New extractivism in European rural areas: How twentieth first century mining returned to disturb the rural transition.

In this article we aim to explore the still incipient first steps of the return of extractivism to Europe, examining the geopolitical context that led to a reemergence of metal mining in rural areas. Previous emphasis on nature conservation and tourism promotion, equally fostered from European stances since the 70s on, are nowadays being confronted with a renewed focus on the strengthening of self-provision of certain raw materials. We will go through the most relevant regulations as key tools for grasping the contradiction within the new legal frameworks. Despite the urgent need to understand the changing scenario of European rural areas, the staggering reality of critical mineral extractivism, together with its environmental, ecological and social threats, is only now starting to be analyzed by social scientists.

Can Perceptions of Environmental and Climate Change in Island Communities Assist in Adaptation Planning Locally?

Local perceptions of environmental and climate change, as well as associated adaptations made by local populations, are fundamental for designing comprehensive and inclusive mitigation and adaptation plans both locally and nationally. In this paper, we analyze people's perceptions of environmental and climate-related transformations in communities across the Western Solomon Islands through ethnographic and geospatial methods. Specifically, we documented people's observed changes over the past decades across various environmental domains, and for each change, we asked respondents to identify the causes, timing, and people's adaptive responses. We also incorporated this information into a geographical information system database to produce broad-scale base maps of local perceptions of environmental change. Results suggest that people detected changes that tended to be acute (e.g., water clarity, logging intensity, and agricultural diseases). We inferred from these results that most local observations of and adaptations to change were related to parts of environment/ecosystem that are most directly or indirectly related to harvesting strategies. On the other hand, people were less aware of slower insidious/chronic changes identified by scientific studies. For the Solomon Islands and similar contexts in the insular tropics, a broader anticipatory adaptation planning strategy to climate change should include a mix of local scientific studies and local observations of ongoing ecological changes.

Social Sciences and landscape analysis: opportunities for the improvement of conservation policy design.

This article develops a methodology aimed at generating a systematic social diagnosis of social and natural landscapes. The analytical process is divided into six easily replicable and causatively connected steps. The goal is two-fold: first, to present the inextricable connections between physical landscapes and the communities that occupy them. And second, to provide a fundamental tool to public policy designers that should simultaneously improve social acceptability of conservation policies and policy efficiency and effectiveness. Finally, this methodology is consciously heterogeneous from a theoretical perspective. This article puts together, in fruitful dialogue, contributions from varying places on the social theory spectrum: from political economy to poststructural theory.