Category Archives: Voices

Resilience Spaces: Rethinking Protection to Address Protracted Urban Displacement

April 23, 2020
By 25334

Using an SRA grant, Pablo Cortés Ferrández conducted participatory action research (PAR) in Altos de la Florida, an informal settlement for internally displaced persons in an urban area outside Bogota, Colombia. He is making a firsthand analysis of the humanitarian conditions in the settlement to uncover challenges and propose pathways to improve interventions through protection and resilience approaches.

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Capacity building for urban IDPs (internally displaced persons) and host communities is emerging as a new way of working to confront the root causes of protracted displacement in unsafe, informal settlements in Colombia. Despite the challenges, these urban contexts provide an opportunity to advance the complementarity, connectedness, and localization of humanitarian and development aid.

View of Altos de Florida and Soacha on the outskirts of Bogota, the capital of Colombia.


“I was displaced by the paramilitary from Llanos Orientales to Chocó in 2005,” says Yomaira, who lives with her husband and three children in Altos de la Florida, an informal settlement in urban Soacha, just outside the Colombian capital of Bogota. “Three years later we fled to the urban areas of Buenaventura and then again in 2012 to Bogota due to increased violence. In 2014 we started to build a house on this hill because the cost of living in the city was too high.” Yomaira’s narrative reflects the experience of many families for whom armed conflict prompted just the first of many internal displacements: 5.8 million people remain displaced in Colombia as of the end of 2019.[1]

The Root Causes of Displacement

In Colombia, initial displacements due to armed conflict or generalized violence often results in displacements again to urban areas, where families seek protection and economic opportunities. An estimated 87% of the country’s IDPs come from rural areas, and they wind up in the only places that they can access due to their vulnerability: the informal settlements,[2] where more than half of the IDPs live.[3] Both authorities and humanitarian, development, and peace actors need to better understand these supposed urban refuges.

This article is based on a research project implemented from 2015 until 2018 in Altos de la Florida, including surveys of 211 households, 98 in-depth interviews, 3 social cartographies, and 3 focus group discussions.[4] Altos de la Florida is a neighborhood in Soacha, a municipality of approximately 1 million people, the largest of the cities surrounding Bogota. Over two-thirds of its population was living under the poverty line as of 2010.[5]

According to the city’s development plan, 48% of the municipality—378 neighborhoods—are deemed “illegal” by local authorities. The IDP population in the municipality stood at around 50,000 in July 2018. Since the outbreak of the economic and political crisis in neighboring Venezuela, at least 12,300 Venezuelans have joined the ranks of Soacha’s displaced people.

Altos de la Florida suffers from the common pattern of social and spatial segregation in a poverty area with low-quality housing, services, and infrastructure: 72.9% of households are in conditions of structural poverty. The neighborhood as an urban community, formed by 1,011 families of around 3,657 people, has two main characteristics: 52.49% are less than 25 years old, and 48.81% are women.

An article in a local daily linked so-called social cleansing with the murder of the son of a community leader in Altos de la Florida.

From One Informal Settlement to Another

The UNHCR and UNDP have diagnosed Altos de la Florida as a “vulnerable community due to the informality of the neighborhood.”[6] The informal nature of these urban settings limits the capacity to reduce vulnerabilities, yet the planning secretary of the mayor’s office refuses legalization.

Due to the absence of political will, households lack tenure security and have no official proof of home ownership. The neighborhood faced eviction attempts in 2009, and the lack of basic services and infrastructure in Altos de la Florida increases residents’ vulnerability. According to my survey results, 97.1% of households do not have access to drinking water except for a tank trunk, around 300 children need a kindergarten, and there are no primary health centers in the area—in fact, Soacha’s hospital has only 250 beds for 1 million people.

Altos de la Florida is regarded as an urban territory without state.[7] Urban violence increases protection risks. Informality combined with the settlement’s geostrategic position, and the absence of local authorities makes the neighborhood a strategic location for nonstate armed actors. According to Forensis data, the homicide index in Soacha was 40.58 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2016, the highest in the department of Cundinamarca. The profile of victims follows a common pattern seen in other urban contexts in Latin America: 91.5% are men, and 44.3% are between 20 and 29 years old. Interpersonal violence also represents a significant challenge with 2,898 cases per year, the fourth highest behind the cities of Medellin, Cali, and Barranquilla.

The lack of political will, the structural vulnerabilities of communities in informal urban areas, and high levels of insecurity are the causes of new urban displacements, both intra- and inter-urban. Re-victimization and re-displacement are the two main characteristics of this vicious cycle. Intra-urban displacement is the victimizing event with the greatest impact on the urban dynamics of the conflict in Colombia.[8] Urban IDPs are forced to flee their informal settlements due to violence, only to arrive in other settlements with similar protection risks. Informal settlements are therefore at once expelling zones and arrival areas for displaced populations. In socially and spatially segregated Altos de la Florida, IDPs represent 30%–40% of the population.

A man in Altos de la Florida building a brick house.

Promoting Community Participation

Humanitarian, development, and peace actors have increased their interest in urban contexts in recent years. Despite increasing knowledge, though, a lack of experience and challenges inherent to urban settings continue to undermine humanitarian and development interventions. International humanitarian aid began in 2001, when World Vision International established a presence in Colombia. In 2006 UN agencies and the Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS) started their intervention. Particularly interesting was the UN Human Security Program (2010–12) and the UN Transitional Solutions Initiative (TSI) project (2012–16).

In the settlements, a protracted and supply-driven emergency response has caused people to become dependent on external aid. Emergency assistance is an essential form of humanitarian aid, mainly for displaced families, but protracted aid can discourage community participation and increase the gap between assistance and development. According to one development worker operating in the neighborhood, to avoid creating dependency, “it is necessary to promote sustainable public policy solutions and the participation of IDPs in the political, economic, and social life of the host community.”[9]

The dependency of community leaders on humanitarian assistance also undermines social cohesion in the neighborhood. Limited consultation and lack of coordination decreases the effectiveness of the intervention. Past project evaluations have found that “international cooperation is insufficient and requires the integral intervention of the State.”[10] Therefore, achieving a durable solution for urban displacement requires closer collaboration between the humanitarian sector and local authorities, along with strong political will at both the local and national levels.

Resilience Spaces as a Protective Approach

In urban informal settlements, humanitarian, development, and peace actors must work in a weakened and less cohesive social engagement environment, exacerbated by sporadic violence. These circumstances lend themselves to short-term responses and silo-approaches to deal with emergencies, further increasing dependence among the communities that receive support. Poorly integrated responses have limited capacity to address complex urban crises. Cooperation between humanitarian and development actors and engagement with national and local actors are essential, given the potentially limited capacity and political will of certain municipalities.

The protracted vulnerability of urban IDPs and host communities in informal urban contexts has revealed the need for real change in humanitarian aid, particularly as fragile situations are exacerbated by urban violence. Protracted urban displacement requires better connectivity between humanitarian and development efforts, and the needs of IDPs should be balanced with those of the host communities. Current debates show a growing consensus around new and comprehensive approaches. To face the challenges of protracted urban displacement, interventions must go beyond immediate humanitarian needs and should aim to reduce the vulnerabilities of both IDPs and local host communities.

Humanitarian aid should be committed to not only ensuring survival but also supporting people to live in dignity. “Resilience spaces” were developed as a complementarity approach in the UNHCR’s Policy on Refugee Protection and Solutions in Urban Areas (2009), combining assistance and recovery by not only addressing urgent needs but also strengthening local capacities. The framework combines a top-down protection approach with a bottom-up capacity building approach through three areas of intervention: creating education, economic, and labor opportunities; strengthening social cohesion; and, supporting leadership capacities.

Such resilience spaces have been set up in Altos de la Florida, resulting in the creation of two important grassroots organizations in the informal settlement: Comité de Impulso, a fortnightly meeting among community leaders, dwellers, IDP associations, and humanitarians; and Florida Juvenil, a youth community organization engaged in break-dance, theater, and football activities.

Resilience has emerged as one of the strongest responses to the humanitarian and development divide. In Altos de la Florida, the joint work of humanitarian and development actors, in collaboration with national and local counterparts, aims to achieve collective results in the short to medium term (three to five years) to reduce risk and vulnerability. The situation in Altos de la Florida features three criteria that are on the rise in modern humanitarianism and deemed essential in urban responses to displacement: complementarity, connectivity, and sustainability.

A youth theater group supported by Fe y Alegría in Altos de Florida.

In Altos de la Florida, international actors strengthened rather than replaced local and national systems. The complementariness of response included collaboration with local and national aid providers in affected territories, empowerment of leaders of both local and national NGOs and community-based organizations, as well as inclusion of authorities and municipalities at the urban level. Going beyond complementarity, connectivity can not only to bridge the humanitarian-development divide but also incorporate approaches like resilience, which is key to strengthening local capacities. Sustainability, evident through positive long-term results for the supported individuals and societies, depends directly on this capacity for collaboration among the actors and the strengthening of local and national capacities.

Currently, there is consensus in the humanitarian community that in urban contexts populations can be protected by strengthening their capacity. In this sense, humanitarian action has a particular and perhaps unique role in protecting the population through strategies that allow people to build their resilience. Resilience approaches bridge lingering disparities and disconnections between humanitarian and development responses in urban interventions. The approach observed in Altos de la Florida helps better articulate an urban response around the construction of resilience as an instrument of protection. This protection, in turn, represents a comprehensive strategy to address the root causes of urban displacement.

Resilience space in Altos de la Florida supported by the Jesuit Refugee Service.

 

[1] IDMC (2019), ‘Global Report on Internal Displacement 2019’, IDMC, p. 44, https://bit.ly/2WNKeKQ.

[2] CNMH (2010), ‘Una nación desplazada. Informe nacional del desplazamiento forzado en Colombia,’ CNMH and UARIV, p. 38, https://bit.ly/29uyNzv.

[3] IDMC (2015), ‘Global Overview 2015. People internally displaced by conflict and violence,’ IDMC, p. 20, https://bit.ly/2TSq3ZK.

[4] This part of the project was funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 691060.

[5] UNDP (2010), ‘Política Pública de Desarrollo Social Incluyente. Municipio de Soacha,’ UNDP.

[6] UNHCR and UNDP (2017), ‘Documentación proceso de integración local comunidad Altos de la Florida, Soacha,’ UNHCR and UNDP, https://bit.ly/2SQ0vgc.

[7] Laura Tedesco (2007), ‘El Estado en América Latina ¿fallido o en proceso de formación?’ Fundación para las Relaciones Internacionales y el Diálogo Exterior, Vol 37.

[8] CODHES (2013), ‘Desplazamiento forzado intraurbano y soluciones duraderas,’ CODHES, p. 18, https://bit.ly/2EEfmpf.

[9] Interview, April 4, 2016, with a UNDP TSI coordinator in Soacha.

[10] Econometría Consultores (2016), ‘Evaluación externa del programa “Construyendo Soluciones Sostenibles-TSI,”’ Econometría S.A., p. 19.

