Risultati per "Territorial analysis"

Youth social infrastructures: dynamics and critical issues in two marginalised neighbourhoods of Palermo. – This article examines Youth Social Infrastructures (YSIs) in two marginalised neighbourhoods of Palermo – San Filippo Neri (ZEN) and Uditore-Passo di Rigano – exploring how places and organisations enable or constrain young people’s participation and sociality in contexts marked by public disinvestment and territorial stigmatisation. Drawing on ethnographic research, the study investigates formal spaces managed by third sector organisations and informal spaces of spontaneous aggregation. The analysis identifies key capacities of YSIs – including continuity, safe spaces, networking, and advocacy – alongside critical limitations: funding precarity, numerical inadequacy, difficulties in institutional co-design, limited youth self-determination, and deficit-based narratives that risk reinforcing stigmatisation. By examining YSIs in context and in contest, the article highlights the tension between grassroots vitality and structural fragility in southern European marginalised contexts.
Rethinking the places of life and work: the inner areas facing the challenges of syndemics. – After a ten years long debate on the SNAI and the goal of demographic in-version to be pursued with a «reversal of the gaze», or «bringing the margins to the center», we can talk about the controversial process generated by this objective, still ongoing: centering the strategy on a spatial practice (living) has led to a concentration of scientific and policy responsibilities on territorial planning which, while certainly crucial, works if the project is equipped in advance with a strong analysis of the places. This is the basis of the thought on inner areas that must be strengthened so that these places can be freed from intellectual subalternity. In fact, the theory and practice of planning also need to recover a good description of the territory, that ability to interpret the complexity of the relationships between natural space and human action, which is the work of the geographer. The paper aims to reflect on the need to re-think the descriptive investigation as a prerequisite for good planning, due to the urgencies issued by climate change and the pandemic shock, phenomena which, closely connected to each other, have shown how unpredictable and diversified they can be territorial responses to external stresses. The complementarity between description and planning, i.e. the alliance between geographers and architects, will be adopted as a guiding category to be able to read the depopulation of internal areas not as a merely housing issue but, rather, in a holistic vision, as the effect of the limits of a production system based on unsustainable territorial hierarchies.
Living with austerity, rebuilding care. Social infrastructures in crisis and practices of self-organization in Antico Corso, Catania. – This paper examines how the dismantling and partial rebuilding of care-related social infrastructures in the Antico Corso neighbourhood of Catania has reshaped everyday life and local power relations. The closure of three historic hospitals—an outcome of prolonged urban austerity—has profoundly altered the neighbourhood’s sense of place. Drawing on a qualitative approach that includes ethnography, interviews, document analysis, and participant observation, the paper shows how institutional narratives present these closures as inevitable and beneficial, legitimizing top-down “urban regeneration” while excluding residents from meaningful decision-making. Many inhabitants respond with a mix of anger and resignation, perceiving the loss of the hospitals as a wound to the neighbourhood’s identity. At the same time, feminist collectives, civic committees, and grassroots organizations are developing alternative narratives and practices of social and territorial care. These initiatives contribute to redefining the neighbourhood from below and contest the spatial consequences of austerity. The paper argues that the crisis of social reproduction manifests not only as an economic issue, but as a spatial and political struggle that generates both new forms of marginalization and innovative practices of resistance and belonging. The case of Catania highlights the specificities and contradictions of austerity urbanism in Southern Italy.
Counter-Geographies of Wine: Marginal Viticultural Practices and the Transition To-ward a Post-Alcoholic Enotourism. The Role of Acquata. – This article proposes a critical re-reading of contemporary wine geographies through the notion of counter-geographies, focusing on acquata—a traditional post-fermentative beverage derived from the rehydration of grape pomace—as an epistemic and territorial device capable of reconfiguring the cultural and ecological meanings of wine production. Building on the theoretical framework of post-alcoholic enotourism, the study explores how emerging “NoLo” (no- and low-alcohol) consumption regimes intersect with transformations in rural landscapes, sustainability policies, and socio-symbolic practices of conviviality. Historical and geographical analysis reveals that acquata, far from being a marginal residue of pre-industrial viticulture, embodies a vernacular knowledge system rooted in circular use of resources, social equity, and ecological restraint. Its historical erasure through modern regulatory frameworks reflects broader processes of epistemic and territorial exclusion within capitalist agri-food regimes. By reactivating ac-quata as a cultural and political tool, the paper advances the hypothesis of a regenerative geography of wine, in which residual practices and marginal knowledges serve as generative forces for more inclusive, sustainable, and plural forms of enotourism and territorial identity.
