Suchergebnisse

This book deals with the tension between a strategy of language maintenance (protecting and reinforcing the language where it is still spoken by community members) and a strategy of language revitalization (opening up access to the language to all interested people and encouraging new domains of its use). The case study presented concerns a grammar school in Upper Lusatia, which hosts the coexistence of a community of Upper Sorbian-speakers and a group of German native speakers who are learning Upper Sorbian at school. The tensions between these two groups studying at the same school are presented in this book against the background of various language strategies, practices and ideologies. The conflict of interests between the "traditional" community which perceives itself as the "guardians" of the minority language and its potential new speakers is played off on different levels by policy-makers and may be read through different levels of language policy and planning

After two and a half decades of state-mandated cotton production, the diversification of agriculture and the downsizing of the cotton area have become prominent features of Uzbekistan's current modernization strategy. Given the momentum of agricultural policy reform, this policy brief aims to evaluate the success of farm restructuring so far. Moreover, it asks what policymakers should do next to promote agricultural competitiveness without losing sight of the social consequences of reform. After initial downsizing of the former collective farms and achieving nominal self-sufficiency in grain during the 1990s, the government has struggled to find a new model for its farming sector. In January 2019, the government initiated a new wave of farm consolidation. Rather than targeting at a particular type or size of farm organization, policymakers are recommended to focus instead on ensuring that all farmers receive undistorted market signals and have access to an optimal set of supporting public services. Stepwise liberalization of output and factor markets will contribute to this goal, and it needs to be complemented by better tailored public services to Uzbekistan's heterogeneous farming sector to lead to a successful agricultural transformation. The latter is especially important for household producers who will likely appreciate better non-farm income opportunities generated by reforms that go beyond the agricultural sector.