Exploring Networked Project Coordination in Combined Utility Streetworks

Combined utility streetworks involve cable and pipeline owners and authorities that concurrently undertake work in the same physical space. In this networked project setting, ownership fragmentation and lacking formal coordination instruments complicate the integration of multi-stakeholder engineering and construction operations. Boundary spanners have a unique position to pursue integration in this complex system. To understand what it is that constitutes their practices, we explore them through Mintzberg’s seminal framework of informational, interpersonal, and decisional roles. Specifically, we extend the framework to the context of boundary spanning in networked projects by conducting semi-structured interviews with seven boundary spanners of combined utility streetworks: the so-called utility coordinators. Based on open coding of the interview data, we identified 149 performed activities, and twenty-three lower-level management roles (such as involving stakeholders; facilitating formal processes; and, creating a collective memory). Next, axial coding allowed us to tailor Mintzberg’s role model to networked project settings. Based on this, we reflect on how a setting that lacks formal coordination instruments influences the roles that boundary spanners adopt. This empirical study of coordination in networked projects contributes a case to the practice turn literature that calls for explorations of everyday organizational practices in their situated context. Other contributions are the extension of Mintzberg’s framework to networked projects; and, the development of two hypotheses about the position and roles of utility coordinators. Eventually, our findings may help practitioners identify what interpersonal and informational skills they need to improve alignment in loosely connected project networks.

Assessing Land Fragmentation in Planning Sustainable Urban Renewal

Planning of sustainable urban renewal is one of the key issues for city development. Particular emphasis is placed on the problem of the sustainable urban renewal of areas that are made up of a large number of private cadastral parcels that cause ownership fragmentation. Urban renewal is most often carried out to realize a large project where it is necessary to determine the optimal way of its realization. This paper proposes a methodology for assessing the index of fragmentation for the purpose of sustainable urban renewal planning. The methods used to solve the task are Simple Additive Weighting method (SAW) for ranking alternative solutions (i.e., cadastral parcels, spatial elements and areas of future construction), and the Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process method (FAHP) for defining the criteria weights. In the process of defining the index of fragmentation model as well as the weighting determination, a group of experts was involved. The proposed model was tested on the field of the construction of the University of Split campus, for which implementation was planned in several periods. The obtained results show that the proposed methodology can provide support in analyzing the spatial–functional capacities of the existing land, and for decision making in optimizing the realization of urban projects.

PATENT OWNERSHIP FRAGMENTATION AND MARKET VALUE: AN EMPIRICAL ANALYSIS

Patent ownership Fragmentation following the U.S. pro-patent shifts has built overlapping intellectual property rights or patent thickets. This has made the use of others’ innovations costlier due to transaction costs, licensing fees, and hold-up. Using panel data on 2,441 public U.S. manufacturing firms for 1976–2002, I find that patent thickets lower firms’ expected profit and their market value. I also find that firms with a large patent portfolio experience a smaller effect, likely because stronger bargaining position lowers the hold-up likelihood. There is no systematic time effect from patent thickets on firms’ market value with a large patent portfolio size.

The Contemporary Agrarian Change in Rice Production Village in Klaten Regency, Central Java

Rural Java areas underwent significant changes during the last 20 years due to increasing education and health level and improving transportation and communication infrastructure, but researches on agricultural transformation, especially rice farming in Java, was limited. This study aimed at understanding the structure of land ownership and tenure, and the changing of land tenure institutional system in wetland farming, in its relation to the contemporary demographic change in the Javanese rural areas. The research was conducted in Kauman Village, Klaten Regency, Central Java. There were 307 farmer households in the village. The samples of 52 farmer households were taken randomly. Data collection used questionnaires and in-depth interviews with 52 respondents and 6 key informants. The analysis was carried out by comparing the data before the green revolution and 2016 data. The results of the study were as follows. Firstly, the number of landless farmers was very large (60 percent). Despite the green revolution, the proportion of this group had been already high before the green revolution program was intensified. Secondly, the level of land ownership disparity was moderate and tended toward equity due to the continuity of land ownership fragmentation through land inheritance processes, and no land ownership concentration occurred on the basis of agricultural land purchase. Thirdly, the level of inequality of land tenure was moderate and even close to low, and tended toward equity as the number of land tenants was much greater than the land owners. Fourthly, the bargaining position of the land tenants tended to be stronger than the land owners due to the declining attraction of agricultural work as a source of employment.

Identification of stagnation reasons in the field of land consolidation in Slovakia compared with the Czech Republic

Causes of different evolution of land consolidation in the Czech Republic (CR) and Slovakia (SR) are documented and analyzed. Land fragmentation, methodical guidelines, legislative measures, financing and implementation of land consolidation projects are compared. Extensive, broad, complex land consolidation (LC) brings direct and indirect economic, environmental, social and landscape benefits for land owners and communities alike. It is a planning and development tool that is crucial for regional development. Authors focus on success of LC projects (measured by numbers of accepted projects relative to the country size) and their historical backgrounds in both neighbouring countries. Comprehensive land consolidation (CLC) and simple land consolidation (SLC) are examined. Approach to LC is similar in both countries. Demand for solving certain problems (e.g. land fragmentation, ownership fragmentation) is higher in Slovakia. Comprehensive land consolidation projects were initiated earlier in Slovakia than in the Czech Republic. But the current situation is significantly worse in Slovakia than in the Czech Republic. Risk of promoting particular interests resulting in an environment with disrupted dynamics of land consolidation is mentioned. Slovakia has a chance to change current dismal situation in the field of land consolidation only with the support of landowners.