The State and the Rights of Individuals: Pursuing Research at the Graduate Institute Geneva

April 16, 2020
By 25314

Using an SRA grant, Benedikt Behlert spent four months from September 2019 to January 2020 as a junior visiting fellow at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva, Switzerland, which proved to be highly beneficial for his PhD project on the administrative procedures required to protect human rights. 

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My PhD project on “The Necessity of a Conversation between the Administration and the Individual: The Relevance of Procedure to International Human Rights” asks the question whether international human rights law requires states to have in place structured decision-making procedures for their administrative bodies. Such procedures are often perceived as a nuisance by the two sides involved—the administration and the individual confronted with it—and as an unwelcome hurdle in reaching their objectives.

The Maison de la Paix, home of the Graduate Institute Geneva.

This perception clouds the value of administrative procedure, however, which can protect individual rights against arbitrary state action. This protective potential is realized first and foremost by involving the individual in the decision-making process, such as by granting them a right to be heard and requiring reasons for a negative decision. This is the insight from which my normative analysis of international human rights law commences.

The different ways in which individuals are potentially confronted by administrative bodies are numerous. Beyond “everyday encounters,” such as when an individual applies for a permit, there are complex and sensitive human-rights issues like the ongoing “migration crisis” that highlight the relevance of this inquiry.

What does international human rights law say about the relevance of procedures for the protection of the rights of migrants and refugees? Does it require institutionalized procedures to examine whether a person’s claim for asylum is well-founded? What should such procedures look like? A thorough understanding of the general relationship between the laws governing international human rights and administrative procedures should help answer such questions about specific encounters between state administrations and individuals.

Comparison with Constitutional Rights

One chapter of my thesis draws inspiration from German constitutional law, in particular, the German doctrine of constitutional rights. The connection between administrative procedure and German constitutional rights has been discussed for more than 40 years. The ideas and arguments found in this discourse are by now well-developed, and given the striking structural and substantial similarities, they might provide valuable insights for human-rights-based arguments.

The goal of this comparative exercise was to learn something about the structure and nature of international human rights law, which will inform the subsequent part of my thesis where I try to construct an international-human-rights-law-based argument in favor of procedural rights and obligations.

However, looking for inspiration from one’s own jurisdiction carries a certain risk for the international lawyer. The outcome of research may be too heavily influenced by one’s own background and thus irrelevant to the international legal discourse. In order to avoid falling into this trap, I decided to write the part of my thesis focusing on the similarities and differences between constitutional rights and international human rights in a highly international research environment.

I had the great honor of spending four months at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva as a junior visiting fellow. With its very diverse faculty and even more diverse student body, the Graduate Institute Geneva—also a Sylff institution—was just the right place for me to get the inspiration and critical feedback I needed.

The view from my workplace at the Graduate Institute Geneva.

The Benefits of an International Research Environment

I reviewed pertinent German constitutional law literature and international human rights law literature during my stay. The vast number of resources available at the Graduate Institute and its library were a great help. Most importantly, however, I had the chance to talk to researchers at various levels—PhDs, postdocs, and professors—from different disciplinary and national backgrounds, both informally and in more formal settings. Everyone at the International Law Department was extremely welcoming and helpful. In numerous talks with members of the world-renowned faculty and fellow PhD students, I received valuable input.

Furthermore, I gave a presentation in a roundtable session at the International Law Department, which was followed by an engaging and stimulating discussion. Not only did all these talks enable me to think about the German ideas more critically, but they also helped me to find more effective ways to present my findings to an international audience, which is the eventual target of my thesis.

Beyond the direct benefits for my research, my time as a junior visiting fellow at the Graduate Institute helped to broaden my horizon more generally. Almost every day, a high-level event with leading figures of international politics took place in the grand auditorium, exposing me to many interesting and informed analyses of current issues and crises. The junior visiting fellowship thus enabled me to better perceive my research within the bigger picture of international studies. Finally, the support which the International Law Department and the visiting fellows office provided was outstanding, very personal, and made my stay comfortable and easy.

Being a junior visiting fellow at the Graduate Institute Geneva was a splendid experience. I am certain that my thesis will reflect the inspiration and input I received during my stay. I am immensely grateful to the Sylff Association for funding my stay in Geneva with a generous SRA award, and I can only encourage other fellows who have not done so to make use of the extraordinary opportunities the Sylff Association provides!

Jonction, the place in Geneva where the Rhône and the Arve meet.

Behlert's related article "Forced Migration in Transition: Perspectives from Social Science and Law" can be read at www.sylff.org/news_voices/27466/.

Insights into the Dynamics of Diplomacy in the Future

April 14, 2020
By 19817

Didzis Kļaviņš, a Sylff fellowship recipient in 2012, is a senior researcher at the Faculty of Social Sciences and Advanced Social and Political Research Institute, University of Latvia. He is currently conducting a research project on the transformation of diplomacy in the Baltic and Nordic countries. The aim of the comparative research is to analyze the nature of the changes in the ministries of foreign affairs in six countries: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Sweden, Denmark, and Finland. In this article, Kļaviņš shares a number of observations from his ongoing post-doctoral research project.

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During the last two decades, changes in diplomacy have been widely observed. Commercial diplomacy, digital diplomacy, and city diplomacy are just some of the types of diplomacy that characterize the scale and variety of changes. Although sometimes it may seem as though diplomacy—as an instrument of foreign policy and diplomatic practice—has accordingly experienced significant changes or is experiencing them right now, diplomacy development trends in recent years prove that the largest changes are still to be expected. The issue is related with the readiness of each country and its ability to adapt to such changes. By taking the multifaceted nature of international relations and unpredictability into account, this article aims to raise some of the main issues in diplomacy, the meaning of which will continue to grow and require increased attention in the coming years.

Photo of Denmark's Tech Ambassador visiting the United Nations Headquarters.


New Technologies and Artificial Intelligence

Undeniably, in the future, new solutions in technology and communications will significantly change the nature of diplomatic communication. Operativity in the circulation of information and the availability thereof will change the dynamics of diplomatic work by requesting an even faster response on the part of foreign affairs services. More attention will also be paid to the selection of information and the verification of facts by using the newest technological solutions. Moreover, the integration of the information technology (IT) infrastructure of foreign affairs services with the IT systems of other governmental institutions will be one of the most current issues. There is no doubt that the introduction of new technological and communication solutions in each and every ministry of foreign affairs (MFA) will require large investments of financial means in comparison to the benefits acquired by society from the use of such technologies in foreign affairs.

Significant changes in MFAs will be determined by the solutions of artificial intelligence, which are now enjoying their victory procession in the field of technologies and which are used more and more in the improvement of public administration work. It may be that in the coming years, the use of AI in foreign affairs will significantly affect the work of diplomatic and consular services. Already now, the solutions offered by artificial intelligence indicate that changes will be revolutionary. Machine learning, neural networks, virtual assistants, and chatbots will not be unknown in diplomacy, a prediction that is backed by the research published and forecasts expressed during recent years. Thanks to innovative methods and algorithms that efficiently process large amounts of data and ensure significantly high speed, one of the main benefits of AI will be the automation of processes. Although for the time being AI hardly appears on the agenda of foreign policy as indicated by Ben Scott, Stefan Heumann, and Philippe Lorenz (2018), this situation will rapidly change in the very near future, and AI will become one of the central themes in the creation of foreign policy, including the modernization of diplomatic practice.

Bearing in mind the current development of artificial intelligence, it is important not to postpone looking at the issues of how it might be possible to better integrate AI with the needs of the MFAs.

 It is also quite possible that many countries will begin by using AI solutions for the needs of the consular service, commercial diplomacy, and public diplomacy. Examples include the provision of information regarding the work of the consular service, help in emergency situations abroad, safe travel, export possibilities abroad, and the formation of the state image via a virtual assistant or chatbot. The possibility cannot be excluded that AI solutions will be used in the management of crises. In general, the rapid development of technologies and diverse innovations will require a more operative response and operation of the MFAs. It will mean in turn that the possibilities of communication technologies will allow society and mass media to request even faster and more decisive foreign policy actions from the ministries and governments in general, including more operative activities by the foreign affairs services.

 

The Significance of Diplomacy in Public Administration

Although nowadays more or less every government  ministry and agency directly cooperates with other public administration institutions, it is predicted that in the future even more involvement in the coordination of foreign policy issues and involvement of other state institutions in solving external issues will be expected from every MFA (Rana 2011; Hocking, Melissen, Riordan, and Sharp 2012, 2013). With regard to the provision of support to other state institutions, great importance will be given to the use of the “whole of government” approach (WGA) in the formation of international issues and administering of public administration. It for the MFA to no longer perform the “gatekeeper” role between foreign policy and interior policy and to become a support institution or a platform for other public administration institutions instead. The types of support may vary from the coordination of interinstitutional issues to servicing all government institutions. Tom Christensen and Per Lægreid (2007) are just two of the well-known WGA researchers who underline the significance of horizontal coordination. In the future, many MFAs are expected to focus on coordinating foreign policy issues between the institutions involved; this is in line with the nature of the national diplomatic system, namely, the MFA as a part of the wider governmental system in the implementation and coordination of foreign policy issues (Rana 2011; Hocking, Melissen, Riordan, and Sharp 2012, 2013; Hocking and Melissen 2015; Hocking 2016, 75).

 

Dynamics of Change in Diplomatic Representations

Looking at the possible development of diplomacy, it may be predicted that employees in diplomatic missions abroad will have to deal with wider themes—for example, use of the newest communication technologies in the creation of the country’s image, use of artificial intelligence in the promotion of national competitiveness, and the formation of science and innovation diplomacy—which means acquiring new and diverse knowledge. Emphasis will also be placed on the implementation of WGA, which in turn means that employees from other ministries and agencies will be working more and more in embassies and other representations. It may be further predicted that the functions of ambassadors will become broader, because they must also support the activities and operations of the representatives of other institutions in the host country along with new agenda issues in foreign affairs. According to Kishan S. Rana (2011, 136), an ambassador will fulfill the role of the leader of the state team abroad. There is no doubt that diplomats abroad will have to be even more involved in the creation of the country’s image by using innovative communication solutions, including AI technologies.

The importance of public diplomacy will also become more topical. Along with the foregoing, diplomatic services will be required to promote economic and commercial diplomacy even more. In order to be able to promote export growth and attract investments, the MFAs will be forced to more actively use the accrued contacts and communication with representatives of the diaspora. The study by Ieva Birka and Didzis Kļaviņš (2019) on the role of diaspora diplomacy in the Baltic and Nordic countries is a good example of the importance of dialogue with diaspora communities abroad, including launching initiatives for growth and export purposes.  It is predicted that in the future, all abovementioned activities of the diplomatic service will be more deeply integrated with the model for performance management and activity reporting.

 

In Conclusion

By projecting the transformation of diplomatic practice in the coming years, it may be predicted that, in general, diplomacy that includes a variety of themes and functions—which is described as integrative diplomacy in the literature—will become dominant (Hocking, Melissen, Riordan, and Sharp 2012). Demand for the proactive service of foreign affairs and the implementation of WGA will promote structural and functional changes in the MFAs of many countries. Taking into account the fact that services will become even broader, it cannot be denied that one of the innovations could be the establishment of more and more specialized ambassadorial positions (for example, the designation of Tech Ambassador in Denmark). It may also be predicted that more external experts will be attracted to the field of strategic communications and creation of the country’s image.