Geopolitics of Early Modern Age. Global Lines, Territorial Power, and Geographical Uncertainty. – This article explores the origins of geopolitics in the early modern period (16th-17th centuries), demonstrating how three key elements – the establishment of global lines, the relationship between state power and territoriality, and geographical uncertainty – shaped both the politics of the era and contemporary geopolitical thought. Through the analysis of cartographic sources (e.g., the Cantino Planisphere, 1502), treaties (Tordesillas, Cateau-Cambrésis), and theoretical works (Schmitt, Bo-tero, Machiavelli), it argues that: global lines codified the division of the world into spheres of influence, foreshadowing bipolar or multipolar logics; political territoriality emerged forcefully, crystallizing in national borders and the principle of sovereignty (Westphalia), despite simultaneous global expansion; geographical uncertainty, stemming from discrepancies between maps and reality, became a defining feature of geopolitics, with echoes in today’s crisis of international orders. The article thus reinterprets the roots of geopolitics, locating them not in the 19th century but in the crucible of early modernity, with implications for understanding contemporary power dynamics.
The new opportunities offered by immersive and inclusive technologies to represent and rediscover the complex relationship between human communities and water resources. – In order to know, represent and interpret the complex relationship between water landscapes and human communities the new technologies (immersive cartography, three-dimensional web, augmented reality, 3D environments) represent extraordinary and functional tools both for research and for territorial information and promotion actions in terms of tourism. Evidence of this is the project “Tourist Itineraries to Discover the Waters of Italy”, conceived and promoted by the GECOAGRI LANDITALY Interuniversity Research Group Association and financed by ACEA, aimed at promoting a process of water resource enhancement in the dimension of environmental, economic and social sustainability. The authors through some exemplifications and using a methodology of operational analysis, characterized by new syntaxes, reconstruct with the help of augmented reality and immersive technologies, as well as the canonical geocartographic and documentary sources, the material and immaterial dimension of the water resource in the Conca reatina, Umbilicus Italiae, where the sociocultural dynamics underlying the relationship between water and population, narrate experiences of vulnerability and development, participation and conflict, protection and threat. Through 10 ten interactive and implementable totem-stations, it is possible to embark on an inclusive and participatory journey that allows people to explore even inaccessible places. Not only video and audio, historical and thematic cartographies, photos and three-dimensional images, but also drone shots from which to observe from above what nature and culture have achieved and, if necessary, to land in particular places reconstructed through augmented reality that allows one to observe them as they were and as they are today, making clear the processes of transformation of which signs and sedimentations remain in the landscape palimpsest.
Analysis and perspectives on water stress reduction: territorial implications and innovative approaches. – Ensuring water sustainability through technological innovation is crucial, especially for groundwater, a vital component linked to the hydrological cycle. It plays a pivotal role in supplying drinking water for various purposes, including agriculture and industry. Climate change pose significant threats to groundwater conservation, raising concerns about both quantity and quality with significant socio-economic implications. Effective preservation requires hydrogeological monitoring of underground basins, coupled with dynamic water balance modelling to provide predictive insights. These modern tools are essential for proper physical resource management. Implementing innovative technologies and strategic political and management planning for underground aquifers are imperative for initiating a robust program to mitigate risks and achieve a sustainable balance for this precious resource.
Hydric resources as patterns for a community regeneration: the Gleno dam between memory and innovation in Scalve Valley. – Geography offers tools for territorial analysis and planning which, by integrating field research with geographic information technologies, propose innovative approaches to support re-generation processes. This is strategic in mountain contexts where, over time, water resources management has been at the core of a delicate co-evolutionary relationship between humans and non-humans and, sometimes, has caused catastrophic fractures induced by anthropic action, like dam collapsing. The essay presents the case study of the Gleno Dam in the Scalve Valley, province of Bergamo, where, since the collapse centenary (1923-2023), the geographers of the Imago Mundi Lab at the University of Bergamo have been carrying out research aimed at reconstructing the territorial stratification generated over time, focusing on the role of water and the disastrous results of the dam collapse on the entire valley. Many places abandoned after the disaster can today be regenerated through co-design processes using mapping systems and placing water at the centre of new symbolic meanings, cultural functions, and production practices.
Major events and local identity. The case of “la notte della taranta” in Salento. – Major events are often created to enhance or regenerate territorial attractiveness. The goal is not only to maximize the economic and employment impacts that can directly affect the event itself but also to attract the attention of investors, tourists, and institutions to invest resources and projects in the territory. In reality, these events, in addition to their attractiveness purposes, also have generative purposes, potentially contributing to strengthening the sense of belonging within the local community, territorial cohesion, and, consequently, the affective and financial investment of individual inhabitants as well as the community as a whole. This contribution, starting from the analysis of the summarised interpretative framework, aims to evaluate the effects of the Notte della Taranta on the territory and the Salento identity over a quarter of a century.
