scholarly journals Urban Marginalization and the Declining Capacity for Disaster Risks in Contemporary China

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (11) ◽  
pp. 424
Author(s):  
Jia Xu ◽  
Makoto Takahashi
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Urban Governance ◽  
Environmental Changes ◽  
Urban Migration ◽  
Rapid Urbanization ◽  
Disaster Studies ◽  
External Pressures ◽  
Structural Resistance ◽  
Underlying Causes ◽  
Social Vulnerabilities

Many disaster studies in the social sciences have so far pointed out that contemporary urbanization catalyzes the transformation of actual and potential risks into disasters. Compared with the greater attention paid to the losses of disasters, there is inadequate recognition of the roles of deep-seated social factors in addressing environmental changes and risks. In addition, very few discussions about social vulnerabilities have paid attention to China, even though they focus on developing countries. In the past four decades, China’s rapid urbanization, urban expansions, and large-scale rural-urban migration have led to increasing difficulties in urban management, generating a large number of marginalized populations and spaces that are often called urban villages. The current marginalization problems are connected with economic poverty, sustained exclusion, and social inequality under state-managed urbanization. This study aims to provide a valuable discussion on the relationship between rapid urbanization and urban marginalization to identify the underlying causes of social vulnerability from the perspectives of institution, space, and urban governance, reviewing the experiences of China’s urbanization. This study concludes that urbanization-induced marginalization has adverse impacts on structural resistance to external pressures such as natural disasters.

scholarly journals Living and Planning on the Edge: Unravelling Conflict and Claim-Making in Peri-Urban Lahore, Pakistan

2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 189-201 ◽  
Author(s):  
Helena Cermeño
Keyword(s):  
Urban Governance ◽  
Urban Migration ◽  
Spatial Transformation ◽  
Rural Settlements ◽  
City Development ◽  
Rapid Urbanization ◽  
Population Growth Rates ◽  
Governance Practices ◽  
Inclusive Approach ◽  
High Population Growth

In Lahore, Pakistan’s second largest city, high population growth rates, decades of rural-urban migration, and rampant land and real-estate speculation have contributed to the rapid urbanization of peri-urban land and the engulfing of pre-existing rural settlements. Lahore’s spatial transformation goes hand in hand with an increasingly complex urban governance framework. Historically shaped by colonial planning institutions and decades of political instability as power alternated between military and civilian regimes, Pakistan’s governance practices have contributed to increasing levels of urban segregation and inequality. This raises questions around the in- and exclusionary role of planning in fostering or constraining residents’ access to housing and services. Comparing three vignettes and drawing upon insights gained from extensive fieldwork, this article employs the concept of ‘access-assemblages’ to analyze how access to urban resources—i.e., land, housing, and services—is experienced, disputed, and negotiated in the rapidly urbanizing peri-urban fringe of Lahore. The cases represent different spatial and socio-political configurations brought about by a variety of actors involved in the planning and development of the city’s periphery as well as in contesting development: private developers, the army, the city development authorities, and the residents of affected villages. The analysis unpacks the planning rationalities and mechanisms that reinforce inequalities of access and exclusions. Unfolding practices that enable or hinder actors’ ability to access resources sheds light on the complex layers assembled in urban planning in Lahore and serves as a basis to rethink planning towards a more inclusive approach.

scholarly journals The Rise of Political Islam in Turkey: The Role of Socio-Psychological Factors

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eldar T. Hasanov
Keyword(s):  
Ethnic Groups ◽  
Social Transformation ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Common Ground ◽  
Social Preferences ◽  
Political Islam ◽  
Ethnic Identities ◽  
Potential Conflict ◽  
Rapid Urbanization ◽  
Underlying Causes

What are the underlying causes of the spectacular rise of political Islam in Turkey? The factors behind the rise of Islamism in Turkey remain the subject of intense scholarly debate. There are interesting relationships between the rise of Islamism and preceding changes in population dynamics in Turkey. Rapid urbanization and large-scale migration of Kurds and other ethnic minorities from the east of the county to major cities in the west created a situation when Kemalist ideology, that was based on Turkish nationalism and secularism, could not continue to play its nation-building role anymore. The changes in demographics created a need for a social transformation that can bring people with different ethnic identities together based on a shared aspect of their identity. There was a need for a bond that can link members of different ethnic groups to one another and to the country as a whole. This need found its realization in Islamism because the main shared aspect of the identity of the majority of ethnic Turks and Kurds is their religion - Sunni Islam. Islamism offered a sense of a new superseding identity that helped to restrain existing Turkish, Kurdish and other ethnic identities and helped to reconcile and stabilize social relationships by reducing ethnic antagonism, tension and potential conflict. This new consolidating mechanism helped to create a state of a strong and substantial common ground between different ethnic groups concentrated in major metropolitan areas of Turkey. The rise of political Islam in Turkey was the political consequence of changing social preferences and motivation that resulted in inventing the reason for the social and political change, without recognizing and acknowledging the real underlying motives behind it.

