Ottavia Cima | University of Bern, Switzerland (original) (raw)
Papers by Ottavia Cima
Urban Planning, 2023
Environmental destruction, social inequalities, geopolitical vulnerability-the limits of the long... more Environmental destruction, social inequalities, geopolitical vulnerability-the limits of the long-time praised paradigm of post-industrial cities and globalised value chains are becoming evident, while calls for (re)localising production in cities are getting increasingly vocal. However, the material implications-i.e., where and in which form manufacturing should concretely take place in cities and the consequences on urban space and relations-are rarely addressed in debates on (re)industrialisation. In this article, we engage with the concept of conspicuous production by combining research on mixed-use zones with sensory methodologies. We focus on the multisensory dimension of urban manufacturing to interrogate the spatial possibilities for production in a small town in Switzerland. Together with a group of graduate students, we apply sensory methods to explore how production shapes urban sensescapes and how these sensescapes affect our relation to production. Our exploratory endeavour provides ideas of how sensory methods can be integrated into urban planning research and practice: we suggest that these methods, which necessarily emphasise subjective experience, can constitute powerful tools if they take into attentive consideration the local political and economic context, including the norms and power relations that shape individual perception. Our study sparks critical questions about conspicuous production and mixed-use zoning and tentatively advances the concept of sensible production: a production that not only is perceptible and can actively be engaged with, but that also shows good sense, makes sense, and focuses on what we need rather than on appearance. Keywords affect; learning to be affected; mixed-use zones; (re)industrialisation; sensory geography; sensory methodologies; small towns; sustainable cities; urban manufacturing; zoning Issue This article is part of the issue "Planning, Manufacturing, and Sustainability: Towards Green(er) Cities Through Conspicuous Production" edited by Yonn Dierwechter (University of Washington) and Mark Pendras (University of Washington).
Progress in Human Geography, 2022
This paper brings together two streams of literature which rarely enter into conversation: divers... more This paper brings together two streams of literature which rarely enter into conversation: diverse economies scholarship and critical readings of postsocialism. Mobilising the cases of food self-provisioning (FSP) in Czechia and agricultural cooperatives in Kyrgyzstan as an empirical basis for our reflections, we pursue a twofold aim. Firstly, we call for attention to the postsocialist East as fertile ground for the study of diverse economies. Secondly, we offer a postcapitalist reading of postsocialism as embedded and emancipated theorising, arguing that diverse economies thinking can support novel representations of this geopolitical area and open space to appreciate economic diversity on the ground.
Feministische Geo-RundMail, 2022
Feministische Geo-RundMail, 2020
Geographica Augustana, 2021
After Kyrgyzstan’s independence from the Soviet Union, international development agencies promote... more After Kyrgyzstan’s independence from the Soviet Union, international development agencies promoted the establishment of service and marketing cooperatives in the agricultural sector. However, the dominant narrative claims that cooperatives of this type in Kyrgyzstan, as well as in other postsocialist countries, have failed. This apparent failure is commonly explained by the legacies of the past socialist regime. This paper questions such narrative and causality highlights their problematic consequences. I first present the narrative as it is reproduced by scholars, development actors, governmental representatives and farmers. I then turn to scholars of postdevelopment, post capitalism and postsocialism to set the theoretical basis for the deconstruction and critique of the narrative of failed cooperatives. On this basis, I argue that the narrative is part of a broader hegemonic discourse on development and on the economy. I conclude by sketching a postcapitalist approach to building alternative representations of cooperatives and cooperation in Kyrgyzstan and beyond it.
Geographica Helvetica, 2015
The spread of participatory development worldwide has multiplied opportunities for local populati... more The spread of participatory development worldwide has multiplied opportunities for local population to engage in paid and unpaid development activities. However, scholars have pointed out that participatory approaches bear the risk of strengthening unequal social structures, despite their emphasis on democratisation and inclusion. This paper investigates the case of a Swiss-funded infrastructural project in rural Nepal, analysing the role of participatory spaces in the dynamics of development resource capture. The empirical material collected suggests that, although participatory development has created more opportunities for social mobility, these opportunities are not necessarily open to everyone. In the case studied, the transformational potential of participation is only partially fulfilled.