Since September 2017, Casper Klynge is the first Tech Ambassador in Denmark and the world to be spearheading the government’s decision to elevate technology to a foreign policy priority as part of the Danish “TechPlomacy” initiative. (Photo courtesy of the Office of Denmark’s Tech Ambassador, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark)

References

Scott, Ben, Stefan Heumann, and Philippe Lorenz. 2018. Artificial Intelligence and Foreign Policy. Berlin: Stiftung Neue Verantwortung.

Rana, Kishan S. 2011. 21st Century Diplomacy: A Practitioner’s Guide. London: Continuum, 2011.

Hocking, Brian, Jan Melissen, Shaun Riordan, and Paul Sharp. 2012. “Futures for Diplomacy: Integrative Diplomacy in the 21st Century,” Clingendael Report 1: 1-79.

Hocking, Brian, Jan Melissen, Shaun Riordan, and Paul Sharp. 2013. “Whither Foreign Ministries in a Post-Western World?” Clingendael Policy Brief 20: 1-7.

Christensen, Tom, and Per Lægreid. 2007. “The Whole-of-Government Approach to Public Sector Reform,” Public Administration Review 67 (6): 1059–1066, doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-6210.2007.00797.

Hocking, Brian, and Jan Melissen. 2015. “Diplomacy in the Digital Age,” Clingendael Report: 1-58.

Hocking, Brian. 2016. “Diplomacy and Foreign Policy.” In The SAGE Handbook of Diplomacy, edited by Costas M. Constantinou, Pauline Kerr, and Paul Sharp, 67-78. London: SAGE.

Birka, Ieva, and Didzis Kļaviņš. 2019. “Diaspora Diplomacy: Nordic and Baltic Perspective,” Diaspora Studies, Epub ahead of print, doi.org/ 10.1080/09739572.2019.1693861.

Note: This work was supported by the European Regional Development Fund project “Post-doctoral Research Aid,” project title “Comparative research on foreign ministries in Baltic States and Nordic Countries (2012–2015),” research application Nr. 1.1.1.2/VIAA/1/16/082 and research agreement Nr. 1.1.1.2/16/I/001.

 

 

Empirical Research on Financial Crowdfunding at a Leading Research Organization for Alternative Finance

March 31, 2020
By 26667

Wanxiang Cai, who received a Sylff fellowship at Chongqing University in 2016 is currently enrolled in a PhD course at the School of Economics, Utrecht University, Netherlands. His research area is entrepreneurship. Using an SRA award, he visited the Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance, a leading research center in the field of fintech.

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In recent years, crowdfunding has emerged as a source of online entrepreneurial finance. Although crowdfunding has attracted the attention of both researchers and policymakers, as an emerging form of entrepreneurial finance, we still have very limited information about its global pattern. My PhD research is about the governance of financial crowdfunding, and I suggest it is important to analyze the relationship among social capital, legal institutions, and financial crowdfunding at the macro (national), meso (platform), and micro (campaign) levels. It is essential for me to collect data about financial crowdfunding at the platform and national levels to finish my thesis.

Kings College of the University of Cambridge.

The Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance (CCAF) is a leading research center in the field of fintech. It publishes several international industry reports every year. The center collects data from more than 1,000 fintech companies around the world and provides information about the development of the alternative finance market in different countries. These reports are the most comprehensive publications in this field and have been extensively cited in academic papers. Furthermore, the CCAF has established favorable relationships with policymakers around the world, including the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) in Britain, the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), and the World Bank. Thus, visiting the CCAF can not only help me collect essential data for my research, but also offer me a chance to have a deeper understanding of the industry and get more great insights from policymakers.

The author, left, with several members of the benchmarking report project.

After communicating with Tania Ziegler, the lead in Global Benchmarking at the CCAF, we reached the agreement that I would visit the CCAF and help them write the global benchmarking report, and in return, they would provide me with their survey data for my research. Furthermore, they would also give me a chance to discuss my research with several senior researchers at the University of Cambridge, including Professor Raghavendra Rau, who has a very high reputation in finance. Thanks to Sylff Research Aboard, I had the chance to visit the University of Cambridge and had a great time at the CCAF.

The Mathematical Bridge at the University of Cambridge.

I started my visits on September 1, 2019. I was shocked by the beauty of the city and the sacredness of the university. It was always sunny during my first two weeks in Cambridge, which is unusual in Britain, as it rains all the time. Several colleges are scattered along the banks of the River Cam, including Trinity College, where Issac Newton studied hundreds of years ago. An enormous number of visitors walked along the river, while the students in Cambridge shared with them the glories of the university, such as its history, famous alumni, and recent academic outcomes. These students looked very confident and felt so proud of their university, making me eager to start my research at Cambridge.

I began my research immediately. The first thing that I had to do was to collect data from a vast number of alternative finance platforms. The annual alternative finance report is based on these survey data. Thus, I contacted the founders of the platforms to see whether they were willing to get involved in our research. We collected data from more than 1,600 platforms around the world. Then we summarized how the market volume had changed over the last few years in major countries, as well as platform owners’ opinions about potential risks and regulatory changes. Based on this data, we also provided some preliminary analyses of what affects the growth of the alternative finance market. For example, we found a significant relationship between proper legal protections and the development of the alternative finance market. The information obtained in this way helps me to gain a deeper understanding of the global alternative finance market and is beneficial to my future research.

Meanwhile, I enrolled in an online course called Fintech and Regulatory Innovation. Through this course, I have gained new knowledge about fintech, especially from a regulatory perspective. More importantly, other students in this course are policymakers from around the world. During their discussions, I learned enormously from them. All the students come from central banks or other financial institutions, and they have great insights about the governance of fintech. They not only showed their expertise and experiences in the fintech topics but also raised questions about the future development of the market and potential research on these topics.

In addition to the above, we have discussed my research with several researchers. I have discussed one of my current papers with Wanxin Wang, a PhD candidate at Imperial College London. She also studies the topic of crowdfunding, and in fact, my paper is built on her recent paper published in a top journal. Her paper shares many similarities with mine, and she provided me with several suggestions for my research. I have also talked extensively with Dr. Rui Hao. She is very interested in my research, and she also helped me get a chance to interview policymakers worldwide. We decided to work together on a research project about how the regulations on equity crowdfunding will change. Unlike traditional entrepreneurial finance (e.g., venture capital and business angels), crowdfunding mainly consists of small investors who have limited knowledge about finance and investments, making it difficult to make proper regulations on financial crowdfunding. On one hand, overly strict legal protections on investors may harm small firms and entrepreneurial initiatives. On the other hand, legal protections can resolve extensive information asymmetry between investors and entrepreneurs. Thus, we have decided to conduct interviews on dozens of policymakers around the world. Using qualitative research methods, we would like to study how the regulations on financial crowdfunding will develop in the future.

Lastly, I conducted a study about how equity crowdfunding affects traditional entrepreneur finance. As an emerging form of entrepreneurial finance, we know less about the influence of equity crowdfunding compared to traditional entrepreneurial finance. First, equity crowdfunding may substitute traditional forms of entrepreneurial finance, such as venture capital, business angels, and private equity. Alternative, it may compensate traditional entrepreneurial finance, as it mainly supports small companies. This study contributes to my PhD research, as it explores under which legal conditions equity crowdfunding can contribute to the development of traditional entrepreneurial finance. Using the data from the CCAF and other databases, I have done some preliminary analyses. I have also discussed the idea and methods with Professor Raghavendra Rau. He gave me several comments, and I am improving this paper based his useful input.

In a nutshell, I have benefited extensively from this visiting. I have made friends, shared my research, got feedback, and gained a deeper understanding of my research. I appreciate that the Sylff Association has provided me with the scholarship to support my research at the CCAF. I am confident that other scholarship winners will also benefit from the Sylff.

Christmas dinner at the CCAF.

 

The Greenhouse Enterprise

March 31, 2020
By 19669

Sylff fellow Sennane Gatakaa Riungu implemented a project to empower a local community in Kenya with funding from Sylff Leadership Initiatives (SLI). The project seeks to provide capacity building and agribusiness training for community members in Maara constituency, Kenya Riungu’s home community—to equip them with the tools and information needed to develop agricultural business enterprises. Aside from her professional work, Riungu has been engaged in empowering her home community with others for over 10 years by utilizing her vast networks outside the community. The result of the project found both great outcomes and challenges to be addressed to fulfill a long-term goal.

*  *  *

In the words of Simon Winter, Senior Vice President of a non-profit organization for development: “If we’re serious about ending poverty and feeding a growing planet, it’s imperative that we focus on the 2 billion people who live and work on small farms in the developing world. Often, the best way to support these smallholders has less to do with things they can do to improve their farms and more to do with the systems in which they operate.

“What happens at the farm level is important, and farmers need access to knowledge that enhance productivity inputs and tools. But to create sustainable growth in agricultural industries, that can provide opportunities for increasing economic benefits for farmers now and in the future, we need to take a broader approach to development that targets the entire market system.” ( “Beyond the farm: Promoting agribusiness as a way out of poverty,” The Guardian, February 1, 2013) https://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals-network/2013/feb/01/agribusiness-mozambique-cashew-farming

The Roots

Hailing from a community whose largest population depends on peasant farming for their livelihoods, I had a question that lingered in my mind continually: how can what is described by Winter and myriad other like-minded scholars become a reality? Maara is a constituency located in Tharaka Nithi County in the Eastern side of Kenya. Maara as a constituency has a population of approximately 78,000 per the 2009 census. Whereas the upper part of the constituency enjoys favorable climatic conditions, being on the windward side of Mount Kenya, the larger population engages in small-scale subsistence farming that yields only enough produce for household consumption. The majority of the constituents are unfamiliar with the agribusiness concept, which could make a big difference in their household income and improve their socioeconomic status if well applied.

Map of Maara constituency. It is one of the three constituencies in Tharaka-Nithi County

A view of Maara Constituency, Kenya.

 

Given the community’s physical location, the agrarian nature of its economy, and the educational levels of most of its population, I researched slowly and grew convinced that creating an agricultural business model that incorporates most members of the community will go a long way in assisting the community members in this area to overcome some of the major economic challenges that they currently bear—mainly poverty—and bring a new dawn of sustainable economic empowerment for them.

Prospects and Action

Together with some of the colleagues with whom I had seen the birthing of the Makuri Development Forum (MDF), a community based welfare organization based in Maara Constituency in 2013–2014 and a brainchild of a conference funded by Sylff Leadership Initiatives), we formulated the concept of providing a practical avenue through which some of the community members would gain knowledge and learn practical skills in agribusiness. The goal of the project is to provide a practical avenue for an agricultural enterprise model where community members can train and build capacity on agribusiness-related concepts with the long-term objective of establishing a sustainable agricultural enterprise hub for the younger generation in Maara constituency. Overall, the project aims at economically empowering the constituents in Maara constituency through agribusiness.