scholarly journals Large-Scale Road Network Congestion Pattern Analysis and Prediction Using Deep Convolutional Autoencoder

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (9) ◽  
pp. 5108
Author(s):  
Navin Ranjan ◽  
Sovit Bhandari ◽  
Pervez Khan ◽  
Youn-Sik Hong ◽  
Hoon Kim
Keyword(s):  
Traffic Congestion ◽  
Network Architecture ◽  
Road Network ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Pattern Analysis ◽  
Image Data ◽  
Urban Life ◽  
Prediction Algorithm ◽  
Rapid Urbanization ◽  
Convolutional Autoencoder

The transportation system, especially the road network, is the backbone of any modern economy. However, with rapid urbanization, the congestion level has surged drastically, causing a direct effect on the quality of urban life, the environment, and the economy. In this paper, we propose (i) an inexpensive and efficient Traffic Congestion Pattern Analysis algorithm based on Image Processing, which identifies the group of roads in a network that suffers from reoccurring congestion; (ii) deep neural network architecture, formed from Convolutional Autoencoder, which learns both spatial and temporal relationships from the sequence of image data to predict the city-wide grid congestion index. Our experiment shows that both algorithms are efficient because the pattern analysis is based on the basic operations of arithmetic, whereas the prediction algorithm outperforms two other deep neural networks (Convolutional Recurrent Autoencoder and ConvLSTM) in terms of large-scale traffic network prediction performance. A case study was conducted on the dataset from Seoul city.

scholarly journals Social Evaluation of Public Open Space Services and Their Impact on Well-Being: A Micro-Scale Assessment from a Coastal University

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (8) ◽  
pp. 4372
Author(s):  
Abdullah Addas ◽  
Ahmad Maghrabi
Keyword(s):  
Open Space ◽  
Environmental Changes ◽  
Positive Impact ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Social Evaluation ◽  
Open Spaces ◽  
Rapid Urbanization ◽  
Public Open Space ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Public Open Spaces

Public open spaces services have been shown to be profoundly affected by rapid urbanization and environmental changes, and in turn, they have influenced socio-cultural relationships and human well-being. However, the impact of these changes on public open space services (POSS) remains unexplored, particularly in the Saudi Arabian context. This study examines the socio-cultural influence of POSS on the King Abdulaziz University campus, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia and the impact of these services on well-being. A field survey and questionnaire were used to collect data. Non-parametric tests (Kruskal–Wallis and Mann–Whitney tests) were used to find significant differences in the importance of POSS as perceived by stakeholders based on socio-demographic attributes. Factor analysis was performed for 14 POSS to identify those that are most important. The study showed that (i) university stakeholders are closely linked to services provided by public open spaces (POS) and dependent on POSS, (ii) there were significant differences in the perceived importance of POSS according to gender, age, and social groups, and (iii) 70 to 90% of stakeholders reported POSS as having a positive impact on well-being. Thus, the findings will help design and plan POSS to meet the needs of society and promote well-being.

scholarly journals Impact of the municipal merger on watershed management: a study of Lake Kasumigaura, Japan

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Takeshi Mizunoya ◽  
Noriko Nozaki ◽  
Rajeev Kumar Singh
Keyword(s):  
Watershed Management ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Environmental Changes ◽  
Water Environment ◽  
Reduction Rate ◽  
Oxygen Demand ◽  
Policy Implications ◽  
Pollution Reduction ◽  
Lake Kasumigaura ◽  
The Impact

AbstractIn the early 2000s, Japan instituted the Great Heisei Consolidation, a national strategy to promote large-scale municipal mergers. This study analyzes the impact that this strategy could have on watershed management. We select the Lake Kasumigaura Basin, the second largest lake in Japan, for the case study and construct a dynamic expanded input–output model to simulate the ecological system around the Lake, the socio-environmental changes over the period, and their mutual dependency for the period 2012–2020. In the model, we regulate and control the following water pollutants: total nitrogen, total phosphorus, and chemical oxygen demand. The results show that a trade-off between economic activity and the environment can be avoided within a specific range of pollution reduction, given that the prefectural government implements optimal water environment policies, assuming that other factors constraining economic growth exist. Additionally, municipal mergers are found to significantly reduce the budget required to improve the water environment, but merger budget efficiency varies nonlinearly with the reduction rate. Furthermore, despite the increase in financial efficiency from the merger, the efficiency of installing domestic wastewater treatment systems decreases drastically beyond a certain pollution reduction level and eventually reaches a limit. Further reductions require direct regulatory instruments in addition to economic policies, along with limiting the output of each industry. Most studies on municipal mergers apply a political, administrative, or financial perspective; few evaluate the quantitative impact of municipal mergers on the environment and environmental policy implications. This study addresses these gaps.

