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- Convenor:
-
Vesna V. Godina
(University of Maribor)
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- Stream:
- Borders and Places
- Sessions:
- Friday 18 September, -
Time zone: Europe/London
Short Abstract:
In our panel we will open several questions about relations between anthropology and geography in postsocialism, such as: first, changes in geography in postsocialist societies; and second, the fact that postsocialist societies represented a (geographic) field locations for Western anthropologists.
Long Abstract:
In postsocialist societies several important changes have been connected also with geography of these societies. First group of changes have been connected with deindustrialization and deagrariozation which were part of postsocialist change. These processes changed geography of these countries in several way. Some of them have been analysed also by anthropologists. We will discuss more detailed these changes. Second group of problems, connected with anthropology and geography in postsocialism, is the fact that postsocialist geographical locations become a field for Western anthropologists after the end of socialism. Also this fact have already been researched and critically evaluated in anthropology and other disciplines. We would like to open a discussion how the fact that postsocialist societies become anthropological field influenced on geography, anthropology and other disciplines.
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Friday 18 September, 2020, -Naoki Asada (University of Tsukuba)
Paper short abstract:
This paper aims to analyse the way socialism affects establishment of social identity among Romanian people through investigating public childcare in Romania. Socialism can be considered as "alterity" which includes possibility to be, but not as disconnected "otherness" such as ethnicity.
Paper long abstract:
Romanian orphanages were one of central points to be "found" by western countries after the revolution in 1989 which overthrew and executed a communist dictator, Nicolae Ceaușescu, due to sensational broadcasting of miserable images of orphans in Romania. In fact, improvement in child welfare and child rights were a topic mentioned during their participation process to EU. As a result of restructuring and Europeanising its systems, Romanian public childcare system shifted from institutional care to family-type care, and a smaller number of children are in the care system as well as more proportion of children are in family-type care. In terms of education and qualification, social workers, foster carer and adoptive parents are required to fulfil more strict criteria than the past. Especially, social workers are better trained and more aware of their importance and responsibility. Even though there have been some issues to overcome, it can be said that the system and people in childcare has been transformed from socialist past. Nonetheless, past socialism seems to still cast a shadow on them. This paper aims to investigate how socialism is still alive in Romanian public childcare system and to insist the way Romanian childcare system can be examined by postsocialist framework. Socialism likely appears as an "alterity" which is one of elements to establish social identities among Romanians. However, this "alterity" seems to be a possibility that people realistically could be rather than "otherness", such as ethnicity, which is disconnected from them.
Silvia Balzan (University of Basel)
Paper short abstract:
The paper explores the development of legal frameworks that regulate dispossession, rights of access to land, and their consequences on local communities, in two different political moments of FRELIMO, the former Marxist and today democratic ruling party of post-independence Mozambique.
Paper long abstract:
The paper sheds light on two different moments in the political life of post-independence Mozambique after the Portuguese colonialism lasted until 1975. Precisely it analysis the evolution of the political party FRELIMO from its socialist one-party phase to the following multi-party system from the '90s onward.
The paper focus on one aspect of FRELIMO's policy: the development of legal frameworks that regulate dispossession, rights of access and use to land, and their socio-economical and anthropological effects on local communities.
During the Portuguese colony, the land was occupied through various types of titles. Following the en masse departure of colonizers, the land was nationalized by FRELIMO in 1975. The population was organized into communal villages and cooperatives, retaining their right to use land.
Successively FRELIMO grew in favor of the neoliberalist market. Through policy as the 1997 Land Law, the State owns all land and grants communities use rights (DUAT). The law also enables investors to acquire 50-years renewable rights, which they negotiate with community consultations, in many cases, flawed and leading to dispossession.
These deals are filtered by local elites, which exercise control over Mozambican land. It is not simply the global capital that acts upon a developing country.
The paper aims to expand on the progressive erosion of socialism and the politics of privatization of land in Mozambique. These policies accompany a reorganization of territorial units that, in turn, leads to a change of power structure in the Mozambican society previously organized by the customary system.
Andrej Naterer (Faculty of Arts, University of Maribor)
Paper short abstract:
Contribution is based on the fieldwork in the area of Dobrovnik, NE Slovenia, between 2016 and 2018. The main aim is to present trajectories of coping strategies of rural communities adapting to the changes within transition from socialist Yugoslavia to contemporary EU.
Paper long abstract:
This conference contribution is based on the ethnographic fieldwork in the area of Dobrovnik and neighbouring villages in Northeast Slovenia. Fieldwork was conducted between 2016 and 2018 as a part of two research projects, one focusing on survival strategies in times of crisis and one focusing on formal and informal institutions in the Balkans. Three main methods employed were participant observation, interview and visual notes. The main aim of the contribution is to present trajectories of coping strategies of rural communities striving to adapt to the changes that resulted from switch from one socio-political reality, namely socialist Yugoslavia to another, contemporary EU. Findings show a series of changes in social behavior of these communities, for instance in distortion of traditional forms of reciprocity, and a series of difficulties in adoption of new formal rules enforced by EU, resulting in tenstions between formal and informal institutions.