http://hdl.handle.net/10315/6200 2013-05-21T16:35:06Z http://hdl.handle.net/10315/20831 The Paradoxes of State-Led Transnationalism: Capturing Continuity, Change and Rupture in the Eritrean Transnational Social Field Tecle, Samia Processes of conflict and domination have historically influenced and continue to influence patterns of mass migration; in some cases, over time shaping the formation of diasporas. These processes have contributed to a rapidly growing body of literature exploring various aspects of what has been termed the migration-development nexus. Contrary to early arguments suggesting that migrants assimilate fully into the societies in which they settle, it is largely observed today that migrants inhabit transnational spaces where they varyingly maintain ties with their ‘home countries’. More recently, literature has acknowledged the ways subsequent generations raised outside the ‘homeland’ are socialized into transnational social fields and thus also lead transnational lives. A range of local, national and global actors have recognized the importance and potential of emigrant populations to transnational processes. Specifically, the ‘sending state’ has been an integral actor in the cultivation and mobilization of its dispersed populations. Relying on a host of mechanisms to ‘court’ their dispersed populations, states adopt policies in an attempt to institutionalize relationships with their diasporas. This portfolio situates itself within this relatively recent, yet quickly growing body of literature on the role of the state in transnational processes. Grounding my analysis in the Eritrean transnational social field, this portfolio locates the role of the Liberation Front-turned-State in engaging its dispersed populations over time. I emphasize the continuities, changes and ruptures that have highlighted and arise from Eritrean state-diaspora relationships since the formation of the Eritrean diaspora. In the face of significant legitimacy loss, relationships between the state and its local and dispersed populations have increasingly become marked by control and coercion aimed at ideologically and physically disciplining citizens. While my analysis is contextually situated within the Eritrean transnational social field, I acknowledge that the issues I explore are located within broader global processes. Thus, my analysis fluidly shifts between individual, national and global levels of analysis to highlight the differing and competing political considerations that are at play at each level. 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/10315/20830 Some, for all, forever: A Case Study of Participation in Water Management in South Africa’s Umgeni River Catchment Lorimer, Beth South Africa is a water scarce country where freshwater resources are unevenly distributed in relation to the majority of its people. Integrated water resources management, which takes in all competing interests for water use, is crucial. In 1998, South Africa enacted the National Water Act, which created a progressive framework for water management in the country that promoted equitable and sustainable use of water resources. By equitable, the Act set out to repeal the discriminatory water policies of the apartheid era, which restricted access and allocation of water resources to black and Coloured South Africans. The main approach through which this would be achieved is public participation and a decentralized approach where decisions are delegated to the catchment level, through a catchment management agency. Several public forums, intended to initiate participation and identify key stakeholders towards the establishment of an agency, support these bodies. Since 1998, only two of the 19 proposed catchment management agencies have been established. This case study of one catchment management forum along the Umgeni River in Northeastern South Africa, analyzes this trend of institutionalization and evaluates participation in light of promoting National Water Act’s goals of redressing past inequalities. The case study illuminated that there is strong participation in the catchment related to the environmental concerns of the River. However, the degree to which participation in the forum addressed the social concerns within the catchment in relation to water use and allocation was less evident. The study concluded that reimagining how we organize and perceive participation in democracy is key as water management in South Africa moves forward. 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/10315/20829 Evoking a site of memory: An Afrofuturist Sonic Walk that Maps Historic Toronto's Black Geographies Turner, Camille Drawing on the work of historians, geographers, writers and other Black Canadian Studies scholars I argue that Blackness has been systematically ‘disappeared’ from the Canadian nation. I explore various mechanisms through which this disappearance has been achieved, ranging from historical omissions to social exclusion as well as literally burying evidence of Canada’s Black past. Numerous theorists agree that the absence of Blackness defines the Canadian landscape and although their ideas about how to redress this absence vary, their work demonstrates that this absence is highly generative for Black artists and scholars. I apply this insight to my work as a digital artist creating HUSH HARBOUR, a sonic walk that utilizes digital media and performance to reimagine the past from the perspective of the present and future and to remap Blackness onto the Canadian landscape in embodied and sonic ways. Embracing elements of African Diasporic sonic, fantastic and spiritual traditions, I evoke a site of memory and desire within which participants recreate, reveal and transform the space that currently hides the Black presence. 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/10315/20828 Social Enterprises and Alternative Agro-Ecological Food Networks: A Co-operative Business Model for Agro-Ecological Vegetable Seed Production Dey, Aabir Alternative agro-ecological food networks (AAFNs) are being advanced by farmers, civil society organizations, academics, and other concerned citizens, who understand the current agri-industrial food system to be ostracizing the socioeconomic needs of small-scale farmers and damaging the ecological processes required for food production. Advocates of AAFNs support transitioning towards a food system that consists of differentially-scaled farms that prioritize food security, community development, and ecological restoration. The transition towards regionally-populated AAFNs is partly constrained by corporate consolidation in all sectors of the food industry and by government policies that favour large-scale industrial farming. Maintaining a diversity of regionally-adapted agro-ecological seed varieties is an essential component to building AAFNs. Yet, the proliferation of hybridized varieties and their requisite agro-chemicals, the implementation of intellectual property rights on seeds, and the concentration of agricultural inputs by corporate agribusinesses, have disrupted the ability of farmers to reproduce agro-ecological seed varieties in Canada. The responsibility for preserving these types of seeds has been assumed by seed banks and small-scale seed enterprises; however, due to the oligopolistic pressures exerted by dominant market actors in the seed industry, these organizations face a variety of economic difficulties in scaling up their socio-ecological missions. Co-operatives are an alternative form of social enterprise that agro-ecological farmers can implement to better hedge against these market pressures and to reclaim ownership of agro-ecological seed production. The research in this report analyzes the feasibility of a regionally-based agro-ecological vegetable seed co-operative in the Greater Golden Horseshoe region of Ontario. The findings reveal that by pooling production from different vegetable seed growers in the region, a seed co-operative can economically sustain the preservation of agro-ecological seed varieties through a democratically-owned mission-based enterprise. In doing so, it is hoped that the co-operative can indicate to the market, the state, and the general public, one kind of organization that can meet the underserved needs of agro-ecological growers, and more broadly, begin to better facilitate a national transition towards regionally-based AAFNs. 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z