scholarly journals UVLens

2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-26
Author(s):  
Longbiao Chen ◽  
Chenhui Lu ◽  
Fangxu Yuan ◽  
Zhihan Jiang ◽  
Leye Wang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Floating Population ◽  
Open Government ◽  
Residential Areas ◽  
Rapid Urbanization ◽  
Urban Village ◽  
Open Government Data ◽  
Government Data ◽  
Real World Datasets ◽  
Urban Villages

Urban villages refer to the residential areas lagging behind the rapid urbanization process in many developing countries. These areas are usually with overcrowded buildings, high population density, and low living standards, bringing potential risks of public safety and hindering the urban development. Therefore, it is crucial for urban authorities to identify the boundaries of urban villages and estimate their resident and floating populations so as to better renovate and manage these areas. Traditional approaches, such as field surveys and demographic census, are time consuming and labor intensive, lacking a comprehensive understanding of urban villages. Against this background, we propose a two-phase framework for urban village boundary identification and population estimation. Specifically, based on heterogeneous open government data, the proposed framework can not only accurately identify the boundaries of urban villages from large-scale satellite imagery by fusing road networks guided patches with bike-sharing drop-off patterns, but also accurately estimate the resident and floating populations of urban villages with a proposed multi-view neural network model. We evaluate our method leveraging real-world datasets collected from Xiamen Island. Results show that our framework can accurately identify the urban village boundaries with an IoU of 0.827, and estimate the resident population and floating population with R2 of 0.92 and 0.94 respectively, outperforming the baseline methods. We also deploy our system on the Xiamen Open Government Data Platform to provide services to both urban authorities and citizens.

scholarly journals Characterizing the Topographic Changes and Land Subsidence Associated with the Mountain Excavation and City Construction on the Chinese Loess Plateau

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (8) ◽  
pp. 1556
Author(s):  
Chuanhao Pu ◽  
Qiang Xu ◽  
Kuanyao Zhao ◽  
Yanan Jiang ◽  
Lina Hao ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Loess Plateau ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Ground Deformation ◽  
Urban Expansion ◽  
Chinese Loess Plateau ◽  
Rapid Urbanization ◽  
Chinese Loess ◽  
City Construction ◽  
Large Scale Land ◽  
The Chinese Loess Plateau

A mega project, Mountain Excavation and City Construction (MECC), was launched in the hilly and gully region of the Chinese Loess Plateau in 2012, in order to address the shortage of available land and create new flat land for urban construction. However, large-scale land creation and urban expansion significantly alters the local geological environment, leading to severe ground deformation. This study investigated the topographic changes, ground deformation, and their interactions due to the MECC project in the Yan’an New District (YND). First, new surface elevations were generated using ZiYuan-3 (ZY-3) stereo images acquired after the construction in order to map the local topographic changes and the fill thickness associated with the MECC project. Then, the interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) time series and 32 Sentinel-1A images were used to assess the spatial patterns of the ground deformation in the YND during the postconstruction period (2017–2018). By combining the InSAR-derived results and topographic change features, the relationship between the ground deformation and large-scale land creation was further analyzed. The results indicated that the MECC project in the YND has created over 22 km2 of flat land, including 10.8 km2 of filled area, with a maximum fill thickness of ~110 m. Significant uneven ground deformation was detected in the land-creation area, with a maximum subsidence rate of approximately 121 mm/year, which was consistent with the field survey. The strong correlation between the observed subsidence patterns and the land creation project suggested that this recorded uneven subsidence was primarily related to the spatial distribution of the filling works, along with the changes in the thickness and geotechnical properties of the filled loess; moreover, rapid urbanization, such as road construction, can accelerate the subsidence process. These findings can guide improvements in urban planning and the mitigation of geohazards in regions experiencing large-scale land construction.

scholarly journals Variability in larval gut pH regulation defines sensitivity to ocean acidification in six species of the Ambulacraria superphylum

