The purpose of this article is to search for the connection between the physical environment and the way people understand and perceive that environment. We believe that this relationship could be better understood through the research of toponyms. The research focused on field names, while they provide the most detailed knowledge about cultural landscape. We collected field name data from different sources, prepared filed name maps, overlaid them with spatial data and finally, clustered them into groups of similarities. The results show that areas, determined on the basis of field names have a unique landscape character and could be used as basic typological units.
COBISS.SI-ID: 8336249
The article sets demographic change in the Alps in the framework of European Territorial Cooperation programs. A statistical overview of selected regions in five Alpine countries serves as a basis for further policy analysis. The latter was undertaken to reveal how transnational projects tackle youth issues, including the difficulties within the labour and real estate markets that appeared to be the most problematic factors influencing (out) migration of the youth. While there is only a minor recognition of the young in current policymaking on supranational, regional and local levels, the analysis showed that the added value of transnational programs for mountain regions and localities can be recognized in the development of multi-stakeholder environments, creating and transferring new solutions for the labour market as well as empowering youth participation in policy processes. However, the extent to which these solutions might contribute to overcoming the challenges of demographic change because of transnational programs is limited by various factors. Among these are the precise governance framework, administrative capacity, and population figures.
COBISS.SI-ID: 2689731
European Union directives, along with their transposing arrangements in EU member states, can have unanticipated and sometimes undesirable impacts on certain regions and places. These include impacts on the use of space (e.g. new infrastructure or sprawl), governance, and on wider social, economic or environmental dimensions. Although ex-ante assessment of the potential impacts of EU initiatives has been carried out since 2002 through the European Commission's Impact Assessment procedure and also through national equivalents in some member states, important impacts are still overlooked, frequently because of their territorially heterogeneous nature within and between EU member states. This paper presents the results of the ESPON EATIA research project, in which a new territorial impact assessment methodology was developed for national and regional administrations in EU member states in order to inform their national positions during the negotiation of European draft directives and potentially other policy proposals.
COBISS.SI-ID: 7840889
The frequent use and popularity of landscape scenarios has raised the question of whether and how one might influence attitudes and, indirectly, the actions individuals take in the landscape by presenting scenarios depicting probable changes of the known landscape. This study focused on two groups of stakeholders, farmers and decision-makers, using questionnaires and a Delphi study to assess assumed impact. At the beginning of the study, farmers were presented with a landscape scenario prepared for the test area using the Markov chain method. The effects of scenario use were evaluated by comparing these results with the results for a control group, comprised of half of the sample that was not exposed to the scenario. The group of decision-makers was subjected to a two-round Delphi study in order to provide qualitative data on the research question. The results confirmed that landscape scenarios influence attitudes regarding the landscape. The impact on actions was only partially confirmed because there were many other factors that might influence future actions to a greater extent than scenario use; for example, personal characteristics, professional occupation or the characteristics of the farm.
COBISS.SI-ID: 2642627
Territorial impact assessment (TIA) aims at informing policy makers about the policy impacts on different geographical areas (called here ‘territorial units’). This paper presents a methodology for TIA which was tested on four European Union (EU) directives and their likely impacts on territorial units in Slovenia. This involved clustering Slovenian statistical (NUTS 3) regions according to their policy-relevant characteristics. The reference frame for evaluating impacts was reflecting the specific territorial cohesion objectives at corresponding governance levels (EU, national, local). The results from this exercise show some significant differences among Slovenian regions for different impacts. However, these differences become somewhat blurred when aggregated. In the vertical dimension, the meaning of impacts differs depending upon the governance level from which they are viewed. In conclusion, we argue against a generalization of impacts in policy assessments, as important differences can be lost.
COBISS.SI-ID: 7985273