With the above focus in mind, we formulated a double-edged approach: On the one hand, members of the development forum who are connected with other community development organizations would attend an educational workshop that can provide them with relevant information on agribusiness as an economic enterprise. On the other hand, it was expected that a self-sustaining model of greenhouse farming as an example of a functional agribusiness enterprise would be set up within proximity of the community for all interested members to access and have a hands-on experience in this regard.

It has often been stated that most developing countries have a weak culture of entrepreneurship. To assist us in demystifying this myth, I contacted the proprietors at the East Africa Seed Company (EASEED), which has been successfully running agribusiness-related enterprises in Kenya for over 40 years. Fortunately the company’s director, Mr. Jitendra Shah, and co-director, Ms. Nima Shah, were willing to take on the risk of spreading their wings further to encompass the training element of local potential entrepreneurs in my community. Through the director and as part of their corporate social responsibility, EASEED has a goal of training at least 10,000 youths across the country on agribusiness-related enterprises. The Makuri Development Forum members were able to benefit greatly from this venture through a one-day training held on July 13, 2019. The agronomists from EASEED engaged gainfully with at least 60 members of the community-based forum. The company has further pledged to continue providing seeds and related farm inputs at subsidized costs to interested participating members and groups in the community. 

The training session held in July 2019.

A greenhouse set up in the project for practical training.

 

Following the successful training session, the gained skills were expected to be put to practical use. The community development forum engaged PHFAMS Africa, a professional horticultural farms advisory and management services organization, to conduct the construction of the greenhouse. The greenhouse was set up within weeks of the training session, and the first seedlings of tomatoes and capsicum were transplanted within 21 days after that. The first crop is in season, as can be seen from the photographs presented below, and has delivered in bounty as expected.

 

The crop in season, week 2.

The crop in session, week 4.

Tomatoes as of October 2019.

Tomatoes in early November.

Tomatoes on the day of harvest.

The Output

The impact of this work is already apparent in the community, with some of the community-based organizations already gearing up to set up more greenhouses in the locality. The desired outcome is that more greenhouses will bring increased economic activities in the constituency, which will lead to revitalization of the local business sector and the broader community.

The first harvest was made on a Sunday in the presence of a visiting SLI Program Coordinator, Ms. Aya Oyamada. It was expected that the harvest from the initial crop would be sold at very reasonable costs to the members of the community. Given the intricacies of storage of a bumper first harvest, however, this was transported to the capital city of Nairobi to a wholesale buyer who purchased the entire lot in one go. This included more than 200 kg of capsicum and over 100 kg of tomatoes. Subsequent harvests have been sold to the community grocers at reasonable prices.

The demand for the produce is very high, leading to quick plans of setting up a second greenhouse in the coming months by other group members. Other nonmember constituents have also shown great interest in this model of farming. At this juncture, the initial income will go toward the maintenance of the greenhouse for subsequent crops and continued demonstrations as a continuous effort to provide any additional information or required support to the members and other interested constituents. A second training session is scheduled for March–April 2020.

With the momentum gained, it can be projected not only that the presence of agriculture-based enterprises will rise in the community but also that there will be an increase in other income-generating activities, such as the setting up of agrovets and like enterprises that will in future cater to the foreseen demand of agricultural inputs and implements in the area. This in turn will translate to better incomes for the community members and significantly improved livelihoods in every other aspect.

The author with a basket filled with capsicum.

The Challenges

As expected with these kinds of projects, some challenges have also ensued. One of the major challenges that we faced in the initial construction of the greenhouse was the negative mindset held by the community members toward crops grown in a closed setup like a greenhouse. As mentioned before, the majority of constituents have been practicing small-scale farming for subsistence use for decades. This means that they have also used traditional methods of farming, in which the yields were low and a majority of the yield was affected by disease and pests. With the greenhouse setup, the output seemed too perfect for the community members. A crop that had not been attacked by pests was perceived as almost “unsafe” for human consumption. This is a myth that we are continuing to debunk through training sessions and smart farming method demonstrations.

The other challenge that we are thinking through is the development of a constant supply of produce for the market that we have now established. Our first harvest was sold in the capital city of Nairobi, which is about three hours away from the constituency. The first wholesale buyer has been asking for more produce, as he was impressed with the first produce that he bought. On the other hand, the local market has now awaken to the availability of a good produce in the neighborhood, and most of the grocery stores are also demanding more. At the moment, we provide at least a harvest every week for the local market. This means that we have been unable to supply on wholesale to our initial client in Nairobi.

With the interest generated from the produce, we are mobilizing resources to set up more greenhouses in the community with the other members from the initial founding groups of the development forum. The constant demand is a good sign that the agribusiness concept will actually pick up and become a sustainable venture for the constituents. Our five-year plan is to be able to establish not only a sustainable client base but also sustainable production of different varieties of horticultural produce for the market. Our current challenge is therefore a positive one: grappling with the high demand for the produce. We believe that with the sustained effort, we will be able to address the foregoing challenges to establish a business model that will elevate the status of the quiet community that lies in Maara constituency.

Youth in the community working in the greenhouse.

In summary, we can safely conclude that “We just need to think and act [in and] beyond the farm.”

 

University of Nairobi LANS Meeting 2019

March 18, 2020
By 19672

University of Nairobi Sylff fellows organized a LANS meeting on November 29 and 30, 2019—their second meeting following a LANS gathering the previous year. Academic presentations were made by fellows on the first day, and participants visited Bethsaida Community Foundation to spend time with needy children on the second day. This report outlines the activities over the two days.

*     *     *

The 2019 LANS meeting of the University of Nairobi (UoN) Sylff Chapter on November 29 and 30 was held in line with the recommendations of the 2018 LANS meeting, which advocated a two-day gathering of academic presentations and a social engagement activity. Therefore, the first day featured academic presentations, while the second day entailed a visit to the Bethsaida Community Foundation. The meeting was organized by five fellows: Jacinta Mwende, Socrates Majune, Alexina Marucha, Steve Muthusi, and Awuor Ponge.

Twenty-three participants attended the meeting on the first day: 21 fellows, Aya Oyamada of the Sylff Association Secretariat, and Professor Lawrence Ikamari of the Graduate School. Fellowship years ranged from 2003–05 to 2017–19. Two fellows attended from abroad—Tanzania and Germany—while the rest were from Kenya but spread across many different cities and towns: Nairobi, Kisumu, Homa-Bay, and Mombasa. The meeting was held at the University of Nairobi Towers from 12:30 pm to 6:00 pm.

On the second day, 15 participants—Oyamada and 14 fellows—visited Bethsaida Community Foundation. The event started at 11:00 am and ended at 3:00 pm.

Group photo of LANS participants on November 29, 2019.

LANS participants outside the Bethsaida Community Foundation on November 30, 2019.

 

Presentations

Professor Lawrence Ikamari making his opening remarks on the first day.

The meeting was officially opened by Professor Lawrence Ikamari, Deputy Director of the UoN Graduate School. He expressed his gratitude to the Sylff Association for its generosity in sponsoring the LANS event. Aya Oyamada followed with a presentation on various Sylff Association support programs. Key among them was the new Sylff Disaster Relief Fund aimed at bringing together the resources of the Sylff community to support fellows who are engaged in immediate relief and recovery efforts following large-scale natural disasters in the vicinity of Sylff institutions. It was launched after the Mexico City earthquake of September 2017. More information about the program can be found at this link https://www.sylff.org/support_programs/sylff-disaster-relief-fund/.

Then there were eight presentations by fellows, with current fellows presenting first (master’s students), followed by current PhD fellows, and lastly fellows who have moved on to an academic or professional career. This arrangement ensured that fellows learned from one another, especially with up-and-coming scholars getting a chance to learn from their seniors.

Brenda Oloo responding to a question.

The first presenter was Brenda Oloo, who holds a bachelor of arts, first class honours (FCH), from UoN with majors in sociology and political science and public administration. She graduated on December 20, 2019, with a master of arts in sociology, receiving a Sylff fellowship between 2017 and 2019. Her presentation, based on her master’s thesis, examined several issues of male infertility in Machakos County, Kenya, and offered policy recommendations for the Ministry of Health in Kenya.

Jacob Omolo.

Jacob Omolo, the second presenter, dropped out of high school due to poverty but enrolled in UoN in 2012 and graduated in 2016. With Sylff’s support, he began studying for a master of education in educational planning in September 2017. He presented a proposal on the influence of adherence to the Commission for University Education (CUE) guidelines on provision of quality education. Omolo seeks to assess the CUE guidelines on physical facilities, assessment of academic programs, the employment of teaching staff, and library resources. He currently teaches at Ahono Tumaini School in Siaya County, Kenya.

Miriam Viluti.

Miriam Viluti holds a bachelor of education arts in business studies and geography and a master of education in education economics, both from UoN, and received a Sylff fellowship in 2017–19. Her presentation was on the influence of socioeconomic factors on pupils’ transition rate to secondary schools in Kibra sub-county, Nairobi. In order to enhance transition rates, Viluti recommended standardizing the hidden costs of education at the basic level; initiating, monitoring, and evaluating empowerment policies to improve living standards; and encouraging collaborative multidisciplinary research. She is currently an employee of the UoN Graduate School and is working toward starting her PhD studies.

Sennane Riungu.

Sennane Riungu was a fellow between 2006 and 2008 and is currently a PhD student in international studies at the Institute of Diplomacy and International Studies, UoN. She was awarded an SLI in 2013 and 2019, and her presentation was based on the 2019 SLI award on the “Greenhouse Enterprise.” This agribusiness project is based in Maara constituency, Tharaka-Nithi County, and encourages efficient and economically beneficial agricultural practices. Through this project, Riungu hopes to empower society, especially members of the Makuri Development Forum, by equipping them with agricultural business enterprises skills. More information is available at: https://www.sylff.org/news_voices/26460/. Riungu is currently a visa processing officer for the Australian High Commission in Nairobi.

Henry Bosco.

Henry Bosco is a journalist by profession who currently works at Maseno University and Laikipia University as a lecturer in the Media and Communications Department. He is also pursuing a PhD in communication and information studies at UoN and holds a master of arts in communication studies and bachelor of arts in journalism and media studies (FCH), both from UoN. His fellowship period was between 2012 and 2014. Bosco’s presentation assessed the binary impact of media coverage on terrorism and recommended that the media play a bigger role in countering terrorism by framing the actions in a less fear-provoking manner.

Jackie Okelo.

Jackie Okelo is a lecturer in the Department of Linguistics at Maseno University and is currently pursuing a PhD in linguistics at the university, having obtained a bachelor of education (arts) and master of arts in linguistics from UoN. She was a fellow between 2006 and 2008. Her presentation was on the “bedroom metaphor,” as presented in the political discourse surrounding the November 2019 Kibra by-elections in Kenya.

Jeremy Muthoka (next to the board) and Dominic Amoro engage in a psychological game during Muthusi’s presentation.