Mega events and urban spaces: Paris, Olympic City 2024. – Geographical reflection has now sedimented, through theoretical reflections and empirical analysis, the assumption that the organization of major events has disruptive effects on the balance, albeit always dynamic, of urban ecosystems. Infrastructure construction and preparatory governance processes are then accelerators of transformative dynamics that implicitly or explicitly impact the spaces and communities involved. The construction of the Olympic village in the St. Denis neighborhood for the 2024 Paris event explicitly seeks to intervene on the area’s marginal territorial milieu. Investment and infrastructure constitute the line of intervention on which, naturally, critical debate has been activated. This paper, based on a qualitative methodological approach, through Document analysis, and a number of field surveys aims to identify the main critical ribs specific to the case study.
Olympic territorializations: the case studies of Cortina and Bormio. – The material construction processes of Olympic territoriality have often triggered dialectics, controversies, and conflicts of a rather widespread political, social, and communicative nature, as emerged, also in the case of the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics, by the chronicles of recent months. These controversies unfold on multiple discursive levels. Firstly, on the legal level, which is the focal point around which revolve all the configurative conflicts of an environmental and landscape nature. Secondly, on the economic level through strategies of appropriation and access to territorial resources. Finally, on the political level in the dual dialectic of contrasts and different positions within administrations and between administrations and civil society. The study aims to investigate some of the outcomes of the projects and territorial transformations produced by the organization of the Milan-Cortina 2026 mega Olympic event, focusing in particular on the analysis of two case studies related to two infrastructures designed in mountain municipalities with a strong tourist characterization such as Cortina and Bormio. In this context, more specifically, controversies arising from the design of the bob track in Cortina and the so-called “Alute” bypass road in Bormio will also be considered.
Textures and scalar relationships of transhumance between tradition and innovation. The Sportumanza project for a slow and responsible tourism. – Recalling the importance of transhumance as a territorial process and as the demonstration of the three attributes of space - scale, metric, substance – we can reveal the power of this ancient practice: it proceeds by multiscale relationships, foresees multiple metrics and it shows all its richness in substance, through the three characterizations of inhabiting (relational, functional and temporal). Through the case study of the vertical transhumance of the Orobic pre-Alpine context, we investigate how it generates relationships between human and non-human agents, functional practices for pastoral activity and for other ecosystemic services, care and preservation of biodiversity sites, enabling the shepherd and his animals to become sensors of environmental changes on a global scale. We then move on to the analysis of transhumance as an opportunity for innovation in the forms of living and doing tourism, especially in areas defined as peripheral and internal, by presenting the “Sportumanza” project.
Transhumance and landscape: relationship between settlements and tractural roads in central southern Italy – The study analyzes the historical and spatial evolution of the settlement system in central-southern Italy, with reference to Abruzzo aquilano, affected by the phenomenon of transhumant farming. The main element examined is the historical evolution of the settlement
structure with respect to the tractural ways, understood as a fundamental morphogenetic element of the urban systems and the landscape. The objective of the analysis is the identification of a series of elements useful for the protection and enhancement of the paths and of the historical and landscape pre-existences attributable to the phenomenon. The methodol-ogy is based on the analysis of the bibliography, especially recent innovative elements about the degradation of the “Tratturi” system, and, with cartographic analyzes and in situ surveys, it defines the critical issues and the territorial resources to lay the basis for a valorization project.
The relational space of transhumance: practices, values, visions. – In the past few decades, the study of transhumance has shifted from documenting a declining practice to adopting a more comprehensive approach, integrating heritage studies, political ecology, and the analysis of territorial resignification dynamics. This monographic issue aims to emphasize an articulated and relational perspective on the phenomenon. By using both old and new transhumance practices as a foundation for exploring forms of territoriality, the focus lies on the interplay between mobility and the creation of patrimonial value, cultural landscapes, and governance processes. The central question addressed is whether an operational approach to transhumance routes can effectively reconnect the past and the future. The contents of the volume are organized to prioritize research objectives, with contributions concentrating on the knowledge and patrimonialization of transhumance areas at risk of abandonment, ultimately aiming to preserve their ecological, biological, and cultural values.
Requalification of peripheries with an industrial background: the case-study of Mirafiori in Turin. – The paper intends to develop a reflection, starting from the case of the Mirafiori neighbourhood in Turin, on the role that the peripheries can adopt as a laboratory of transversal innovation in the field of urban design, policy, governance, active citizenship and overall the global themes of Agenda 2030 (United Nations, 2015). The Mirafiori neighbourhood can be highlighted as an emblematic case, since it is an industrial suburb closely connected with the former FIAT (now Stellantis) industrial plant. Over the years, the neighbourhood has suffered a socio-demographic and identity crisis, and over time numerous projects have been launched to address these crises. Participation in European projects insisting on the neighbourhood allows us to be privileged observers and actors for: the re-designing and re-qualification of Mirafiori Sud through the realisation of Nature-based Solutions, useful to strengthen and increase the connection of the food system, a tool for social inclusion and territorial development, as well as to increase the envi-ronmental value of the already existing natural elements; to address activities with a Place-based Education approach, useful in the redesigning of spaces. The analysis of projects settled in Mirafiori is needed in order to assess the possibility of constructing new urban centralities starting from marginal places.
