Devolutionary Pressures in Europe (Rough Draft)
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GEA3500DevolutionaryPressuresinEurope.pdf
Team Exercise – Devolutionary Pressures in Europe
You are responsible for reading and understanding these instructions. If you turn in an assignment that
does not follow these instructions, your grade will reflect it.
Deadlines
1. Team Composition (assigned randomly by your professor): Friday, October 4. 2. Selection of Team Leader: Monday, October 7. 3. Submission of Case Study Selections: Saturday, October 12. 4. Rough Draft: Saturday, October 26. 5. Final Project: Saturday, November 9. 6. Assessment of individual and team members’ contributions: Saturday, November 9.
Overview
Devolution refers to a process in which powers are granted by a central government to a lower-
level region or state. More specifically, it describes the process in which centrifugal forces (those
that divide a state) such as cultural diversity or difference in religion, language, etc., divides a
region or peoples of a region in which they gain political strength through demands, negation, or
rebellion. Devolution typically occurs in countries where nationalism grows due to centrifugal
forces and their inhabitant feel the need to depart from their centers (or central government); in
many instances, they consider themselves minorities within a country. There are many examples
of devolution occurring today. Europe, Catalonia, Scotland, and Ukraine are some of the regions
undergoing this transformation.
This exercise is based on the most important aspects highlighted in the section, “Regionalism and
Regional Movements”, from Chapter 7 of our course textbook (pages: 246-257, and other pertinent
sections of this chapter). In this activity, students will be assembled in teams of four-five members
each. Each team member will analyze one case study of a European country facing devolutionary
pressures.
Selection of Team Leader Each team will be guided by a team leader that will be in charge of the overall project
and coordination of the assignment. Once you have made your selection, the team leader must
notify the professor through Canvas message before the deadline.
The Team Leader is responsible for
1. starting a Collaboration for your team on Canvas by following these instructions
2. sending a message to the professor with the name of the region [individual case study] that
each team member will research.
3. organizing the team collaboration and cleaning up and formatting the collective works
(following the Technical Aspects).
4. submitting the rough draft and the final project in a word document to Turnitin. (only
the Team Leader is allowed to upload the team’s work)
The work is to be evenly distributed between all team members. Each team member must
contribute directly into the same Collaborations page on Canvas.
The final grades will be based on the contribution of each member to the overall project. All
contributions by ALL members must be conducted in the Team’s page individually in order
to receive a grade for this assignment. A brief report of your performance and that of each team
member is also required and is an important component of your final grade for this assignment
(details the end of these instructions).
Submission of Case Study Selections Each member of the team will select and work on a region of Europe that is experiencing
devolutionary pressures. The team selections must include all of the following countries/regions:
Ukraine, Scotland (Great Britain), and Catalonia (Spain). At the end of this document you will
find a map of Europe that shows the regions of this continent (not including Russia) that are
experiencing devolutionary pressures (“Europe: Foci of Devolutionary Pressures, 2010”); these
regions are marked in red.
The Team Leader will send a message to your professor with the name of the region
[individual case study] that each team member will research.
Rough Draft / Final Project
It is expected that the rough draft will include the complete individual Case Studies ONLY, not
the Introduction or Conclusions sections.
The team will compose a paper that must include an outline of the project (introduction), an
analysis of the information provided, and a conclusion section. The structure of the team project,
which is delineated in the following pages, must include these sections:
a) Introduction – (which must be composed by the entire team);
b) Case Studies (individual activity); and,
c) Conclusions (team activity)
d) Bibliography section, (included at end of project)
e) Map in which the team will include the countries/regions studied included in their work.
Once the team completes the project in their Collaborations page, the leader must submit the team’s
work in a word document formatted following the Technical Aspects by the deadline.
Sources to Compose your Work
Students are encouraged to use any academic source, including the course textbook (required to
include in this assignment), as well as the news media, especially BBC News, CNN, The New
York Times, and any other reputable news source. Students are not allowed to use Wikipedia.
Structure of the Collaboration Page and Paper (The page does not have to include a Cover Page and/or a Map)
I. Cover Page: Title, names of members of the Team and area studied (individual case studies),
GEA 3500, Fall 2018, Date Submitted.
II. Table of Contents
III. Introduction (team activity): Briefly answer the following questions to introduce the
overall project. Note that you will have to answer the same questions in the Conclusions section
in detail, so you should just include a general overview of the issues presented in this section.
Please do not include these questions in your work.
What are devolutionary pressures and how are these expressed in Europe?
What has caused a resurgence of regionalism in Europe in recent times?
What role has cultural identity played in the formation of these processes/pressures?
What common characteristics and themes are shared by the regions experiencing
devolutionary pressures and studied by your team?
What distinguishes the inhabitants living in these regions from the majority of the
national population of the country where they live in?
IV. Case Studies (individual activity). Each team member must compose their individual
case study, answering thoroughly the following questions. After providing an overview of the
location of the region you are studying in relation to the country where it is situated, answer the
following questions:
In terms of its physical landscape, where is the region that is experiencing a
devolutionary process located and what type of climate is prevalent?
