Presentation on the PhD thesis during a consortium meeting of the SCENTISS research Programme

In this paper, we apply a civic perspective and social innovation theory to examine how residents of a Dutch village experiencing rural depopulation and austerity reforms evaluate a civic initiative aimed at improving liveability, and what explains their evaluation. Using multivariate statistical analysis, …

In the context of public budget cuts and rural areas facing depopulation and aging, local governments increasingly encourage citizen engagement in addressing local livability issues. This paper examines the non-engagement of mid-aged and elderly residents (45+ years old) in civic initiatives that intend …

Citizens’ initiatives are believed to be a suitable alternative approach to service provision, especially in rural areas where services and facilities are under pressure because of depopulation and the decentralization measures of the state. To date, research has mainly focused on successful examples …

Population decline, welfare state reforms and austerity measures pressurise the liveability of rural areas in the Netherlands and call upon local governments and communities to adapt and renew their mode of governance. This paper reports on three Dutch experimental governance arrangements which are analysed …

Abandoned villages and ruins are the consequence of depopulation. The region of A Ribeira Sacra (Galicia, Spain) is an example, where since 1981 the region has lost 40% of the population. A sustainable masterplan based on a strategy will bring a future to those areas by using the ruins and reactivate …

Many agriculture problems remain nowadays concerning the future of humanity. The world population will increase more and more, and the fertile lands will decrease with the city’s expansions. Rural depopulation already began, and the carbon food print of the food is no longer an issue. Pollution is one …

In this article, we use Kooiman’s theory of governance in combination with key-conditions of community self-steering identified in recent studies to examine how the self-steering capacity developed of a community initiative aiming at improving the liveability of a small Dutch village. Using non-participatory …

Against the backdrop of depopulation and Big Society, citizen initiatives in rural areas are believed to be able to mitigate service-provision inequalities between urban and peripheral regions. Factors influencing the success and failure of such citizen initiatives and their potential in providing solutions …