Landascape of Decay. Landscape of the Camorra: Characters, Perceptions and Storytelling. – For a reading of the landscapes of the Camorra, the peculiarities of a territorial nature should be analyzed: economic, urban planning, social, criminal and narrational of these particolar landscape scenarios of degradation. By practicing a critical analysis of the relationships that are established between organized crime and the landscape. In its physical forms and in those of individual and community life. The Camorra landscape is produced by a system of community relations achieved by a range of widespread illegal attitudes and behaviors, converging in actions of laceration of the civil fabric. The perception of this set of negative values is a fundamental component of the generation and perpetuation of this landscape. The individuals and communities of those territories have the perennial cogency of an "underlying" landscape present to their sensorial and cultural perception, based on disvalues distorting every action and behavior, therefore every feeling of them. The territory, its use and its governance, is strongly characterized by uses, practices, meanings and a particular storytelling. Made up of values charged with social and criminal negativity, but also fully perceived by the communities. Communities are forced to undergo this particular territorial connotation, which becomes fundamental in the emergence of this landscape of organized crime.
Informal Work: Proposing a Dialogue between Development Studies and Labour Geography. The Case of East and Southeast Asia. – The paper brings into dialogue selected streams of critical analysis on the ILO concept of informal labour – especially from the fields of political economy and development studies – with some major insights on labour and its transformations from labour geography. Focusing on the case of East and Southeast Asia, and resorting to the multiscalar notion of “labour regime”, the pa-per details crucial actors and devices that underlie specific ways of organ-izing work, its exploitation – and its informalization – in key export industries such as garment and electronics. More specifically, informalization processes are analyzed at the intersection between international capital mobility, the state and labor organizations, and in relation to the capacity of international capital to exploit pre-existing context-specific differentials, especially along the gender and rural-urban axes. Overall, the paper discloses key labour dynamics characterizing pivotal areas of the so-called “global factory”, while more generally highlighting the co-constitutive role that spatial, territorial and scalar configurations play in the processes of labour informalisation.
The complicate role of violence in the interminable dissolution of multi-national territorial states. A comparison of Yugoslavia, the Soviet Empire and contempo-rary Russia. – The collapse in different ways of some multinational states at the end of the twentieth century (empires or micro-empires and apparent federations) prompted questions about the role that violence played in their disintegration. While some states have experienced peaceful separations (Czechoslovakia), others, such as the former Yugoslavia and only to a small extent the Soviet Union, have sought to violently hinder political-territorial disintegration, escalating violence and repres-sion to the extent of democides, genocides, ethnic cleansing, mass slaughter, and population displacement. This paper, developing personal reflections of the author and at the same time using a factual and theoretical analysis, aims to compare three case studies of disintegration (Yugoslavia, the Soviet Empire and contemporary Russia), seeking to identify the main factors (ideal and material) that stimulated, or conversely restrained, the use of violence in the course of disintegration. Indeed, these very factors may provide insight into whether those processes of disintegration have come to a halt or still underlie a long ongoing disintegrative phenomenon that former imperial centers are striving to stop with violence. While the degree of the latter may be limited and “settling” in the former Yugoslavia, contemporary Russia's attempt to restrain the long post-imperial disintegration for years has been involving a shift to open violence - that could affect even the internal dimension - along the lines of what occurred in Yugoslavia in the 1990s.
The Protection and the Development of Mountain Areas in the Perspective of the Italian National Plan of Recovery and Resilience. – In Italy, implementing the cohesion and territorial development strategies displayed by the National Plan of Recovery and Resilience (PNRR) is complex because of its increasing socio-economic divides. In particular, the mountain areas – traditionally left on the margins of the national development strategies – ask for careful consideration. The traumatic experience of the pandemic, the lockdowns and the ecological transition challenge have awakened the political and media attention to these vital but fragile territories that produce natural resources and ecosystem services for the benefit of the whole community. The contribution discusses whether the NRRP contains adequate invest-ment indications and priority of intervention for the protection, long-term development and functional integration of mountain areas with the rest of the national territory. Concerning the methodology, the paper develops a qualitative analysis of the evaluation reports on the NRRP published by some leading mountain associations (UNCEM, ASVIS, INU, CAIRE) and the communication of a specific NRRP call (call “Villages” on Action 2.1 Village Attractiveness) employed to communicate and promote some calls.

