Rural service provision through citizen initiatives: stable alternative or a spur-of-the-moment?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 …

Engaging people through local initiatives: a discourse analysis on sustainable energy.Sustainable energy forms are seen as one viable answer to reduce global warming. Most countries are in fact struggling to reduce greenhouse gases emissions based on the premise that global warming is caused by man-made …

‘Wake up and smell the…’: a discourse analysis on bio digestion in The Netherlands. Against the backdrop of the energy sustainability objectives of 2020, a growing number of projects to generate clean energy are being initiated. However, such initiatives often meet resistance of local governments and …

Against the backdrop of depopulation and Big Society, citizen initiatives in rural areas are expected to contribute to community liveability, for example by maintaining public services. These citizens initiatives are believed to be able to mitigate service-provision inequalities between urban and peripheral …

http://dx.doi.org/10.14261/postit/F6BBB081-6FD4-43B9-801915E45153D068Keynote speech. In 2015 and 2016, Saxion University of Applied Sciences organized the 2nd and 3rd edition of the Regional Innovation and Entrepreneurship Conference (RIEC).In our region, "De Stedendriehoek" (Cities in the Triangle – …

The transformation from the current energy system to a decentralized renewable energy system requires the transformation of communities into energy neutral or even energy producing communities. Increasingly, citizens become 'prosumers' and pool their resources to start a local energy initiative. In this …

Since the 1960s, the structure of the German population has significantly changed as a result of a number of migration waves. This structural change, and the fact that is was rather ignored by German governments, created a democratic deficit. Large parts of the permanent population were structurally …

This study aims at examining the ways people communicate about energy transition, by analyzing the discourse of different stakeholders in a case of a local initiative for renewable energy. When moving from traditional to renewable energy, social acceptance of new technologies is of central importance, …

As the state retracts further in the Netherlands, the role of civil society increases. Only now the impact becomes visible due to changing arrangements in the social domain. Since enormous cuts in the welfare budgets have been implemented; creative innovations by civil initiatives are much needed to …

How to define succesful citizens' initiatives? A professional perspective.In the backdrop of depopulation and the participation society, citizen initiatives in rural areas are expected to contribute to community liveability by maintaining various types of facilities in the area. Studies on which factors …