(use Figure 2.5 and 2.4 of the textbook).
According to the sources you have consulted, do these physical/natural characteristics
have played any role in the historical background for this devolutionary process? How?
How do the people that inhabit the region you are studying speak about their relationship
to the land and the environment? Do they express any ideas on biodiversity
conservation?
Do they say anything about their homeland? If the region you are studying has a website
(official or not), what role do maps play on their web site/s?
Is this region located close to or far from the center of power of the country (the national
capital city)?
Does this condition have any impact on the reasons why they would like to gain at-least
more autonomy to make their own decisions?
According to the source/s you have consulted, what are the main reason/s why this
population would like to break-up from the country in which they live in?
Do this/these source/s mention any explanation/s based on cultural or ethnic
characteristics? For example, speaking a different language? Which one? Professing a
different religion? Which one? Economic disparities?
In addition to these questions and in case some of these regions have their own websites, or you
have consulted a source published by a native inhabitant of the region, or you have read excerpts
from interviews, look for discussion of conflict, cooperation, or disagreement with national
governments, private companies, or multinational corporations working in this region. You may
also want to use the following questions to improve your study:
Do the people living in the region you are studying have more than one self-generated
website and do those sites present different ideas?
Is there a regional or national project or policy that is disputed?
What position is taken on the website/s? How is the position framed in relation to their
rights to self-rule and culture?
What major issues and challenges does the site highlight and how do these relate to
globalization?
V. Conclusions (team activity): In this section you must make meaningful comparisons among
the regions your team has studied, summarizing all the previous issues (questions) covered in the
Introduction section and in the Case Studies portion.
What are devolutionary pressures and how are these expressed in Europe? Here you
should include an overview of regionalism and regional movements in Europe.
What has caused a resurgence of regionalism in Europe in recent times?
What role has cultural identity played in the formation of these processes/pressures?
What common characteristics and themes are shared by the regions experiencing
devolutionary pressures and studied by your team?
What distinguishes the inhabitants living in these regions from the majority of the
national population of the country where they live in?
How do the people living in these regions speak about their relationship to the land and
the environment?
In terms of cultural identity, are there regional differences in the groups you have
studied?
In terms of their unity, how integrated are the people living in these regions? Are there
any regions studied by your team that show internal conflicts or lack of unity?
Taking in consideration all aspects of your study, how do you envision the future of
Europe will look like in 50 or 100 years?
VI. Bibliography (team activity): You must include a full citation of all resources included in
your Team Page/Paper in this section. It is required to include a reference from our course
textbook.
VII. Map (team activity): You must include a map at the end of your work, including the
approximate location of all regions/countries studied. Your map must include a pertinent title, an
orientation arrow pointing to the geographical north, labels for all regions/countries included in
your work, and a legend.
Technical Aspects of the Paper
Just like all written assignment in this course, your paper must conform to the following formatting
12-point font (Arial, Times New Roman, Garamond, or Book Antiqua),
one-inch margins all around,
double-spaced,
numbered pages
Any exercise that does not follow the technical aspects will result in a 10-point deduction in their
final grade.
Grading Criteria
The Team Page (and paper) should be at-least 5000 words long (each member must
contribute with a minimum of 1000 words). This word count does not include the title
page, Table of Contents, Bibliography, etc.
Must include works cited.
Bibliography.
Proper spelling and grammar.
Proper writing structure (introduction, body, conclusion, etc.).
Table of Contents (no page numbers required).
On topic writing (must directly respond to each questions posed in the Structure section).
Submission of the Self-assessment of individual and team contributions to the project.
You may use any of the online collaboration tools available in CANVAS or external (email,
chat, etc.) to collaborate within your team; nevertheless, the grading of individual
contributions of each team member will be based on the participation in the Team’s
Collaboration page. All team members must participate. If a team members is failing to
properly contribute to the project, please message the Team Leader and the course instructor.
Plagiarism will not be tolerated. Any assignments that have been plagiarized will earn an
automatic failure grade in the course.
Self-assessment of your individual contribution and that of your peers to the
team work:
Each team member is required to send a written assessment of your individual contribution and
that of your peers to your professor answering the following questions.
Self-assessment:
Overall, how would you rate your contributions to the team: more than other members,
about the same as other members, less than other members?
What do you think have been your major contributions to the team project?
What else might you do to increase the effectiveness of your team or improve the quality
of your team’s project?
Team assessment: Include the last name of each member of the team (in bold) that is assess and
answer the following questions for each member:
Helped the team be organized?
Contributed ideas and made thoughtful suggestions?
Listened to and built upon the ideas of others?
Did her/his fair share of the work?
Not submitting the required assessment by the deadline will result in a 10-point deduction in the
final grade for this exercise.
Europe: Foci of Devolutionary Pressures, 2008
Source: de Blij, Harm J. and Peter O. Muller. 2010. Geography: Realms, Regions, and
Concepts. 14th edition. New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