Anthropocene and geography. – The concept of Anthropocene is used today in many disciplinary sectors to thematize the issues concerning the enormous and growing impact of human activities on nature. His introduction in the field of geographic studies has placed at the center the reflection on the heart of geographic epistemology: the relationships between human societies and the environment, their ecological consequences, the interpretation of the landscape, the analysis and the critical deconstruction of representations, the relationship between physical and human geography in scientific investigation. The article discusses the contribution of geographers to research on the Anthropocene and presents some ideas on the role that geography can play in scientific research on the Anthropocene. On the one hand, geography can support the critical reading of the ways in which the Anthropocene has also become a concept widely used by the media, contextualizing and deconstructing narratives. On the other hand, also by using the potential of thematic cartography in visualizing data and allowing reflections and analyzes at different scales, helping to territorialize the Anthropocene narrative, highlighting the changes and processes in the different regions of the planet.

Environmental sustainability among socio-economic variables of influence and geographical determinisms. An analysis of the Italian scenario at nuts-3 level. – The process of awareness of the value of environmental sustainability is currently changing, also due to the the media lever that has catalyzed its dynamics both individually and collectively ones. At a European level, particularly, with the von der Leyen presidency, the orientations based on a vision linked to the Green Deal seem to have strengthened even more, according to which Europe must aim to become the first continent with zero climate impact by 2050, at the same time stimulating the economy, improving people’s health and quality of life, taking care of nature and in the absence of geographical differentials. The real effectiveness of these actions, however, will only materialize where integrated approaches will be adopted able to improve other variables directly related to the propensity for environmental sustainability. The present contribution, through a multivariate regressive analysis, a clustering methodology and the related cartographic representation, therefore tries to understand which are, in the Italian scenario (Nuts 3 scale), these socio-economic variables of possible influence, in order to clarify the territorial differentials that can be detected in the domain of sustainability.