Steve Muthusi, the seventh presenter, is currently a DAAD scholar at the Institut für Psychologie, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, pursuing a PhD in cognitive and biopsychology. Prior to this, he graduated with a degree in social sciences with majors in psychology and sociology (FCH) and a master of psychology (sponsored by Sylff), both from UoN. He is a personal and professional development author, speaker, and trainer. He is the author of a book titled Stir Up Your Potential, and his presentation was on how stress affects the behavior of individuals (executive functions).

Socrates Majune introducing the project.

The last presentation was by Socrates Majune, who is the current chairperson of the Sylff UoN Chapter. He is an economist and is currently pursuing a PhD in economics from UoN. His holds a bachelor of economics and statistics (FCH) and a master of art in economics, both from UoN. He was a fellow between 2013 and 2015. His presentation was on his collaborative research with Eliud Moyi, a 1993–95 fellow. Moyi is an economist and currently works at the Kenya Institute for Public Policy Research and Analysis (KIPPRA) as a policy analyst. Since Moyi was absent, Majune presented their paper explaining export duration in Kenya that was recently published online in the South African Journal of Economics (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/saje.12243). The research assessed reasons exporters from Kenya exit foreign markets faster than expected, and the authors recommend trade policies that can be adopted by stakeholders, such as the government of Kenya, to enhance the sustainability of Kenyan exports in foreign markets.

 

Visit to Bethsaida Community Foundation

Aya Oyamada introducing herself in Swahili during the introduction session.

On November 30, Aya Oyamada and 14 fellows visited the Bethsaida Community Foundation, a community-based, nongovernmental, nonprofit organization that hosts orphans and vulnerable children (OVC), such as street children. The foundation was launched in 2009, and it currently has two branches in Kenya: one in Githurai and the other in Yatta. The foundation cares for OVCs by giving them parental love, spiritual care, and rehabilitation, as well as formal education to promote their personal and professional growth.

Mr. Kamau, founder of the Bethsaida Foundation, introduces himself.

The main events of the day involved donating food, clothing, stationary, and eating lunch with the kids. Fellows raised Kshs. 34,600 (US$346), which was used to buy stationary, snacks, and food for lunch. The event also involved giving motivational talks and Christian teaching.

Fellows visited the Githurai branch.

Jacinta Mwende (left) and Jackie Okelo (right) serve children sodas and biscuits.

Jackie Ogeto serves children lunch.

Fellows and children enjoy their meal during lunchtime.

Fellows and children enjoy their meal during lunchtime.

Steve Muthusi (left), Awuor Ponge (center), and Alexina Marucha prior to their departure from the Bethsaida Foundation.

 

Follow-up Visit to Bethsaida Foundation

Eliud Moyi and Socrates Majune made a follow-up visit to the Bethsaida Community Foundation on December 8, 2019, primarily to make arrangements to sponsor a child with excellent academic potential that the foundation would recommend. The initial activities of this visit involved presentations by the children. Thereafter, Moyi made his presentation before meeting Mr. Kamau, founder of the Bethsaida Foundation, with Majune. Their meeting lasted for one hour. Moyi offered to sponsor one student through high school by paying school fees and providing other necessities. As of the writing of this report, Moyi had already sponsored the student for their first year of high school. Fellows also sponsored another student who joined a day-school in their first year of high school.

“Mr. Sasakawa, from Japan, for the love of humanity sponsored me through my master’s studies without knowing me directly. It is for this reason that I give back to strangers.”

——Eliud Moyi

Eliud Moyi making his presentation about the need to obey parents as per the Bible.

 

Conclusion and Acknowledgments

The 2019 LANS event sought to benefit fellows in two ways: enhancing their presentation skills and giving back to society. This was successfully done over the two days. In addition, the decision to sponsor a needy child by Eliud Moyi affirms that fellows are putting into practice the mission of the Sylff Association, that is, contributing to and sharing the happiness of others.

The organizers of the LANS 2019 meeting offer their immense thanks to the Sylff Association for its financial support in enabling long-distance fellows to participate. Gratitude also goes to the Graduate School of the University of Nairobi for providing a venue at the university and for endorsing our application. Lastly, the organizers appreciate the sacrifice made by all fellows who attended the meeting.

 

List of Participants

 

Day one (November 29)

 

Day two (November-30)

 

No.

Name

Fellowship year

Name

Fellowship year

1

Sennane Riungu

2006–2008

Desterio Murabula

2016–2018

2

Desterio Murabula

2016–2018

Sharon Mumbi Kinyanjui

2015–2017

3

Henry Kibira

2012–2014

Jackie Okello

2006–2008

4

Brenda Oloo

2017–2019

Stephen Okelo

2007–2009

5

Miriam Viluti

2017–2019

Dominic Amoro

2012–2014

6

Maxwell Muthini

2017–2019

Ouma Omito

2006–2008

7

Sharon Mumbi Kinyanjui

2015–2017

Jacob Omolo

2017–2019

8

Jackie Okello

2006–2008

Jackie Ogeto

2006–2008

9

Agnes Mutisya

2007–2009

Maxwell Muthini

2017–2019

10

Stephen Okelo

2007–2009

Jacinta Maweu Mwende

2004–2006

11

Caroline Wanjiru

2013–2015

Stephen Katembu Muthusi

2014–2016

12

Dominic Amoro

2012–2014

Marucha Alexina Nyaboke

2014–2016

13

Maryam Abubakar Swaleh

2009–2011

Cannon  Awuor Ponge

2007–2009

14

Ouma Omito

2006–2008

Socrates Kraido Majune

2013–2015

15

Jacob Omolo

2017–2019

Aya Oyamada

Non-fellow

16

Jeremy Muthoka

2003–2005

 

 

17

Jacinta Maweu Mwende

2004–2006

 

 

18

Stephen Katembu Muthusi

2014–2016

 

 

19

Alexina Nyaboke Marucha

2014–2016

 

 

20

Cannon Awuor Ponge

2007–2009

 

 

21

Socrates Kraido Majune

2013–2015

 

 

22

Aya Oyamada

Non-fellow

 

 

23

Prof. Lawrence Ikamari

Non-fellow

 

 

Link to photos: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1KdbvAJLw6zyG0g8wOYkH11ByK6HBKCJg

Forced Migration in Transition: Perspectives from Social Science and Law

February 6, 2020

In November 2019, we, members of the Sylff Mikrokolleg on Forced Migration at Ruhr University Bochum (RUB), hosted the conference “Forced Migration in Transition: Perspectives from Social Science and Law” at our home university in Bochum, Germany. The conference brought together researchers and practitioners from different disciplines to tackle pressing issues revolving around forced migration.

*     *     *

The Sylff Mikrokolleg on Forced Migration

Our three-member organizing committee consisted of Benedikt Behlert, Corinna Land, and Robin Ramsahye. Benedikt and Robin are PhD students in international law at RUB’s Institute for International Law of Peace and Armed Conflict (IFHV). Corinna is a PhD student at the Social Science Faculty. All of us are current or former fellows of the Sylff Mikrokolleg on Forced Migration at RUB. The Mikrokolleg was established in 2017 as an interdisciplinary group of four PhD students contributing to the field of forced migration studies from different angles through their individual PhD projects and through common projects like our conference. By now, it has assembled a network of eighteen members around itself, consisting of seven professors, three current Sylff fellows, and eight associates, two of whom are former fellows. Following the aim of Sylff to “nurture leaders who will initiate action to transcend differences and address issues confronting contemporary society,” the theme for this micro assembly of young researchers at the doctoral level was quickly found: forced migration, one of the greatest challenges facing the international community today.

An Interdisciplinary Conference Bringing Together Academia and Practice

Given the contemporary dynamics of human mobility, scholarly debates on “forced migration” gained new momentum over the last year. Controversial discussions often revealed a set of highly important challenges concerning theoretical, conceptual, and methodological approaches. They also confirmed that it was impossible to truly understand this multidimensional issue without intense cooperation between various disciplines.

Against this backdrop, our conference provided a highly necessary platform to discuss recent research findings and theoretical approaches. The fruitful academic exchange was enriched by perspectives of experts from the human rights and development practice who assured the real-world relevance of the debate.

Experts from humanities and law as well as representatives from civil society met in four consecutive workshops and raised yet unanswered questions at the heart of the matter: What is forced migration after all? How do we define it? How useful is distinguishing between legal and other categories? What is the role of affected individuals in forced migration studies? How can we mitigate the pressure to migrate? And what are our possibilities and responsibilities as academics and citizens to defend public discourse from ever more xenophobic and exclusionary voices?


Transitions of Concepts, Perspectives, Law and Space

Panel 1 chaired by Corinna Land, far right, examined the concept of forced migration in the present context.

Panel 1, titled “Transition of Concepts” and chaired by Corinna Land, reflected our interdisciplinary discussions as Kolleg fellows as to what our common project should focus on. It showed that the definitional clarity that a lawyer is trained to seek cannot be conjured out of thin air when it concerns such a contentious and complex term as forced migration. The contributions of all four panelists highlighted that forced migration is conceptualized today as an integral part of global social inequalities that continuously produce forced mobility. Focusing on the African continent, Serge Palasie, a practitioner with the nongovernmental organization Eine Welt Netz, presented a macrohistorical overview of reasons for such inequalities, drawing a link from European colonialist exploitation to contemporary hegemonic practices of states underpinning the global economic order. Christopher Boyd, a doctoral candidate at the University of Glasgow’s School of Law, built on this approach with a critique of the international legal system. As “part of the problem,” international law cements hegemonic political projects as law and is thus inherently limited in providing solutions. Dr. Isabella Risini, an international law researcher at Ruhr University Bochum, equally emphasized the complexity of forced migration in a globalized world in which political, economic, and social questions are tightly interwoven and argued for a moderate role of international lawyers. Dennis Dijkzeul, professor of organization and conflict research at the IFHV, reminded the audience of the importance of gaining a wider understanding of forced migration processes through the actors involved, including states and, increasingly, networks of international organizations and NGOs.

Benedikt Behlert, right, moderates Panel 2, which provided insights for protecting individual migrants’ human rights.

Panel 2, called “Transition of Perspectives” and chaired by Benedikt Behlert, moved the focus from the broader notion of forced migration to individual forced migrants. It explored the rise of actor-oriented theories in law and social sciences transcending the longstanding image of migrants and refugees as passive beneficiaries of humanitarian assistance. The panel acted as a forum to discuss what agency these groups have in defending their interests. Legal scholars Dr. Itamar Mann from the University of Haifa and Dr. Ekaterina Yahyaoui from the University of Ireland, Galway, presented their approaches. Taking writer Behrouz Boochani’s account of life in an Australian refugee detention center on Manus Island in the Pacific as a starting point, Dr. Mann illustrated cases of judicial activism in favor of refugees’ human rights. Having himself brought a claim regarding detention practices against Australian authorities before the International Criminal Court, he provided insights on ways in which international law may be used to further migrants’ rights. Dr. Yahyaoui explored theoretical approaches to circumscribing actors in need of international support, based on the “turn to vulnerability” in refugee and forced migration studies. Criticizing this approach for its lack of nuance, she argued for increased consideration of substantive equality as part of the established human rights framework, coupled with the theory of intersectionality, which allows for engagement with individual experiences instead of schematic categorizations.

