Browsing by Author "Heinecken, Lindy"

Now showing 1 - 7 of 7
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    Building resilience: the gendered effect of climate change on food security and sovereignty in Kakamega Kenya
    (MDPI, 2021) Liru, Pauline; Heinecken, Lindy
    Climate change is a global threat, affecting the food security and food sovereignty of many depending on agriculture for their livelihoods. This is even more pronounced in Kenya, given their over-reliance on rain-fed crops and the frequency of floods and droughts in the country. Through qualitative interviews, this study set out to establish how climate change not only affects the food security, production and consumption of rural women farmers in Kakamega County, Kenya, but their response to climate shocks. Using resilience theory as a lens, we established that women use different pathways to mitigate the effects of climate change on their livelihoods. The study found that initially women adopt coping strategies that are reactive and not sustainable, but soon adapted their farming strategies, using their indigenous knowledge to exercise some control over both their food security and food sovereignty. Besides this, they use their human and social capital to expand their networks of support. By linking up to other organizations and gaining access to government support, they are able to challenge patriarchal relations that perpetuate poverty and inequality and bring about more transformative and sustainable responses to climate change.
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    Military trade unions : a threat to national security …. Really?
    (Stellenbosch University, Faculty of Military Science (Military Academy), 2017) Heinecken, Lindy
    The opinion piece by Eric Z. Mnisi claiming that national security has been sacrificed at the altar of soldiers’ Constitutional rights to form and join trade unions is a claim often muted, not only in South Africa. In the Handbook on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms of Armed Forces Personnel it is stated that “unionization of military personnel is seen as conflicting with the unique nature of the military and its role in maintaining national security and public order”.
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    The military, war and society : the need for critical sociological engagement
    (Stellenbosch University, Faculty of Military Science (Military Academy), 2015) Heinecken, Lindy
    Sociology offers a distinctive way of seeing and explaining the social world within which we live, as well as the events and institutions that shape it. Given this, it is surprising that the study of war by sociologists has been largely at the margins of the discipline. This has not always been the case, if one reflects on the work of the founding fathers of sociology – Marx, Weber and Durkheim. While the ‘sociology of war’ still does not feature strongly within the discipline, this article shows that sociology provides a critical lens through which to analyse military and warfare, as well as to show how violent conflict affects society. To illustrate this, reference is made to various leading social theorists and sociologists who inform our current understanding of collective violence and war in this era of globalisation. To end the discussion reference is made to the place of military sociology as a sub-field focusing on the military institution and some of the key texts and issues addressed by sociologists.
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    The military, war and society : ‘the achilles heel’ of sociology and the need for reflection
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2014-02) Heinecken, Lindy
    Lindy Heinecken was formerly a researcher and Deputy Director of the Centre for Military Studies (CEMIS) at the South African Military Academy, where she worked for 17 years. Since 2006 she has been at the Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology at Stellenbosch University where she lectures in political and industrial sociology. The main focus of her research is in the domain of armed forces and society where she has published extensively on a range of issues including gender integration, civil-military relations, military unionism, the military profession, HIV/AIDS and security and more recently on the experiences of military personnel on peace operations and on post-conflict reconstruction and development. She holds an MSocSc in Industrial Sociology from the University of Cape Town and a PhD from Kings College, Department of War Studies, University of London. She serves on numerous academic boards, including the Council of the Inter- University Seminar on Armed Forces and Society (USA) and the International Sociological Association’s Armed Forces and Conflict Resolution working group; she is also working group convenor for Crime, Violence and Security of the South African Sociological Association. She serves on the editorial board of the journals Armed Forces and Society and Scientia Militaria: South African Journal of Military Studies and is a reviewer for more than eight scholarly journals in the field. She is a NRF C1 rated researcher and is also one of the pool of specialists conducting research for the South African Army.
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    Mussel and oyster culture in Saldanha Bay, South Africa : potential for sustainable growth, development and employment creation
    (Springer, 2013-02) Olivier, David; Heinecken, Lindy; Jackson, Sue
    Worldwide declines in fish stocks have a significant impact on the livelihoods of coastal fishing communities as jobs are lost and alternative forms of employment are limited. Mariculture (marine aquaculture) is considered by governments to be a viable solution to address unemployment and poverty in such communities. In Saldanha Bay, South Africa, the growing mussel and oyster industry has considerable potential for poverty alleviation, hence food security enhancement. In the first part of this study, we examine the potential ecological carrying capacity of the Bay to produce bivalves, and estimate the impact of this on employment creation should the sector’s growth potential be fully realised. This growth potential could take the sector to 10 to 28 times its current size, providing direct employment for 940 to 2,500 people in the Saldanha area. Secondly, we assess five factors that affect the sustainable growth, development and employment creation potential of small-scale mariculture in South Africa and other countries. These are state support, markets, funding, the natural environment and the local community. Participants in the sector perceive its expansion potential to be hampered by regulatory issues such as incomplete implementation of a cohesive and accessible financial support policy, slow processing of mandatory samples required to monitor product safety, poor facilitation of access to international markets, price undercutting by imports subsidized in their countries of origin, and injuriously high lease fees for water levied by the parastatal harbour authority, coupled with lack of medium- and long-term lease tenure. The risk of environmental degradation from competing harbour use by large, fossil fuel and ore transport industries is of potential future concern.
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    Socio-economic and social capital assessment of Avian Park residents, Worcester
    (2011) Heinecken, Lindy; Vorster, Jan H.; Du Plessis, Jacob M. J.
    At the beginning of every academic year, the Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology (hereafter Department), Stellenbosch University, takes Honours students on a research fieldtrip. The rationale is based on the need to provide Honours students with an in-service learning opportunity that entails fieldwork in an environment where their research efforts could make a contribution to community development. There is thus a dual objective: firstly, in-service learning through applied research using different research methodologies and secondly, the generation of new knowledge that could benefit community initiatives of various stakeholders. There is an additional third objective, namely to train community members in fieldwork skills in order for them to partake in similar studies. For 2011 Worcester and more specifically Avian Park (ward 13) was chosen as the research site. This site was selected partly because Stellenbosch University already has a community health project running in this area and there was both an interest and need for collaboration from the side of the Ukwanda Rural Clinical School in Worcester. Other University stakeholders included (in alphabetical order): Family Medicine, Human Nutrition, Occupational therapy, Physiotherapy, Speech, Language and Hearing therapy, Rehabilitation and Social Work. These stakeholders desired information about the community and some wanted to use the community volunteers trained by the Department for future research projects/interventions in the community.
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    Stress and change in the military profession : attitudes of officer students at the South African Military Academy
    (Stellenbosch University, Military Science, 1997) Heinecken, Lindy
    In this paper it is illustrated that there is a decline in the commitment to altruistic values if one analyses the survey data of junior officers among all four arms of service at the South African Military Academy. The results show a clear drift towards occupationalism as outlined by Moskos (1977) if the reasons for joining, preferred job characteristics, commitment to selfless service and the need for a representative association are analysed. This trend towards occupationalism could be ascribed to the decline in status and relevance of the armed forces in society, coupled to organisational change, which in placing the military profession under considerable stress in this current period of transition. Some implications of these trends for the military profession are discussed.