Some “precedents” of Covid-19 amidst geography, history, diffusion, and contain-ment. – The epidemics which throughout history have caused the deaths of thousands of people always find a common denominator in the travelling and moving about of people and goods. The contrasting actions re-call consolidated procedures, the memory of which has since been lost. Covid-19 has shed light on these aspects, related here to two historical cases: the plague of 1348 that from Asia reached Italy and Europe, and the one that spread to Alghero in 1582, relevant for the way in which the containment measures adopted – a sort of compulsory quarantine, similar to our red zones and lockdowns but applied with greater severity – succeeded in preventing the spread of the contagion beyond the city walls. By re-interpreting the data in geographical terms, this work aims to contribute to the analysis of the plagues from a geo-historic perspective, with the intention of verifying whether the spread, development and ef-fects of these phenomena have common trends, while taking into ac-count the different socio-economic and territorial aspects that characterize the various contexts.
Spatial and temporal dimension of the pandemic covid-19: from the territorial repre-sentation to the governance processes. – The Covid-19 has been increasing interesting and now it results widely argue. This theme is territorial and geographical studies are such important to the role of Italian territorial or-ganization to stem it. The methodology refers to the analysis of spatial and temporal dimensions unfolds along the effects of the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic in Italy on a regional and sub-regional scale with respect to the trend and the current scenario; according to a methodology specific to a position paper, taking into account the situation in the making, the contribution addresses the question of territorial organization and governance with reference to the state and local management of government processes triggered by the crisis and, in particular, the role played by public health. The acknowledgment of evolution and diffusion of Covid-19 is a necessary condition, but it is no sufficient too, despite the recognition of the government best level and the group of authorities. The last question of this topic is about a new proposal to individuate the best institution and the features: the role for the authorities and territorial for the dimension.