2017 ◽  
Vol 284 (1864) ◽  
pp. 20171066 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marian Hu ◽  
Yung-Che Tseng ◽  
Yi-Hsien Su ◽  
Etienne Lein ◽  
Hae-Gyeong Lee ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Ocean Acidification ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Environmental Changes ◽  
Ph Regulation ◽  
Gastric Ph ◽  
Differential Sensitivity ◽  
Larval Stages ◽  
Regulatory Systems ◽  
Alkaline Conditions ◽  
Gut Ph

The unusual rate and extent of environmental changes due to human activities may exceed the capacity of marine organisms to deal with this phenomenon. The identification of physiological systems that set the tolerance limits and their potential for phenotypic buffering in the most vulnerable ontogenetic stages become increasingly important to make large-scale projections. Here, we demonstrate that the differential sensitivity of non-calcifying Ambulacraria (echinoderms and hemichordates) larvae towards simulated ocean acidification is dictated by the physiology of their digestive systems. Gastric pH regulation upon experimental ocean acidification was compared in six species of the superphylum Ambulacraria. We observed a strong correlation between sensitivity to ocean acidification and the ability to regulate gut pH. Surprisingly, species with tightly regulated gastric pH were more sensitive to ocean acidification. This study provides evidence that strict maintenance of highly alkaline conditions in the larval gut of Ambulacraria early life stages may dictate their sensitivity to decreases in seawater pH. These findings highlight the importance of identifying and understanding pH regulatory systems in marine larval stages that may contribute to substantial energetic challenges under near-future ocean acidification scenarios.

scholarly journals Assessing the Vulnerability of Marine Fisheries in China: Towards an Inter-Provincial Perspective

2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (11) ◽  
pp. 4302 ◽  
Author(s):  
Qi Chen ◽  
Weiteng Shen ◽  
Bing Yu
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Adaptive Capacity ◽  
Fisheries Management ◽  
Vocational Training ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Environmental Changes ◽  
Marine Pollution ◽  
Marine Fisheries ◽  
Intergovernmental Panel ◽  
Adaptation Measures

China’s marine fisheries are undergoing large-scale environmental changes associated with climate change, marine pollution, and overfishing. The assessment of marine fisheries vulnerability has become extremely necessary for fisheries management and sustainable development. However, studies on China’s marine fisheries vulnerability remains sparse. This study aimed to provide an analysis of the inter-provincial level vulnerability of China’s marine fisheries under multiple disturbances. The vulnerability measure was composed of exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity indicators specific to marine fisheries based on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) definitions. Results showed that Liaoning, Hebei, Fujian, and Hainan provinces appeared to be the most vulnerable; Shanghai appeared to be less vulnerable among China’s 11 coastal provinces; and the key sources of vulnerability differed considerably among coastal regions. The high vulnerability regions could be divided into two different patterns according to the combination of exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity, but they all had one thing in common: relatively low adaptive capacity. While some existing coercive measures to reduce dependence on fisheries were found to be helpful in China, the reality showed that appropriate adaptation measures such as improving fishermen’s education level and increasing vocational training may be helpful in enhancing the existing policy effectiveness.

scholarly journals Disorder or Reorder? The Spatial Production of State-Level New Areas in China

2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (10) ◽  
pp. 3628 ◽  
Author(s):  
Liang Zhuang ◽  
Chao Ye
Keyword(s):  
Urban Space ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Regional Distribution ◽  
State Level ◽  
Growth Spurt ◽  
Rapid Urbanization ◽  
New Town ◽  
Spatial Production ◽  
Expansion Pattern ◽  
Reform And Opening Up

With rapid urbanization in the world, new town construction has become prosperous. In particular, new emerging towns in China are unique because of the most significant movement of “building cities”. Over four decades of reform and opening-up, this movement has brought about a special development model known as State-level New Area (SLNA) which, like a new town, is causing a growth spurt in national and regional economic development. By applying the critical theory of production of space, this paper gives an overall analysis. SLNAs generate a new expansion pattern of urban space in the regionalization process dominated by governments. To reveal the spatiotemporal evolution logic of SLNA, the framework identifies the main characteristics contributing to spatial production: both bottom-up and top-down project on construction; a sharp and unordered trend of increment in time scale; an unbalanced regional distribution in the sequential order of “Eastern–Western–Northeastern–Central” among regions; complex spatial overlaying with different development zones and administrative divisions; and large-scale spatial expanding. This paper finds that the ongoing growth of SLNAs is a rapid process of spatial production with more contradictions, which is especially marked by tension between disorder and reorder. We hope to provide theoretical reference and practical guidance for the sustainable urbanization and orderly regional development of SLNAs.

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