The authors analyse the nature of policy development to understand the reasons for institutional change in pasture management in Kyrgyzstan. They use the concept of intentional institutional change, emphasising its incremental nature and the important relationship between belief systems and institutions. The paper explores the relationship between the perceptions and beliefs of policy-makers, the policy interventions they undertake, and the consequences for pastoral migration and practices. The study reveals the gap between the intentions behind such policies and their outcomes, the persistence and importance of pastoral migration, and the learning process that policy-makers undergo. This close look at the development and institutionalisation of new dominant societal beliefs highlights the possible direction of the future development of formal pastoral institutions in Central Asia. Policy-makers should respond better to changes in pastoral mobility and the unsustainable increase in intensified use of natural pastures. Policy-makers must also respond to the growth in conflict over pasture use by becoming more aware of the need for inter-sectoral cooperation. The authors argue that a crucial test for the new formal institutions still lies ahead. The key questions are: whether policy-makers and pasture users can eventually come to hold the same beliefs about what is needed in their society, and what new effective institutions will emerge to define the future of pastoralism in Central Asia.
This study focused on the civic education course at Universitas Terbuka (UT). Its purpose was to design a new approach for the online tutorial for the course by analyzing the literature related to online and distance education and investigating participant feedback on the current offering of the course and tutorial, which is a compulsory course in all programs at UT. The study draws from the community of inquiry framework, which promotes a social constructivist approach as well as teaching about democracy by example. This model is intended to create meaningful learning experiences for students in a reformulated civic education course, in which they would learn to think critically through interacting with classmates, experiencing collaborative learning, and supporting fellow students in learning activities and processes. In this model, learning is seen as occurring within the community through the interaction of social presence, cognitive presence, and teaching presence where, students are able to develop civic competences, namely civic knowledge, civic skills, and civic dispositions, as well as experience a democratic interaction that forms the core of civic interactions in a democratic society.
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