Josephine d’Allant – Disaster Management: What We Can Learn From the Developing World

Huffington Post – Whether in Oklahoma or Dhaka, emergencies test the fabric of the community and attest to the importance of citizen engagement. From risk assessment and public awareness, to early warning systems and trained volunteer responders, to mitigation and inclusion in recovery planning, a comprehensive approach to disaster management is essential. In cities with large urban poor populations, planning not only mitigates potential financial and human losses, it also provides a baseline measurement of what survival means for a community. The process of designing emergency preparedness, response, and recovery for informal or marginalized groups is a form of inclusion, which can be leveraged and broadened. The urgency demanded by disaster response operations also mirrors the urgency of responding to the conditions of daily disaster and chronic catastrophe that exist in these communities. Read on to see five innovative approaches to disaster relief in Nairobi, Mumbai, Jakarta, Mexico City, and Rio de Janeiro.

Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/disaster-management-tools

Brief History Of New Media Art In Turkey

• by: Ekmel Ertan

The new media scene in Turkey can be viewed parallel to the establishment of Visual Communication Design (VCD) departments at universities, which goes back to the end of the 1990s. In 1996 private universities founded earliest VCD departments. Yıldız Technical University is the first state university that started such a program, as well as the first master and doctoral degree program in the field. A pioneer in this field, Bilgi University’s VCD department started organizing annual student work exhibits in 2001. These exhibits created a broader awareness of digital technologies. The opening of VCD departments in public and private universities has led to an increased interest in screen based digital media in the last decade. At present there are roughly 170 universities in Turkey, about 45 of them in İstanbul and many of them have a VCD or similar program.

There is not (yet) a department or program solely dedicated to new media in any art faculty of any Turkish university. For the most part, art education still follows a conventional art educational practice, although there seems to be a gradual shift towards conceptual artworks created with different media – even within more conservative institutions such as the Faculty of Fine Arts at Mimar Sinan and Marmara University.

Screen-based interaction has been in the curriculums of all programs from the beginning. But the first course to go beyond screen-based interaction and towards spatial and tangible interfaces in terms of design and art, was offered only recently in 2005 at Bilgi University – and it was actually by me. (I still continue to teach this course at Sabancı University). In 2005, Elif Ayiter and Selim Balcısoy started a multi-disciplinary course at Sabancı University. This course focused on the collaborative work of design and engineering students. Koray Tahiroğlu, a musician who was educated abroad, started similar courses in the Music Department at Bilgi University. In 2008 the students presented their interactive compositions in a club. This was the first event of its kind in Turkey. Read more

Amber ’10 Art and Technology Festival, Istanbul, Turkey

dancetechtv
WORLDGRIDLAB production team
Asli Yilmazturk

Inclusive Cities – South Africa

Photo: inclusivecities.ning.com  – The Challenge

Through the South African national government’s subsidized housing delivery program, roughly 2.3 million households have been accommodated since 1994. Under the auspices of the Financial Sector Charter, the four major banks invested R44.8billion in providing more affordable housing. However, despite these achievements, the total housing deficit has not improved significantly, and an estimated 2.1 million households in South Africa live in shacks, either in informal settlements or in the backyards of formal housing.

In 2004 the then Minister of Housing, Ms Lindiwe Sisulu, introduced two significant policy initiatives. The first, Breaking New Ground is a ‘[national] comprehensive plan for the development of sustainable human settlements’, known as The Comprehensive Plan. A key element of the plan is a commitment to have tackled the question of informal settlement upgrading by 2014. Within the framework of this comprehensive national plan the government also finalized the second significant policy initiative, a thorough and wide-ranging policy on the ‘upgrading of informal settlements’.

Read more: http://inclusivecities.ning.com/page/south-africa

Budget Monitoring And Citizen Participation In The Netherlands

• by: Zeynep Gunduz & Marjan Delzenne

Indische Buurt (Amsterdam) Photo: Zeynep Gunduz

My name is Noureddine and I am a member of the training group that deals with budget monitoring. We have examined the prospects paper for 2013. On page 26 of the bill it is stated that in 2013 there will be 197 million euros in expenses. We’ve got an overview of the financial statements of 2011, which states that the district spent 243 million euros in 2011. Are we correct in understanding that over the next three years, spending will be cut by 46 million euro? In 2016, the expenditure is budgeted at 179 million. Meaning a 64 million difference. Was that the intention?

The expenditure in the social domain in 2011 was 68.7 million euros. If you look at the budget in the perspectives note, you end up with a total of 59 million for the social domain (counted are: work, income and economy, education and youth, welfare and care, sports and recreation, culture and monuments). This means that the social issues will receive almost 10 million euros less in the next 3 years.

Introduction
Thus spoke Noureddine Oulad el Hadj Sallam, one of the participants in the experiment Budget monitoring in the Indische Buurt (Indische Neighborhood) in Amsterdam during the meeting of the Council Committee Social of the municipality of Amsterdam (city district east) in June 2012. His speech addressed the content of the municipality’s perspective paper for 2013.

Noureddine’s speech signifies a unique moment in the Netherlands. Not only because a citizen without a financial educational background commented on the expenditure of the budget made by a governmental organization. But also because it led to a change in the way the local government determines the priorities of the prospective budget for 2014; namely, in co-creation with citizens. Co-creation entails collaborative decision-making concerning the allocation of the budget by citizens and civil servants. It is an important contribution to the enhancement of civil society within the Netherlands.

This paper describes the methodology of budgetmonitoring and its operationalization via the project in the Indische Neighborhood. The 12-month pilot project was realized by The Centre for Budget Monitoring and Citizen Participation, in collaboration with E-motive, University of Applied Science in Amsterdam (HvA), MOVISIE and members of local communities in the neighborhood. Read more

Zeynep Gunduz & Marjan Delzenne – Budget Monitoring And Citizen Participation In The Netherlands

Indische Buurt – Amsterdam Photo: Zeynep Gunduz

This paper describes the methodology of budgetmonitoring and its operationalization via the project in the Indische Neighborhood. The 12-month pilot project was realized by The Centre for Budget Monitoring and Citizen Participation, in collaboration with E-motive, University of Applied Science in Amsterdam (HvA), MOVISIE and members of local communities in the neighborhood.

The launch of the Center for Budget Monitoring and Citizen Participation in the Netherlands
The idea to implement budget monitoring in the Netherlands was initiated by E-Motive of Oxfam-Novib. E-Motive connects knowledge and expertise from developing countries to Dutch professionals. In 2010, E-Motive introduced a group of social professionals in the Netherlands to INESC (Institute of Socioeconomic Studies), the expert on budget monitoring in Brazil. A year-long intense co-operation between active citizens and social workers from the Netherlands and INESC led to the launch of the Center for Budget Monitoring and Citizen Participation (Stichting Centrum voor Budgetmonitoring en Burgerparticipatie) in Amsterdam in December 2011. Read more