Books by Ottavia Cima
University of Fribourg, 2022
In the last three decades, community-based approaches have gained acclamation worldwide as a way ... more In the last three decades, community-based approaches have gained acclamation worldwide as a way to promote sustainable and inclusive development and, in ex-socialist countries in Central and Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union, as a way to support the “transition” towards a market economy. International donors have attempted to establish formal institutions for cooperation in local communities; among these, service cooperatives have promised a democratic and market-fit alternative to socialist collective farms. Kyrgyzstan’s liberalised economy after its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991 has been a fertile ground for experiments with models of institutionalised cooperation – including agricultural cooperatives. However, today the dominant framing considers most cooperatives in the country as failed and explains this apparent failure through forms of historically inherited negative attitude towards cooperation.
This research aims to provide an alternative reading of agricultural cooperatives in Kyrgyzstan in order to generate more positive affects than the feelings of failure and inadequacy produced by the dominant framing. I focus on the promotion of agricultural cooperatives in rural Kyrgyzstan by international actors and on how local communities reinterpret and renegotiate a formal institution for cooperation promoted by external actors. I thereby illustrate how international actors uphold a specific model of cooperatives – as a tool on a prescribed route towards a teleological fantasy of development – and how local actors incorporate, and thereby reframe, this model in their everyday. I do this through an ethnographic engagement with villagers in Pjak, in the north-east of the country, and in particular with the practices and representations that emerge in relation to a local cooperative, Ak-Bulut.
My analysis represents an entry point for rethinking not only cooperatives but also well-established economic theories and models – not only in Kyrgyzstan or in other ex-socialist countries in Central and Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union, but globally. The focus on the promotion of cooperatives opens a broader reflection on how communities and individuals locally rearticulate global processes of neoliberalisation and marketisation. I thus interrogate the ways in which hegemonic discourses on the economy, development and modernity produce particular kinds of subjectivities and affects and their consequences on material inequalities; simultaneously, I explore the room for individual agency – for resistance and contestation – that emerges from the discontinuities of these hegemonic discourses. As a way to reinforce and expand this agency, I propose an approach to cooperatives and cooperation in postsocialism – a postcapitalist, postfantasmatic and relational approach – that invites to assume an open, anti-essentialist stance to engage with communities in the here and now. This approach, I argue, is relevant (and indeed needed) globally, especially in the present context of rising nationalist and authoritarian forces.
Urban Planning, 2023
Environmental destruction, social inequalities, geopolitical vulnerability-the limits of the long... more Environmental destruction, social inequalities, geopolitical vulnerability-the limits of the long-time praised paradigm of post-industrial cities and globalised value chains are becoming evident, while calls for (re)localising production in cities are getting increasingly vocal. However, the material implications-i.e., where and in which form manufacturing should concretely take place in cities and the consequences on urban space and relations-are rarely addressed in debates on (re)industrialisation. In this article, we engage with the concept of conspicuous production by combining research on mixed-use zones with sensory methodologies. We focus on the multisensory dimension of urban manufacturing to interrogate the spatial possibilities for production in a small town in Switzerland. Together with a group of graduate students, we apply sensory methods to explore how production shapes urban sensescapes and how these sensescapes affect our relation to production. Our exploratory endeavour provides ideas of how sensory methods can be integrated into urban planning research and practice: we suggest that these methods, which necessarily emphasise subjective experience, can constitute powerful tools if they take into attentive consideration the local political and economic context, including the norms and power relations that shape individual perception. Our study sparks critical questions about conspicuous production and mixed-use zoning and tentatively advances the concept of sensible production: a production that not only is perceptible and can actively be engaged with, but that also shows good sense, makes sense, and focuses on what we need rather than on appearance. Keywords affect; learning to be affected; mixed-use zones; (re)industrialisation; sensory geography; sensory methodologies; small towns; sustainable cities; urban manufacturing; zoning Issue This article is part of the issue "Planning, Manufacturing, and Sustainability: Towards Green(er) Cities Through Conspicuous Production" edited by Yonn Dierwechter (University of Washington) and Mark Pendras (University of Washington).
Progress in Human Geography, 2022
This paper brings together two streams of literature which rarely enter into conversation: divers... more This paper brings together two streams of literature which rarely enter into conversation: diverse economies scholarship and critical readings of postsocialism. Mobilising the cases of food self-provisioning (FSP) in Czechia and agricultural cooperatives in Kyrgyzstan as an empirical basis for our reflections, we pursue a twofold aim. Firstly, we call for attention to the postsocialist East as fertile ground for the study of diverse economies. Secondly, we offer a postcapitalist reading of postsocialism as embedded and emancipated theorising, arguing that diverse economies thinking can support novel representations of this geopolitical area and open space to appreciate economic diversity on the ground.