Panel 3 chaired by Robin Ramsahye, far right, discussed relations between disputes of land rights and forced migrations.


Panel 3, themed on “Transition of Law” and chaired by Robin Ramsahye, zoomed in on the specific scenario of land allocation within populations and ensuing conflicts as an important driver of forced migration. International litigator Lucy Claridge of Amnesty International provided insights into the Endorois case before the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights. As counsel, she represented members of the Endorois community, who had been displaced by the Kenyan government, in their quest for restoration of their historic land and compensation. Professor Jochen von Bernstorff from the University of Tübingen assessed current efforts to recognize the right to land in international law and examined the structural implications of land rights for the broader framework of international law. Dr. Kei Otsuki of Utrecht University explored the notion of infrastructural violence, pointing to problematic aspects of progressive legal frameworks in reaction to modernization and resettlement, which ultimately contributed to legitimizing and formalizing displacement. Mariana de Martos from the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology in Halle concluded the panel by analyzing the discrepancies between the law and its implementation through a case study of indigenous peoples’ land rights in the Brazilian Amazon rainforest.

Panel 4 chaired by Carolin Funke, far right, looked at the issue of migrants’ integration into their host communities.

Lastly, Panel 4, “Transition of Space” chaired by Carolin Funke, a post-doctoral researcher at the IFHV, opened the conference lens to the wider societal discourse. Both the findings of academic research and practical work on the issue of migration often seem to be drowned out by highly emotional and shrill debates, increasingly dominated by adherents of extreme positions. The panel contextualized these observations from the perspectives of academia, practice, and the media. Professor Ludger Pries of Ruhr University Bochum stressed that refugees and migrants are often either maligned or paternalized. He stressed that narrow views labeling them as intruders or target groups for transnational solidarity miss the mark, since migrants are actors in their own right, shaping their destinies. Building on this, journalist Isabel Schayani provided an account of her daily work covering the fates of migrants stranded on the European outposts that many of them first arrive at, as well as the lives of migrants who make it to Germany and endeavor to create a life for themselves. Complementing these perspectives, Claudia Jerzak from the University of Applied Sciences for Social Work, Education, and Care in Dresden presented examples of the process of integrating migrants into host communities through highly structured spaces, such as integration courses, and interchangeable, prestructured spaces, such as meeting cafés and self-organized spaces where refugees act as hosts and organizers.

Invaluable Experiences and Much Gratitude

The conference has afforded us a number of lasting experiences and benefits. Securing the funds for and organizing the conference sequence enabled us to familiarize ourselves with many tasks that are of crucial importance in the academic world. Having conceptualized several panels in form and content under an overarching theme, reached out to people and secured commitments of participation, organized international travel, and coped with several last-minute cancellations, we feel we have gained insights that can only be achieved through action. The interdisciplinary character of the conference, merging social scientific and legal approaches to forced migration, was initially challenging to conceive but turned out to be very beneficial. Throughout the phase of substantial preparation, we had to transcend our own disciplinary boundaries in delimiting the panels in a way that worked from the perspectives of both law and social sciences. We were glad to see that the conference participants did the same by engaging in fruitful discussions. Beyond the immediate exchange in the panel discussions, the conference enabled us to expand our professional networks and make valuable contacts through numerous occasions for informal discussions with our guests, many of whom we have arranged to stay in touch with for future cooperation.

We are indebted and very grateful to a number of people and organizations for the conference’s success. First, we would like to express our gratitude to the Sylff Association and the Tokyo Foundation for setting up the Sylff Mikrokolleg on Forced Migration and giving us the opportunity to research and express our ideas through their generous financial and administrative support. A special thank you to Sylff director Yoko Kaburagi is in order for attending our conference and encouraging follow-up exchange.

We also very much appreciate the help of RUB’s Research School, which sponsored the conference and continuously supported us with logistics and procedures, most importantly in the person of Dr. Sarah Gemicioglu.

We would also like to warmly thank all associate fellows and researchers involved with the Sylff Mikrokolleg on Forced Migration and who made valuable contributions to the development of the conference. We are glad to see that there is a lot of interest in our Kolleg and that many promising young researchers stand ready to take over and move it forward still.


Behlert's related article "The State and the Rights of Individuals: Pursuing Research at the Graduate Institute Geneva" can be read at www.sylff.org/news_voices/27786/.

Developing an Inclusive Distribution Model Using 3D-Printed Prosthetic Legs

January 30, 2020
By 24612

Keio University fellow Yutaka Tokushima—who became the first recipient of a Sylff Project Grant (SPG) in 2018 for an initiative to provide affordable 3D-printed prosthetic legs—recently completed the second year of his project. The grant enabled him to form a partnership with a university hospital in the Philippines to improve the functions of the prostheses by conducting usability trials with 49 patients. In 2019, he continued to produce and provide artificial limbs while also reaching out to local governments, donors, and the national insurance commission to help expand his project. The following is Tokushima’s account of some of the difficulties he encountered and the knowledge he gained over the past two years, which have engendered new aspirations and prospects. A video introducing his activities can be viewed here (YouTube channel) or by clicking the link below. 

 

*     *     *

I am currently advancing an ultra-low-cost, 3D-printed prostheses project in the Philippines. The 3D-CAD software and 3D printer that we developed for prostheses can create a prosthetic leg from suitable materials (filaments) using data from a 3D scanner. At present, the price of producing one leg is 20,000 pesos (about US$400), roughly a tenth the average price of a conventional prosthesis and equivalent to the starting salary for a college graduate in the Philippines—making it affordable to the local people who in the past were not able to buy one.

In the past, prosthetic limb manufacturing required the patient to visit a production facility many times over several weeks, but 3D printing takes about 24 hours from scanning to production, so the patient only needs to visit the clinic twice; once for the diagnosis and again to pick up the leg.

What initially got me involved in this project was my experience working in Bohol, a small rural village in the Philippines, as a member of the Japan Overseas Cooperation Volunteers (JOCV) between 2012 and 2014.

Diabetes was prevalent among the poor there. Without the means to go to a hospital, they would not get regular medical checkups. Illnesses would get neglected, resulting in diabetic gangrene and forcing people to amputate their limbs or die from not being able to, as many actually did. Visiting the rural clinics where I was assigned as a volunteer, I discovered that about 1% of the residents had decaying legs. The major cause of this can be attributed to their eating habits. Poverty did not provide for more than a very small amount of salty fish or meat to go with a large amount of rice, resulting in an excessive intake of carbohydrates.

There are only three public facilities in the Philippines that manufacture prosthetics. During my research I asked people who had left their gangrene unattended why they did not get medical attention. I suggested that leaving the leg unattended might kill them, but most had no reply, their faces telling me that they had largely given up on life. Getting an amputation would only mean lying around at home because they could not afford prosthetics. They would just become one more mouth to feed, so they were better off dead. I was saddened and shocked when I first realized their plight.

From this experience, I decided to develop ultra-low-cost prostheses that could be made in emerging countries and purchased by anyone. I thought that this could save people all over the world who, like the diabetic gangrene patients I had met, had decaying legs but were not able to do anything about it.

Carefully measuring the dimensions of a patient’s leg.

Understanding the structure of a patient’s leg.

Scanning leg shape data.

I started by examining a wide range of possibilities regarding prosthetic limb production in emerging countries, including the use of construction waste, bamboo, and other readily available materials. I finally came to the conclusion that 3D-printer manufacturing was the best way to balance functionality and price to meet the demands of prosthetic leg production in developing countries. However, there were many problems in terms of quality and cost in designing and manufacturing prostheses similar to existing types using commercially available 3D-CAD software and 3D printers.

After I returned to Japan in 2015, as a Sylff fellow at Keio University, I started developing 3D-CAD software and 3D printers specifically for prosthetic limbs that could overcome these issues. I set out to develop 3D-CAD software and a 3D printer exclusively for prosthetic 3D printing, eliminating all extra features and applications of commercial printers—a process that took three years.

The ever-evolving 3D prosthetic leg printer today and artificial leg brace.

From fiscal 2018, thanks to the Sylff Project Grant and in cooperation with the University of Philippines, Philippines General Hospital (UP-PGH), we conducted material strength tests to secure patient safety and usability tests to obtain medical evidence while advancing preparations for local production.

In the usability tests, we asked 49 patients to wear our 3D-printed prostheses for three months while living as before. Compared to conventional prostheses for emerging countries, we were able to achieve a 128% functional improvement (based on patient evaluation using a prosthesis evaluation questionnaire).

Based on these results, in fiscal 2019, we started local production in the Philippines for the purpose of manufacturing and selling 3D-printed prosthetic legs in emerging countries. As of December 2019, we have been able to deliver approximately 20 prostheses per month to amputees in metropolitan areas in the Philippines, and 112 people now use our prostheses. We are aiming to reach annual production of 1,000 units in fiscal 2020.

Visiting a patient who has started wearing a prosthetic leg.

A patient is able to climb up and down steep steps after regaining a normal lifestyle.

Thus far, the people using our prostheses have been limited to those living in metropolitan areas who are middle- to high-income earners. As such, we can hardly say that the prosthetic problem in the Philippines has been resolved.

My next step is to deliver our prosthetic legs to amputees not only in Metropolitan Manila but also those in remote areas like Bohol, where I had previously served as a volunteer, and in the poorest areas where people cannot afford a $400 prosthesis.

This is why I established the Instalimb Foundation, a nongovernmental organization whose mission is to develop a new distribution model for prostheses delivery catering to those who live in remote areas and who cannot pay $400 for an artificial limb and to implement this model as a social business.

Through the activities of this organization, I hope to establish a sustainable system to ensure that all people who require prosthetic limbs, including the poor in developing countries, have access to them, starting with the Philippines in fiscal 2020. 

With fellow's project members and cooperators.

As for our performance in fiscal 2019, five leg amputation patients were referred to us from local governments, and contributions from local donors were enough to pay for 12 prosthetic legs. Next year, we hope to expand our cooperation with local groups throughout the Philippines.

We have also begun approaching central government agencies in the Philippines, such as the Department of Health and the Department of Trade and Industry, as well as relevant Japanese ministries, such as the Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry and the Ministry of Health, Labor, and Welfare, to have our prostheses distribution model incorporated in the PhilHealth government health insurance framework that is being advanced by the Philippine Insurance Commission.

We will continue to consult with stakeholders and make policy recommendations in the hopes of quickly realizing a social system capable of providing prosthetic legs to all amputees in the Philippines.

Altered Disturbance Regimes and Novel Ecosystems: Understanding and Managing Ecosystem State Change in the Forest-Peatland Ecotone of Southwest Patagonia

January 24, 2020
By 25980

Using an SRA award, Kyla Zaret, a 2018 Sylff fellow from Portland State University, visited Southwest Patagonia in Chile to conduct fieldwork from March to May 2019. She has been continuously visiting this area since 2003, when she was enchanted by the natural beauty of the region. After learning approaches to conservation and development during her master’s program, she began building networks with local people and stakeholders. Her Sylff SRA fieldwork was based on her long-term commitment and experiences.