 

The Covid-19 pandemic within an inner area of Campania: peripherality, density and virus diffusion in the province of Avellino. – In Italy the Covid-19 emergency hit some of the territories crossed by the thickest commercial networks and the intense flows of human mobility
The paper aims to reason on the factors of territorial vulnerability that may have facilitated the spread of the virus, trying to formulate a first hypothesis about the low density settlement structure has protected the more peripheral communities of the inner areas. Starting from the epidemiological data in an inner province of Campania - that of Avellino - the analysis will try to give a first possible framework of the relationship between the degree of peripherality from the service poles, population density and virus diffusion.

The effects of the diffusion of Covid-19 on the production situation in Campania. – The effects of the Covid-19 epidemic in the Campania region, less relevant than in the central and northern regions in terms of number of infections and specific mortality per 1,000 inhabitants, however, had an impact which, measured on the basis of income production and occupation, they came already profiling at the conclusion of the lockdown imposed on the population and production activities, extremely serious. The purpose of this contribution is to assess, on the basis of the first surveys made available, and on the basis of the analysis of the state of the regional economy and of the employment levels measurable on values referring to 2019, to what extent the region will face the situation following the first epidemic phase. In particular, the initiatives (including economic ones) put in place or planned by the regional territorial institutions and by the measures on a national scale falling within the socalled decrees “cure Italy” and “relaunch”. Attention is paid to the tourism sector and related activities, in the awareness that today the greatest suffering is showing.
Geography under “full sails”: territorial analysis and reflexive cartography on Covid-19 in Italy. – The paper exposes the theoretical and methodological ap-proaches adopted to conduct an analysis on the contagion trend of Covid-19, in relation to the specificities of the territories. After a study of the geographical settings adopted for research purposes, the focus is set on the problematic nature of the data available inherently to the infection. This paper also reflects on the tools and sources of information (such as, for example, collective databases, scientific blogs, or online platforms) adopted during the analysis. Finally, through the exemplification of the evolution of the contagion at national and Lombard level, the contribution exposes the relevance assumed by the reflective maps and by the cybercartography which, underlining the territorial importance of Covid-19, contribute to the understanding of the phenomenon in its complexity.

Geographies of Covid-19. – A first analysis of the scenario occurred as a consequence of the Covid-19 pandemic puts in evidence the changes in the way people deal with the spatial-time dimension, in the human rela-tions and in the consequent socio-territorial configurations.
Since the first moments of the pandemic geography gave an important contribution in the study of the phenomenon and in the analysis of its territorial consequences, useful to elaborate solutions from the global to the local scales.
In this path, the reflections made in the field of geography, and in partic-ular in this issue, regard on one side the global modifications on interna-tional assets, travels and mobility, globalization and borders, on the other side the changes in the daily way of living, furnishing tools useful to con-trast the pandemic and models for a sustainable development.

Geographies of Pandemia in the Chile of Social Riots. New appraisals of urban-rural inequalities. – The global spread of the Covid-19 virus, its speed and mode of propagation, the implications on morbidity, social relations and local and state economic dynamics, redefine the social construction processes of the territories. We propose a reading of the Chilean case, in an attempt to relate the structural, economic and territorial conditions, with the evolution of the health measures adopted, read through the perspective offered by social questions at the center of the protests that have animated the country since 18 October 2019. The structural political framework is the hyperliberist economic model, imposed during the dictatorship of General Pinochet, preserved and enlarged by the center-left governments in the last twenty years, which has among its elements characterizing the maximum opening and dependence on markets international, a production sector flattened on the export of raw materials, the privatization of fundamental services (such as health). At a time when, due to the virus, individual states restore a generalized closure of borders, the Chilean model aims to perpetuate itself by depriving special economic interests of collective well-being, further accentuating internal inequalities between groups social and between territories. The objective of the contribution is to analyze how much the geographical peculiarities of rural areas (low settlement density, relative isolation in terms of connectivity, ecc.) can limit the spread of the virus and, at the same time, how the limited presence of essential services (such as specialized medical centers) may give rise to greater negative effects than in metropolitan centers. The adopted methodology foresees: – a quantitative analysis of the dynamics of the spatial diffusion of virus – a diachronic and micro-territorial analysis of the containment measures adopted by the central government, supplemented by an analysis of the discursive constructions of the main social actors - a discussion of the interrelationship between political actions, social and economic factors.

