The current pandemic and search for an effective solution reminds us that the genesis of modern urban planning can be attributed to communicable diseases and health concerns. Recent literature on urban planning deliberating on COVID19 impact in cities, reminisces that many iconic interventions in city planning and management have been in response to diseases. Ian Klaus talks about the London’s Metropolitan Board of Works and mid-19th century sanitation systems that developed in response to public health crises such as cholera outbreaks (Klaus 2020). Rogier van den Berg argued that housing regulations in view of light and air requirements was introduced as a measure to fight against respiratory diseases in overcrowded slums in Europe during industrialisation (Berg 2020). According to Sara S Carr public parks became more popular as tuberculosis swept through the US at the turn of the 20th century (Carr 2014). Tuberculosis in fact influenced a lot of architecture and urban planning right up to the 1960s, especially in modern public housing in the USA. Sam Lubell in his analysis attributes slum clearance and single-use zoning— separation of residential and industrial, to the health challenges in the early 20th century (Lubell 2020).
The compact city argument
This story is from the Issue 146, 2020 edition of Geography and You.
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This story is from the Issue 146, 2020 edition of Geography and You.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
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TO PLUCK AT WILL: FRUIT TREES IN COMMON PROPERTY
Despite many governmental initiatives, malnutrition in India remains a major health challenge. There is a marked deficit of fruits in the diet of most Indians, consuming much lower than what is recommended by the World health organisation (Who). One of the reasons behind this is the high price of fruits and thus its inequitable access. As we prepare ourselves to live in a world marred by COVID-19 and a shrinking Indian economy, we must think of new ideas to manage access to food, especially micro nutrient rich fruits. This paper explores the possibility of planting endemic fruit trees in public spaces like roadsides and parks, that can help in increasing the consumption of fruits amongst the poor. It also attempts to analyse whether this can serve as a long term solution to bridge the gap between fruit production and consumption in India.
Migrants & borders: My wishlist in a post-Covid-19 world
Former Professor of Economics and Education, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. bkhadria@gmail.com.
The Antiquity and Continuity of the Caste System In India - Dalit Perspective
Why has the caste system survived in India for more than millennia is a question that baffles many. In order to understand it one may have to look into its past and how it was transferred generation after generation. People in denial at most profess to believe that it plays a role only in marriages. Is endogamy not the single most factor for the maintenance of the caste system? There is therefore a need to revisit factors that have kept this system alive and how it is being nurtured even today. Manifestations of the caste system and the inequality and violence it entails are quite broad.
Social Diversity, Hierarchy and cultural Heterogeneity Among Muslims of India
Though the media and other journalistic literature in recent years have projected Muslims as socially ‘monolithic’ and with the same ‘identity’ of ‘Muslimness’, Muslims in India, are as diverse and as disparate as ‘Hindus’. The religion as a thin veneer is spread over a block of diverse social practices and conceptions of sub-continental origin like caste, community, kinship, race, gender, language and food habits. This is why, Muslims in India have largely remained unaffected from social and political movements among Muslims elsewhere.
Identity And The Political Economy of Agrarian Change
Despite significant changes in the agrarian structure and affirmative action in various spheres, caste-based exclusion and discrimination continue to be widely prevalent. In the rural, agrarian economy in India, both social exclusion and adverse inclusion—in terms of assets and access to markets and institutions, act as the basis of caste-based discrimination. as a result of historical biases in ownership of and access to resources, including information and institutions, both structural discrimination in asset-ownership and wealth and its manifestations in the market transactions point to the various ways unequal opportunities shape the trajectories of rural transformation in contemporary India.
Caste, Class and The power of Water
The Socio-Political Ecology of Drinking Water in Rural India
THE 2018 KERALA FLOOD: BEST PRACTICES AND LESSONS LEARNT
It is imperative to reconnoiter the potential best practices, lessons learned and way forward from the Kerala 2018 floods, which include community response to disaster risk reduction and institutionalizing capacity building for flood risk management. In order to support this review the significance of social capital in initial response as first responder and the need of institutionalizing this social capital is critically analysed. The paper also suggests a way forward for flood risk reduction.
Multi Hazard Disaster Risk Assessment: A Step Towards Disaster Resilience
GVV Sarma, Member Secretary, National Disaster Management Authority, talks to G’nY about building multi-disaster resilient infrastructure through comprehensive and integrated guidelines by involving entire geographic and socio-economic ecosystems.
DISASTER RESILIENCE - JOURNEY TO SUSTAINABLE INDIA – 2030
Planning and implementing disaster risk reduction requires integration pathways and appropriate tools. The transition from Hyogo Framework for Action to the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction has brought focus on specific goals, integrating climate change adaptation and environment disaster linkages—mainstreaming it across all developmental sectors. This paper examines emerging issues of research and strategies for disaster risk framework strengthening and network development to achieve the designated goals by 2030, as also envisaged under the Prime Minister’s 10 Point Agenda on Disaster Risk Management.
TRIAGING FOR MAINSTREAMING HOMEOPATHY
Homoeopathy, as a system of medicine, is a science of ‘similars’ and ‘overalls’. The role of homoeopathy in alleviating chronic ailments like skin, respiratory, gynaecological, joint, paediatric and psychiatric problems is promising.