***

Patagonia looms large in the imaginations of individuals across the world, though many people are surprised to learn that the region encompasses more than one million square kilometers and extends from Chile’s fjords in the west to Argentina’s cliff-lined coast to the east, thus traversing both the Andes Mountains and national borders. While the global mythos of Patagonia as a pristine landscape of rivers flowing freely from glaciated peaks through primeval rainforest or across windblown steppe is not entirely false, it does belie the region’s historic and current patterns of land use and landscape change, which are becoming increasingly influenced by climate change and globalization. My academic research and goals as a Sylff fellow are responses to my first-hand experiences of how the above factors affect Patagonia’s ecosystems and people and my desire to lead conservation efforts that transcend socio-political boundaries to engage a diversity of stakeholders in fostering the resilience of this critical, yet vulnerable, region of the world.

Mosaic of burned wetlands and forests along the Vargas River, which parallels the “Southern Highway” and flows into the Baker River (also shown) in the Aysén Region, Chilean Patagonia. Photo by Adam Spencer, 2017.

I first arrived in Patagonia in 2003 as a backpacker, eager to explore the region’s remote and rugged beauty; however, my perspective of people and place has since deepened, as has my commitment to generating positive social change. I began conducting scientific fieldwork in southwest Patagonia in January 2010 while completing an independent research project as part of the International Conservation and Development option of the master’s program in which I was enrolled at the University of Montana (UM). I chose to undertake my practicum in Patagonia because observations that I had made during my initial travels (e.g., the conversion of native forest to nonnative tree plantations, evidence of landscape-scale fires, and a controversial hydroelectric project that would displace families from their homesteads) inspired numerous questions about natural resource management and environmental justice—questions that catalyzed my pursuit of graduate study.

Through the interdisciplinary program at UM, I learned approaches to conservation and development that prioritize local peoples’ knowledges, needs, and perceptions while striving to promote the conservation of biodiversity and ecosystem function. Within the doctoral program at Portland State University (PSU), I have been applying those teachings and building upon my master’s research to investigate how patterns of social interaction influence whose information and knowledge about altered ecosystems becomes integrated into decision-making processes, thus determining the next trajectories of ecological and social change. This research is needed because land use practices such as burning, logging, and, more recently, peat moss harvest, continue to dramatically alter the mosaic of temperate rainforests and wetlands (i.e., the “forest-peatland ecotone”) that characterize the landscape of southwest Patagonia, calling into question the continued resilience of sensitive ecosystems and the human communities who depend upon them.

A burned forest site that was once dominated by the cedar tree Pilgerodendron uviferum (Ciprés de las Guaitecas) but is now being harvested for the peat moss Sphagnum magellanicum (pon pon or pompoñ).


Historically, poorly drained sites along river valley bottoms in southwest Patagonia were dominated by a slow-growing, rot-resistant cedar tree (Pilgerodendron uviferum), whose harvest and sale formed the cornerstone of local people’s livelihoods and cultural identities, as I learned through my master’s research (Zaret 2011). Currently, however, almost all of these sites are characterized by fire-charred snags and stumps that rise from a saturated carpet of red-orange peat moss (Sphagnum magellanicum), and the cedar tree is listed as a globally threatened species (IUCN 2010). The change in dominance from cedar tree to peat moss is reflected in a transition in the resource use of these sites: in some parts of southwest Patagonia, people have shifted from harvesting cedar to harvesting peat moss. Thus, trade-offs must be made in the socio-political-economic realm regarding which potential ecosystem services of these now nonforested sites should be encouraged through management decisions. For example, should the keystone species and culturally iconic cedar tree be restored to burned sites, or is there greater perceived value in maintaining such sites in their current state of enhanced peat moss growth (e.g., so as to allow for continued harvest and sale of the moss to the horticulture market)? Conflicts are starting to arise between managers and landowners and other resource users given the passage of a new national law (Decreto 25, August 2019) that regulates the harvest of peat moss on public and private lands. Deciding how best to manage these cedar–peat moss (or “forest-peatland”) sites is further complicated by a dearth of information: none of Chile’s state agencies have been dedicated to wetland management, and very little knowledge is held by agency personnel regarding these altered ecosystems (Fernán Silva, Agricultural Service, pers. comm.).

In response to this situation, my dissertation has two overarching goals, which pertain more to the ecological or social domain of forest-peatland resource use and management of southwest Patagonia. My first goal incorporates ideas of ecosystem resilience (e.g., Holling 1973) and ecological tipping points (e.g., Scheffer and Carpenter 2003) to investigate patterns and mechanisms of ecosystem change across waterlogged sites in southwest Patagonia due to altered climate and fire regimes. I am working on this goal using forest reconstructions, paleoecological data, and vegetation surveys at control and burned sites to compare historical and contemporary relationships between climate, fire, and vegetation. My second goal is to evaluate whether the network of stakeholders engaged in natural resource use and management is structured so as to foster “social learning” (e.g., Muro and Jeffrey 2008), which may be a prerequisite for managing the complex (and novel) multiscalar dynamics of ecosystems comprising this ecotone (Folke et al. 2005). This goal has been made possible by the Sylff Graduate Fellowship and Sylff Research Abroad (SRA) award, which have allowed me to complete the qualitative and quantitative data collection needed to apply the technique of social network analysis (e.g., Bodin and Crona 2009).

Old-growth cedar trees (Pilgerodendron uviferum) rise in the distance beyond tall bulrushes in an unburned area of the Exploradores Valley of the Aysén Region, Chilean Patagonia.

The social dimension of my dissertation research is driven by my interest in whether actors who differ in their capacities (or power) to make decisions that strongly affect their occupations or livelihoods (e.g., governmental land managers vs. resource-dependent landowners or resource harvesters) communicate their knowledge and observations of the natural world with one another. This exchange is needed not only in order to best understand rapidly changing ecological dynamics but also to assure that the perspectives and needs of all stakeholders are taken into account in the management process. Thus, my SRA project was designed to help me answer the research question: Can patterns of information and knowledge exchange within the egocentric networks of distinct socio-political actors be explained by (a) the distribution of relational ties that are constrained, voluntary, or imposed by a third party (i.e., “terms of connection”; Rocheleau and Roth 2007: 434), and/or (b) scale-related differences in perspectives regarding the value(s) of forest-peatland sites?

To begin answering the above question, I conducted fieldwork in the Aysén Region of southern Chile from March to May 2019. (Aysén is where I completed my master’s research and where I have been building my own social network since 2010.) There, I traveled from the capital city of Coyhaique to rural towns and homesteads, engaging in participant observation, meeting with key informants, identifying stakeholders and potential research participants, and conducting semistructured interviews. To find and recruit interview participants, I used purposive snowball sampling to locate individuals representing opposite ends of the socio-political scale ranging from high-interest, low-power individuals to high-interest, high-power individuals. Ultimately, I conducted participant observation with 26 individuals from the land management, commercial, natural resource harvest, and nonprofit science, education, and conservation sectors, and I conducted 12 semistructured interviews (8 with individuals on the high-interest, high-power side of the socio-political scale and 4 with individuals of high interest but low power). This small sample size, especially of low-power individuals, reflects (1) the limited numbers of individuals who are currently regularly engaged in forest-peatland resource use in Aysén[1] and (2) the degree of distrust characterizing landowners’ and resource users’ relations with land managers. That is, a recent campaign by land managers to inform stakeholders of the new rules to be instituted under Decreto 25 resulted in feelings of frustration, and even persecution, on the part of landowners and resource users. Thus, when I arrived at people’s homesteads to discuss the subject of peat moss harvest, many individuals and families were still aggravated over their interactions with land managers. While some people were still open to talking with me—perhaps given my perceived neutral role as a foreign researcher—I felt it inappropriate to request a formal, recorded interview unless I had some prior history and establishment of trust with the research participant.

A view from within a stand of old-growth cedar (Pilgerodendron uviferum) in the Exploradores Valley of the Aysén Region, Chilean Patagonia.


My SRA fieldwork was most productive in terms of connecting me with land managers from the Agricultural Service who will be responsible for implementing the new regulations under Decreto 25. They are actively engaged in building their capacity to understand and monitor the dynamics of forest-peatland sites and to conduct effective education and outreach campaigns. Given my prior work with Round River Conservation Studies (RRCS), a conservation organization that leads study abroad programs for undergraduates and that has been partnering with land management agencies in Aysén since 2012, I was able to participate in several meetings with the Agricultural Service in which I advocated for the recognition of landowners’ and resource harvesters’ knowledge and perspectives. During one of those meetings, a commitment was formed between RRCS and land managers to jointly host a series of workshops for landowners and resource harvesters in which a primary objective would be creating an opportunity to share their experiences and knowledge of forest-peatland sites and to offer feedback on land managers’ activities and regulatory tools.

Back in the United States, I am currently in the process of coding interview data in preparation for conducting the social network analysis (SNA). Following the methods of Knoke and Yang (2008) and Prell (2012), I will map, analyze, and compare the egocentric networks of my research participants in terms of the proportion and quality of information- and knowledge-exchange ties that occur between individuals of the same versus different socio-political scales. These egocentric network maps will display social actors as nodes of different shapes (depending on their socio-political scale) that are connected by arrows, whose direction will indicate whether the exchanges are unidirectional or mutual and whose thickness will represent the quality of the exchange (e.g., whether voluntary or imposed; Rocheleau and Roth 2007). I will use content analysis of the interviews to qualitatively interpret patterns of information and knowledge exchange in the maps in light of people’s own perceptions of their socio-political scales and the value/importance they attribute to forest-peatland sites and their own observations of the natural world.

My preliminary findings, from participant observation and informal conversations, suggest that despite land managers’ new imperatives to identify and communicate with stakeholders, the flow of knowledge and information within and across socio-political scales is currently impaired due to the following: (1) landowners’ frustrations with past interactions with land managers; (2) landowners’ and resource harvesters’ lack of awareness of or appreciation for their own knowledge of the natural history of forest-peatland sites; (3) land managers’ lack of recognition of landowners and resource users as legitimate knowledge holders; and (4) structural aspects of regional institutions that limit communication between land managers, even within a single agency. Ultimately, I hope that the network maps—the visual products emerging from this research—can be used to pinpoint and convey where efforts to enhance communication and collaboration between stakeholders have the best chance to ensure that all perspectives and insights are brought into play to guide the wise use and continuing availability of natural resources in southwest Patagonia. I also intend to use the outcomes of my research to draw attention to other understudied nonboreal forest-peatland ecotones of the world. These areas have received scant attention from the global scientific community despite their vulnerability to climate change and their potential to contribute significantly to greenhouse gas emissions if burned (Davies et al. 2013), thus threatening the resilience of local and nonlocal ecosystems and actors.

The Sylff fellow, so excited to have finally located an old-growth stand of cedar trees (Pilgerodendron uviferum) in the Exploradores Valley of the Aysén Region, Chilean Patagonia.

