaeological methods and radiocarbon dating analysis are used for sampling,identification,measurement,and quantification.Results show that at least 11 mollusc taxa and 14 fish taxa can be identified from the Jingtoushan faunal assemblage.The ancient Jingtoushan residents possibly lived in a settlement close to the coast and engaged in inshore and offshore fishing,hunting,and gathering as their primary subsistence strategies,with low-level rice cultivation as a supplementary means of sustenance.Eventually,the changes in the coastal environment could be one of the reasons why the Jingtoushan residents abandoned their settlement.The research contributes to Chinese Neolithic archaeology with new evidence of the exploitation of marine resources around 8000 a BP in the eastern coastal areas and the relationship between Neolithic community development and environmental changes.

Financing Disaster Risk Reduction:Exploring the Opportunities,Challenges,and Threats Within the Southern African Development Community Region

The Southern African Development Community(SADC)region,a regional economic body comprised of 16 member states,is one of our planet's most vulnerable regions to natural hazards,and has a complex disaster risk profile.The region has sustained several disasters over the past decades.These events include annual floods in 2004-2019 and extreme droughts(1990-1993);other climate-induced disasters,such as cyclones,also have had devastating impacts,particularly on the Indian Ocean island states and east coast countries.To reduce the risk and impacts of dis asters,governments must invest in disaster risk reduction(DRR).However,interventions aimed at reducing social and economic vulnerability and investing in longterm mitigation activities are often few,poorly funded,and insignificant in comparison with money spent on humanitarian assistance,dis aster relief,and post-disaster reconstruction.This study investigated whether DRR is adequately funded within SADC member states in light of the high stakes in human life,infrastructure,and economic losses and the potential savings involved.The study applied a qualitative research design with data collected through semistructured interviews and focus group discussions.Respondents were selected purposefully and through snowball sampling with a total of 67 respondents from Botswana,Eswatini,Namibia,South Africa,and Zimbabwe participating in the study.The study findings reveal that DRR is inadequately funded in all the member states consulted in comparison to funding allocated to disaster response.In light of the underfunding experienced by DRR activities,this study provides a platform for lobbying and advocacy for adequate funding for DRR.

Performance of Rural Municipalities After the 2015 Reformation of Long-Term Care Insurance in Japan

Worldwide,welfare is trending from a welfare state model to social participation to ensure the sustainability of health care systems.Japan,where the aging rate will reach 40%by 2060,reformed public Long-Term Care Insurance(LTCI)on a large scale in 2015 and started the Comprehensive Service project(CS project),which emphasizes the prevention of long-term care through social participation in the community.Through this project,communities work to develop prevention efforts revolving around the community salon/caféand mutual support,including all daily tasks that previously were the purview of family members.Each municipality has an obligation to promote a CS project through new community development initiatives among community members.The purpose of this study is to investigate the CS projects performed by rural municipalities and to explore the important factors for their success.The authors used a case study methodology and constant comprehensive methodology for analyzing interview data to pull out the elements of successful initiatives.The study shows that the following factors influence success:recognition of demographic risk,recognition of the ineffectiveness of LTCI services,developing a passionate philosophy and strategy as a municipality,developing community members’initiative,and having many assets and full participation in the community.These factors imply that community development is a critical part of any successful CS project.

An Institutional Model for Collaborative Disaster Risk Management in the Southern African Development Community(SADC) Region

This article presents and argues for a collaborative model for disaster risk management in the Southern African Development Community(SADC).The research employed a qualitative study through a literature review and empirical research through focus group interviews to realize its objectives.As a key theory of multinational collaboration,neoliberal institutionalism—a subset of the international relations theory—was used to develop the SADC institutional collaborative model.The model combined the theoretical,political,and technical dimensions of collaboration to enhance buy-in for the disaster risk management and reduction function of governments.The model demonstrates the need for a multidisciplinary approach to achieving disaster risk management and reduction in the SADC and elsewhere,if the developmental objectives of disaster risk reduction are to be realized without interference in the domestic affairs of the member countries.This model is therefore grounded in seeking consensus and cooperation among cooperating states in a quest to ensure national implementation of the regional framework on disaster risk reduction.