Rome’s Local Public Transport System: How to Trigger a Resilient Transformation Toward Sustainability? – The research presented in this paper contributes to the ongoing debate on the public vs private ownership by re-examining the case of Rome’s local public transport (LPT) system. After having illustrated the main reasons that led Rome’s citizens to ask for a referendum, the research provides a brief historical overview of Rome’s LPT system and discusses the main stylized facts presented in the institutional literature surveyed. Finally, the summary statistics are built using publicly available data. The results of the analysis highlight how ATAC’s inefficiency is only partially endogenous, as the “imported” territorial inefficiency is not negligible. This issue deserves more attention as, even if liberalization might enter a new golden age, the existence of structural inefficiencies might reduce the margins needed to incentivize private providers to enter the market, at least in those production segments more related to public interests.

Semantic Web and Sentiment Analysis to Investigate the Territorial Image. Updates on the Salento Case. – Starting from the deep difference between cyberspace and cyberplace, this paper is developed in the second field of space: the cyberplace. In its recent conceptualization it is intended as the connection between offline and online actions. It is therefore the interstitial place that is generated by the encounter between virtual space and real space. The cyberplace reflects all the stages of the journey of a smart tourister and therefore becomes a container of numerous information relating to the tourist experience and destination in the tourist gaze 3.0, as Urry recalls. Online, from the tourist's gaze, new territorial narratives are spreading that arouse different reactions from the habitual users of the tourist destination who polarize in the opposite behaviors of strengthening the sense of identity or denial of the tourist narrative and reaction. The proposed empirical case is an update of the study conducted four years ago on the perception and online narration of the tourist destination Salento. The methodology used for the qualitative analysis of the semantic web, used in the first study updated, is the Sentiment Analysis which, after several experiments, proves to be increasingly useful for the study of the cyberplace and of the geographical narratives that spread in a-material squares (Fayyad, Piatetsky-Shapiro, & Smyth, 1996; García, Gaines, Linaza, 2012; Grabner, Zanker, Fliedl, Fuchs, 2012; Hippner, Rentzmann, 2006; Kasper, Vela, 2011; Liu, 2011; Pang, Lee, 2008; Hu, Liu, 2004). Thanks to the proprietary App2Check sentiment analysis software, it is possible to understand the stories that spread on the Net and, above all, to investigate which new (though changeable and short-lived) feelings, images and identities are developing in Salento.

Tourism in Malta archipelago: between the mass phenomenon and new sustainability hypotheses. – The territorial repercussions linked to the tourist practice can characterized as a source of stress for the destination, such as to undermine its territorial integrity. Therefore, forecast the effects are of fundamental importance to better understand the future developments of the phenomenon in order to prepare new and sustainable development strategies. Starting from the analysis of the latest tourism trends, the paper intends to focus attention on the characteristics that the phenomenon has taken in the Maltese archipelago. More specifically, will analyze the various forms that tourism has taken over the last decades, from the mass phenomenon to new hypothesis of sustainable models, and how they are sufficient or not to ensure the integrity of material and immaterial heritage on which the tourist appeal of the affected area is based.

Mountains, cities inland areas in Italy: a challenge for a public policies. – From the analysis of the national project about "inland areas" started by Fabrizio Barca in 2012, ex minister of the Territorial Cohesion, we will want to know the importance of the different meaning of the terms "inland areas" and "mountains" because very frequently we flatten the differences between the two. It is not only two reality that not coincide geographically, are also two concept really different.

The first part of this article will be dedicated to define this characters and their relevance for cohesion policies. The second part will consider the relations of interdependence of the cities with their hinterland mountains as a possible subject of political relations based on a reciprocity artificial ecosystem.

The importance of knowledge for the innovation process is widely recognized in the literature. The diffusion of it passes through the use of resources internal and external to the firm. The work focuses on two aspects. On one side it identifies the impact of internal and external resources on the innovation process. The other aim is to find an indicator that captures the combined effect of the two resources with the objective of demonstrating the importance of using these synergies for developing the firm in a given territory. The territory in this case emerges as a key element in the analysis as it is able to provide a complex set of elements: social, cultural and economic, which are able to support the development of enterprises. In some cases, they become determinants by allowing an area of become more competitive than another.
than another.