As a Sylff fellow and SRA awardee, I am thankful to have been able to expand my dissertation to include a social line of inquiry that (1) will generate new conceptual and methodological links between governance, scale, and social network theory that pertain to knowledge and information exchange regarding the use and management of altered ecosystems and (2) has an applied goal of active “network weaving” (Vance-Borland and Holley 2011). In this way, I feel that I am becoming a conservation scientist and practitioner who works to transform environmental governance into a process that is equitable and inclusive for all natural resource stakeholders.

References

Bodin, Ö., and B.I. Crona. 2009. The role of social networks in natural resource governance: What relational patterns make a difference? Global Environmental Change 19 (3): 366–74. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2009.05.002.

Davies, G.M., A. Gray, G. Rein, and C.J. Legg. 2013. Peat consumption and carbon loss due to smouldering wildfire in a temperate peatland. Forest Ecology and Management 308 (November): 169–77.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foreco.2013.07.051.

Folke, C., T. Hahn, P. Olsson, and J. Norberg. 2005. Adaptive governance of social-ecological systems. Annual Review of Environmental Resources, 30: 441–73. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.energy.30.050504.144511

Holling, C.S. 1973. Resilience and stability of ecological systems. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics 4: 1–23.

Knoke, D., and S. Yang. 2008. Social Network Analysis. Thousand Oaks, California: SAGE Publications, Inc. http://methods.sagepub.com/book/social-network-analysis.

Muro, M., and P. Jeffrey. 2008. A critical review of the theory and application of social learning in participatory natural resource management processes. Journal of Environmental Planning and Management 51 (3): 325–44. https://doi.org/10.1080/09640560801977190.

Prell, C. 2012. Social Network Analysis: History, Theory and Methodology. Los Angeles: SAGE Publishing.

Rocheleau, D., and R. Roth. 2007. Rooted networks, relational webs and powers of connection: Rethinking human and political ecologies. Geoforum 38 (3): 433–37. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2006.10.003.

Scheffer, M. and S.R. Carpenter. 2003. Catastrophic regime shifts in ecosystems: Linking theory to observation. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 18 (12): 648–656.

Vance-Borland, K. and J. Holley. 2011. Conservation stakeholder network mapping, analysis, and weaving: Conservation stakeholder networks. Conservation Letters 4 (4): 278–88. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1755-263X.2011.00176.x.

Zaret., K. 2011. Distribution, use and cultural meanings of ciprés de las Guaitecas in the vicinity of Caleta Tortel, Chile. Unpublished master’s thesis, University of Montana.

 

Copycats and Patent Wars: The Effects of Quality Investment

December 13, 2019
By 22425

Qinquan Cui, a 2017 Sylff fellow at Sun Yat-sen University in China, is currently conducting research as a visiting PhD student at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Recently, he published his thesis “Quality investment, and the contract manufacturer’s encroachment” in one of the flagship research journals. In this article, he shares his analysis and perspectives on global business issues.

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Multinational cooperation has become increasingly popular in the manufacturing industry, including contract manufacturing and the setting up of joint ventures in emerging economies. In contrast to integrated business models in the past where the manufacturer had absolute control over material supply, manufacturing, assembling, and retailing, the core manufacturer in the new era has to face competition from business cooperators who can even be copycats. [1,2,3] This owes to the spillover and leakage of technology between different entities in a supply chain, which is a double-edged sword. [4] The positive side has been proven by Toyota’s knowledge-sharing network by learning product information. [5] However, product innovation can be imitated by local suppliers or contract manufacturers from the channel of foreign direct investment and product quality investment, leading to an emerging proliferation of supply chain encroachment. In such a situation, contract manufacturers (CMs) establish direct channels to compete with original equipment manufacturers (OEMs).

 

An Apple store opposite a Samsung store.
Wang Xiaofei — Visual China Group via Getty Images

The Patent Fights

This type of supply chain encroachment has induced a few intense fights - costly juristic activities. To stop such a practice of market entry, Apple Inc. (an OEM) fought with Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. (a kind of CM), because the latter had been copying Apple’s product designs and patents for a long time. Recent years have witnessed a battle in which Apple took legal action against Samsung for product plagiarism, which has cost the former more than one billion dollars. [6] However, the United States Supreme Court appeared to be stuck in a dilemma over how to deal with the high-stakes battle between the two. [7] It indicated that it was uncertain how much money the South Korean electronics company owed for infringing patents on the iPhone’s design. Thus, it seems that filing a lawsuit has brought only a faint possibility of blocking Samsung’s encroachment and compensating for Apple’s losses caused by the former’s imitations. The complexity and uncertainty of the legal environment in different countries are mainly accountable for this dilemma.

 

Apple and Samsung’s legal fight over patents.
Peter Macdiarmid — Getty Images Europe

Strategic Quality Investment as a Weapon

To reduce the contract manufacturer’s incentive of encroachment by imitation, Apple has turned to a more attainable operational strategy—investing in product quality improvement. Accordingly, Apple’s investment in research and development (R&D) has increased significantly; for instance, the fiscal year 2016 saw a 25% increase from the previous year, which contrasted sharply with the 8% fall in revenue. [8]

One important point should be made clear: sometimes the upgrade of Apple’s products is not significant, and thus the differences between the two companies’ products are not distinct, while at other times the update is striking. In addition, the contract manufacturer does not always keep up with the pace of Apple’s product quality upgrade or compete with Apple by imitation. This makes people wonder under what conditions Apple would enhance investment for improvements in product quality and be highly cautious of the co-competitor’s imitations. A question then arises: is the CM’s threat of competition one of the motivations for the OEM to invest in product quality improvement?

The Multiple Effects of Quality Investment

When the collaborator is a copycat, there are two major concerns for the profit-maximizing OEM. First, enduring a CM’s imitation and encroachment without any costly deterrence is a conservative strategy, but the OEM has to share the retail revenue with the CM. Second, investing in quality improvement has multiple effects compared with the strategy of no investment: (1) it may stop the CM from encroaching and benefit the OEM; (2) if the CM’s encroachment cannot be prevented, the OEM’s profit may deteriorate, while the rival (CM) could obtain more retail revenue by imitation; and (3) a profit improvement might be induced by the OEM’s quality investment, regardless of whether the encroachment is prevented or not.

Besides, in order to enter the OEM’s final market, the CM would strategically adjust the wholesale price to affect the OEM’s sourcing quantity. The OEM may then benefit from the CM’s encroachment if the wholesale price becomes lower.

Research Questions

Motivated by the above discussions, my research “Quality investment, and the contract manufacturer’s encroachment,” published in the European Journal of Operational Research, aims to explore the following three questions by analyzing a game-theoretical model. (The main content of this article is based on the above published research.) First, under what economic conditions does the CM’s encroachment occur? Second, should the OEM invest in quality as a mechanism to deter—or encourage—the (potential copycat) CM’s encroachment? Third, under what conditions can the CM’s encroachment achieve a Pareto improvement instead of causing a loss to the OEM?

Main Findings

Without the OEM’s quality investment, the CM always has the incentive to encroach on the OEM’s market and will claim a higher wholesale price in contrast with the ideal scenario without encroachment, but the increase of the wholesale price will be mitigated by the CM’s higher imitating ability. Then the OEM’s profit will decline as the product demand decreases due to competition from the CM.

Furthermore, when there is an attainable quality investment opportunity for the OEM, once the investment is executed, the CM will prefer the irresponsible encroachment only if its imitating capability exceeds a certain threshold. Alternatively, the CM’s encroachment policy may depend on the characteristics of the OEM’s investment. In the latter scenario, the strategic interactions between the OEM and CM become more intricate, depending on the nature of the quality investment and the CM’s imitating capability.

Another key finding shows that the CM’s threat of encroachment can facilitate the OEM quality investment and that quality investment could be preferred if it can blockade the CM’s encroachment even though the quality investment per se is unprofitable. Overall, quality investment is partially effective in deterring the CM’s encroachment. Moreover, it is found that a win-win situation can be induced by the encroachment when quality investment is implemented by the OEM; in other words, if the CM’s imitating ability is not extremely strong, the OEM’s profit can be improved by the CM’s encroachment.

Managerial Insights

The motivations for the OEM’s quality improvement (investment) lie in two aspects. Firstly, it can stimulate market demand for the OEM’s original product, which can generate more retail revenue even as the CM acts as a free rider and copycat. Secondly, quality investment is also a powerful weapon to deter the competitive CM’s encroachment. Moreover, it is found that the CM’s encroachment is certain to happen when its imitating ability is strong, in which case the structure of quality investment no longer matters.    

Furthermore, research findings show that the CM’s imitation and encroachment can contribute to a win-win situation for both parties under certain conditions. In this scenario, the OEM’s profit increment is generated by an increased demand for the original product and a lower wholesale price, while the retail price of the original product falls compared with the situation without encroachment.

 

Quality investment at the crossing.
Lucas Jackson — REUTERS

However, quality investment is not always an effective solution to deterring the CM’s encroachment or helping encroachment improve the OEM’s profit. For instance, an encroachment by a CM with a strong imitating ability and an investment structure characterized by low investment cost and low quality improvement will certainly hurt the OEM’s profit.

This explains why, among those OEMs who established joint ventures (or other forms of cooperation) in developing countries, some would use quality improvement to deter their partners’ product imitation and encroachment, others prefer to invest in quality improvement and wink at the CM’s encroachment, and yet others complain about their CMs’ irresponsible imitation behavior.

As stated by the New York Times, the insights of this research are in line with the prediction that “Apple can find better ways of earning hundreds of millions of dollars than fighting a decade-long lawsuit.” [9] Then the courtroom is not always the place to try to get patent problems solved. Instead, the alternative operational strategy—quality (R&D) investment—would be a more efficient weapon that can deter copycats’ imitations and supply chain encroachments.  

 References

[1] Chen, Y.J., S. Shum, and W. Xiao. 2012. Should an OEM retain component procurement when the CM produces competing products? Production and Operations Management, 21 (5), 907–922.

[2] Cui, Q. (2019). Quality investment, and the contract manufacturer’s encroachment. European Journal of Operational Research, 279, 407–418.

[3] Cui, Q., C.H. Chiu, X. Dai, and Z. Li. 2016. Store brand introduction in a two-echelon logistics system with a risk-averse retailer. Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, 90, 69–89.

[4] Aldieri, L., V. Sena, and C.P. Vinci. 2018. Domestic R&D spillovers and absorptive capacity: Some evidence for US, Europe and Japan. International Journal of Production Economics, 198, 38–49.

[5] Dyer, J.H., and N.W. Hatch. 2004. Using supplier networks to learn faster. MIT Sloan Management Review, 45 (3), 57.

[6] Eichenwald, K. 2014. The great smartphone war. Vanity Fair, May 3, 2014.

[7] Kendall, B. 2016. Supreme court hears Apple-Samsung patent case. The Wall Street Journal, October 12, 2016.

[8] Gallagher, D. 2016. What does Apple get for $10 billion of R&D? The Wall Street Journal, October 28, 2016.

[9] Nicas, J. 2018. Apple and Samsung end smartphone patent wars. The New York Times, June 27, 2018.