Priorities for Social and Humanities Projects Based on Text Analysis

Purpose:Changes in the world show that the role,importance,and coherence of SSH(social sciences and the humanities)will increase significantly in the coming years.This paper aims to monitor and analyze the evolution(or overlapping)of the SSH thematic pattern through three funding instruments since 2007.Design/methodology/approach:The goal of the paper is to check to what extent the EU Framework Program(FP)affects/does not affect research on national level,and to highlight hot topics from a given period with the help of text analysis.Funded project titles and abstracts derived from the EU FP,Slovenian,and Estonian RIS were used.The final analysis and comparisons between different datasets were made based on the 200 most frequent words.After removing punctuation marks,numeric values,articles,prepositions,conjunctions,and auxiliary verbs,4,854 unique words in ETIS,4,421 unique words in the Slovenian Research Information System(SICRIS),and 3,950 unique words in FP were identified.Findings:Across all funding instruments,about a quarter of the top words constitute half of the word occurrences.The text analysis results show that in the majority of cases words do not overlap between FP and nationally funded projects.In some cases,it may be due to using different vocabulary.There is more overlapping between words in the case of Slovenia(SL)and Estonia(EE)and less in the case of Estonia and EU Framework Programmes(FP).At the same time,overlapping words indicate a wider reach(culture,education,social,history,human,innovation,etc.).In nationally funded projects(bottom-up),it was relatively difficult to observe the change in thematic trends over time.More specific results emerged from the comparison of the different programs throughout FP(top-down).Research limitations:Only projects with English titles and abstracts were analyzed.Practical implications:The specifics of SSH have to take into account—the one-to-one meaning of terms/words is not as important as,for example,in the exact sciences.Thus,even in co-word analysis,the final content may go unnoticed.Originality/value:This was the first attempt to monitor the trends of SSH projects using text analysis.The text analysis of the SSH projects of the two new EU Member States used in the study showed that SSH’s thematic coverage is not much affected by the EU Framework Program.Whether this result is field-specific or country-specific should be shown in the following study,which targets SSH projects in the so-called old Member States.

Perceived Adverse Effects of Separating Government Institutions for Disaster Risk Reduction and Climate Change Adaptation Within the Southern African Development Community Member States

Integration of disaster risk reduction(DRR)and climate change adaptation(CCA)is widely recognized as a solution for reducing the risk and impacts of disasters.However,successful integration seems elusive,and the two goals continue to function in isolation and in parallel.This article provides empirical insights into the perceived effects of separating government institutions for DRR and CCA within the Southern African Development Community member states.A mixed method research design was applied to the study.A total of 40 respondents from Botswana,Eswatini(until April 2018 Swaziland),Madagascar,Malawi,Namibia,South Africa,Tanzania,Zambia,and Zimbabwe participated in face-to-face interviews or an online survey.Five major effects of separating the organizations for DRR and CCA that impede efforts to reduce disaster risk coherently were identified:duplication of services,polarization of interventions,incoherent policies,competition for the same resources,and territorial contests.Given the continued fragmentation of institutions for DRR and CCA,highlighting these effects is important to emphasize the need for integrated approaches towards the reduction of disaster risk.

Application of Mindsets to Health Education and Behavior Change Programs

Successful health promotion programs are characterized in part, by the willingness of audiences to engage, participate, and adopt healthier behaviors. But presentation of messages that reach and resonate with the intended audience remains challenging. This is due in part to the variety of mindsets—viewpoints, attitudes, and beliefs—within a population. These mindsets play an essential role in understanding and predicting behaviors and lifestyle factors associated with health or chronic diseases. The purpose of this study is to demonstrate how a specific survey-based method of mindset segmentation can distinguish predominant mindsets and then be used to create, adapt, and/or market health programs to appeal to these mindsets. Steps in survey construction, distribution, and analysis are described. Interpretation of the results, yielding three primary mindsets, is the critical outcome of this segmentation method. The applications of this interpretation to community health education programs are suggested. This approach has potential to inform, enhance, or customize programs, tailoring activities, methods, and messages to the preferences of the community.

Another look at social innovation:From community-For community

Social innovation(SI)continues to raise interest among scholars and policymakers,as a potential panacea for social disenfranchisement and civic dysfunction.What is troubling is diverse perspectives of SI abound,creating inconsistencies in methodological approaches which confound theory development.This paper clarifies that discussion by considering the locus of initiation and locus of benefit as informing characteristics that differentiate grounded social innovation from other types of well-recognized socially beneficent endeavors.The notion of‘from community e for community’is presented to aid understanding of the unique nature of authentically grounded social innovation.This paper is significant as it presents a practical approach to help researchers and practitioners consider where opportunities for targeted policy support,institutional involvement,and agency action can aid community development and wellbeing.

转型期中国城市多元参与式社区治理模式研究

As China’s socio-economic development is entering into a transitioning era,urban residents’demands are becoming more diversified,complicated,and fragmented.Ought to address issues regarding community environmental renovation,infrastructure and facilities constructions,and efficient public service supplies,measures should be adopted to adjust the urban community governance model in China to face emergent challenges.Against this background,this paper argues that the"participating actors,""community management and organization framework,""related laws,regulations,and policies,"and"resources allocation and management"are the four crucial dimensions in urban community governance.We then adopted these four underpinnings as the theoretical framework to unravel the complex dynamics of community governance in contemporary urban China.This paper argues that the current community governance system falls short in accommodating the growing demands of community development due to"ambiguity of participating actors,""excessive administrative intervention on community management,""insufficient legislation supports,"and a"deficiency in financing management system."Therefore,this paper argues that through the pluralization of public participation,diversification of community organization modes,and the enhancement of participation accessibility,community governance performance in urban China could be drastically improved.Therefore,a pluralistic and participatory community governance model is proposed in this paper to provide additional policy implications for community governance in urban China.