Publications

Shifting Solidarities offers a comprehensive analysis of solidarity at a time when major social transformations have penetrated the heart of European societies, disrupting markets and labour relations, transforming social practices, and affecting the moral infrastructure of European welfare states. Factors such as the economic crisis, migration, digitalisation, and climate change all contribute to a sense of emergency. This volume considers how, ...

People in their role as audiences are increasingly confronted with intrusive digital media technologies that seek to collect personal data, shape people’s media experiences through algorithms and increasingly work towards establishing what is already being called a platform society. This tendency will become even more pertinent in the near future with the Internet of Things permeating many more aspects of our everyday lives. Software interfaces ...

This dissertation deals with the phenomenon of artisanal mining in Katanga, the southeast province of the Democratic Republic of Congo. In the course of the past decade, thousands of people have moved to the Katangese mining areas with the aim of finding new sources of income and developing new strategies to be able to cope with the continuing economic depression in their country. Making use of simple tools such as shovels and pickaxes, ...

The objective of this paper is to establish a comprehensive view of societal
trends that have an impact on mobility and logistics in the future. Based on a review of scientific literature, the output of European research projects and reports from consultancies, the result of this investigation provides a broad and comprehensive set of factors that influence, and will influence in the future, mobility and logistics. The set is composed of 29 ...

Housing market arenas in spatial planning; An actor-relational approach INTRODUCTION Flanders is characterized by a high land take of 33%, which makes Flanders a leader in Europe. This dissertation discusses the consequences of this phenomenon, such as urban sprawl and fragmentation of open space. In addition, it deals with the spatial housing policy in Flanders (no net land take), with the expected population growth, the demand for new housing ...

Life experiences influence our research and motivate us to ask scientific questions and shape research goals. Here, Trends in Molecular Medicine authors share their journey in science. Their portraits highlight the diversity of scientists and that there is no standard career in science. We hope that these inspiring stories help to build bridges of understanding between science and society and motivate others to join the melting pot of scientific ...

This research was carried out within the framework of the 'Environmental Outlook 2018' and provided the necessary scientific foundation.
Horizon scanning is the second building block in the Environmental Outlook 2018. As a process of foresighting, it helps to identify environmental developments in time and to assess their threats and opportunities for the environment in Flanders. This may concern new and unexpected issues (weak signals, for ...

The main objective of this PhD dissertation is to apply theories from intergroup relations literature to media effect studies to obtain a better insight in how immigration news coverage as an aspect of the intergroup context affects native citizens’ attitudes toward immigration. The primary research question is as follows: how does immigration news coverage as a contextual-level factor contribute to attitudes toward immigration. This research ...