Feministische Geo-RundMail, 2022
Feministische Geo-RundMail, 2020
Geographica Augustana, 2021
After Kyrgyzstan’s independence from the Soviet Union, international development agencies promote... more After Kyrgyzstan’s independence from the Soviet Union, international development agencies promoted the establishment of service and marketing cooperatives in the agricultural sector. However, the dominant narrative claims that cooperatives of this type in Kyrgyzstan, as well as in other postsocialist countries, have failed. This apparent failure is commonly explained by the legacies of the past socialist regime. This paper questions such narrative and causality highlights their problematic consequences. I first present the narrative as it is reproduced by scholars, development actors, governmental representatives and farmers. I then turn to scholars of postdevelopment, post capitalism and postsocialism to set the theoretical basis for the deconstruction and critique of the narrative of failed cooperatives. On this basis, I argue that the narrative is part of a broader hegemonic discourse on development and on the economy. I conclude by sketching a postcapitalist approach to building alternative representations of cooperatives and cooperation in Kyrgyzstan and beyond it.
Geographica Helvetica, 2015
The spread of participatory development worldwide has multiplied opportunities for local populati... more The spread of participatory development worldwide has multiplied opportunities for local population to engage in paid and unpaid development activities. However, scholars have pointed out that participatory approaches bear the risk of strengthening unequal social structures, despite their emphasis on democratisation and inclusion. This paper investigates the case of a Swiss-funded infrastructural project in rural Nepal, analysing the role of participatory spaces in the dynamics of development resource capture. The empirical material collected suggests that, although participatory development has created more opportunities for social mobility, these opportunities are not necessarily open to everyone. In the case studied, the transformational potential of participation is only partially fulfilled.
University of Fribourg, 2022
In the last three decades, community-based approaches have gained acclamation worldwide as a way ... more In the last three decades, community-based approaches have gained acclamation worldwide as a way to promote sustainable and inclusive development and, in ex-socialist countries in Central and Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union, as a way to support the “transition” towards a market economy. International donors have attempted to establish formal institutions for cooperation in local communities; among these, service cooperatives have promised a democratic and market-fit alternative to socialist collective farms. Kyrgyzstan’s liberalised economy after its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991 has been a fertile ground for experiments with models of institutionalised cooperation – including agricultural cooperatives. However, today the dominant framing considers most cooperatives in the country as failed and explains this apparent failure through forms of historically inherited negative attitude towards cooperation.
This research aims to provide an alternative reading of agricultural cooperatives in Kyrgyzstan in order to generate more positive affects than the feelings of failure and inadequacy produced by the dominant framing. I focus on the promotion of agricultural cooperatives in rural Kyrgyzstan by international actors and on how local communities reinterpret and renegotiate a formal institution for cooperation promoted by external actors. I thereby illustrate how international actors uphold a specific model of cooperatives – as a tool on a prescribed route towards a teleological fantasy of development – and how local actors incorporate, and thereby reframe, this model in their everyday. I do this through an ethnographic engagement with villagers in Pjak, in the north-east of the country, and in particular with the practices and representations that emerge in relation to a local cooperative, Ak-Bulut.
My analysis represents an entry point for rethinking not only cooperatives but also well-established economic theories and models – not only in Kyrgyzstan or in other ex-socialist countries in Central and Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union, but globally. The focus on the promotion of cooperatives opens a broader reflection on how communities and individuals locally rearticulate global processes of neoliberalisation and marketisation. I thus interrogate the ways in which hegemonic discourses on the economy, development and modernity produce particular kinds of subjectivities and affects and their consequences on material inequalities; simultaneously, I explore the room for individual agency – for resistance and contestation – that emerges from the discontinuities of these hegemonic discourses. As a way to reinforce and expand this agency, I propose an approach to cooperatives and cooperation in postsocialism – a postcapitalist, postfantasmatic and relational approach – that invites to assume an open, anti-essentialist stance to engage with communities in the here and now. This approach, I argue, is relevant (and indeed needed) globally, especially in the present context of rising nationalist and authoritarian forces.