2016 Slovenia Conference
The hosting institution were University of Primorska together with two other Slovenian public universities Ljubljana and Maribor.
For some impressions from the conference click here!
Regional Development, Sustainability and Marginalization
Slovenia (Ljubjana, Koper, Maribor)
1st to 5th September, 2016
Online Book of abstracts and program is available here
The conference started at the Geographical Institute Anton Melik in Ljubljana. The second and the third day of the conference have been held at the University of Primorska in Koper, the fourth during the field trip and the fifth day at the University of Maribor, in this case with the help of the Department of Geography of the Faculty of Arts in Maribor. The conference started on Thursday, the 1st of September and ended on Monday, the 5th of September.
Ljubljana is 25 km from its international airport, and the first day of the conference has been be held at the Anton Melik Geographical Institute in Ljubljana.
University of Primorska in Koper
On the second day we moved to Koper. We traveled through karst areas and visited some places of interest on the way. In the afternoon and on the third day we continued the conference in Koper, a relatively small but important regional centre and port on the Adriatic coast. The presentations took place in the building of the Faculty of Humanities in the old medieval city center (Titov trg 5, Koper-Capodistria).
On the fourth day we traveled to Soča valley and held an evening session on a holliday farmhouse in Robidišče the westernmost village in Slovenia. We crossed the whole country and passed through four major different types of landscape that meet in Slovenia: the Mediterranean, the Alps, the Dinaric karst and the Pannonian basin to finnaly come to Maribor. The conference concluded at the University of Maribor in the building of the Faculty of Arts (Koroška cesta 160, Maribor).
A transfer from Maribor to Ljubljana was organized at the end of the conference.
Here is the itinerary of the whole journey.
Faculty of Arts, Ljubljana
Faculty of Arts, Maribor
The map on the below link shows that Slovenia is a contact of four European macro-regions: Alpine, Dinaric, Mediterranean and Pannonian and during the conference (excursion) we visited all four!
Landscape types of Slovenia (Source: Anton Melik Geographical Institute)
Programme of the conference
Wednesday, August 31, 2016, Ljubljana, Gosposka ulica 16
15:00-18:30 Pre-conference walking tour of Ljubljana
Thursday, September 1, 2016
Ljubljana, Geographical Institute Anton Melik, Hall of the Geographical Museum, Gosposka ulica 16
08:00-09:00 Registration
09:00-09:45 Opening of the conference
09:45-10:00 Coffee break
10:00-11:30 Paper sessions (Chair: Janez Nared)
10:00-10:25 Matija Zorn: Natural disasters and less developed countries
10:25-10:50 Vera Vinogradova, Raisa Gracheva and Elena Belonovskaya: Climate change effect on mountain regions marginalized by socio-economic transformation: North Caucasus
10:50-11:15 Hugo Capella Miternique: De-marginalizing mass tourism: the echo of Ibiza’s nightlife as a global reference.
11:30-13:00 Lunch break
13:00-20:00 Ljubljana-Koper afternoon excursion
20:00 Accommodation in Koper (hotel/hostel)
Friday, September 2, 2016
Koper, Titov trg 5, University of Primorska Faculty of Humanities, room: Maestral 4
08:00-08:30 Welcome ceremony
08:30-10:30 Paper sessions (Chair: Alenka Janko Spreizer)
08:30-08:55 Janez Nared: Local self-government reforms in Slovenia: discourse on centrality and peripherality
08:55-09:20 Katja Vintar Mally: Regional disparities and the path to sustainability: the case of Slovenia
09:20-09:45 George Ţurcanaşu and Gabriel Camară: The spatial dynamics of IT&C sector in Central-Eastern Europe and in Romania (2008-2015). The case of secondary and tertiary cities
10:10-10:30 Coffee break
10:30-12:30 Paper sessions (Chair: Katja Vintar Mally)
10:10-10:30 Jamalunlaili Bin Abdullah, Nazura Mohamed Sayuti and Afiza Azura Mohamad Arshad: Resettlement of Orang Asli (aborigines) in Malaysia
10:30-10:55 John Overton and Warwick E. Murray: Migration, education and marginality: Networks and strategies in the Pacific Islands
10:55-11:20 Alenka Janko Spreizer: Roma, social exclusion and Romani settlements as marginalized place: The case of Loke
11:20-11:45 Jernej Zupančič: Degetoization means demarginalization. The planned process of spatial integration of Roma settlements in Slovenia11:45-12:10 Avinoam Meir: Policy of recognition of Bedouin villages in Israel and bio-cultural diversity
12:30-14:00 Lunch break
14:00-19:30 Slovenian coast and hinterland excursion
20:00 Return to Koper
Saturday, September 3, 2016
Koper, Titov trg 5, University of Primorska Faculty of Humanities, room: Maestral 4
08:30-10:30 Paper sessions (Chair: Miha Koderman)
08:30-08:55 Vane Urh and Elvis Salkić: Marginalization of Slovenia in terms of dual education system
08:55-09:20 Jelena Lončar: Marginalisation or the expansion: Business activities in the periurban area of City of Zagreb
09:20-09:45 Borna Fuerst-Bjeliš and Marin Cvitanović: Post-socialist transition as a driver of geographic marginalization
09:45-10:10 Stanko Pelc: Marginality and sustainability
10:10-10:30 Coffee break
10:30-12:00 Paper sessions (Chair: Stanko Pelc)
10:30-10:55 Ruth Kark, Havazelet Yahel and Noam Perry: Multiculturalism and ethnographic museums in Israel: The case of a Regional Bedouin Museum
10:55-11:20 Simon Kerma and Dane Podmenik: Organic farming and tourism on organic farms in Slovenia - Selected topics
11:20-11:45 Armand Faganel and Anita Trnavčevič: “Developing” Cuban tourism
12:00-12:45 Lunch at the Faculty of Humanities
13:00-19:00 Excursion to Soča valley (Overnight in Robidišče)
19:00-20:00 Paper sessions (Chair: Stanko Pelc)
19:00-19:25 Urška Trček and Miha Koderman: Sustainable tourism as a factor of regional development in mountain regions of Slovenia – The case of Municipality of Bovec
19:25-19:50 Staša Mesec: 40 years after the earthquake – (Tourism) Development of remote crossborder Area (The case of Breginjski Kot, Municipality of Kobarid
20:00 Dinner in village Robidišče
September 4, 2016, excursion from Robidišče to Maribor
07:30-19:30 Soča valley-Maribor excursion
20:00 Accommodation in Maribor
September 5, 2016, Maribor, Faculty of Arts, Koroška cesta 160
08:15-08:30 Welcome address
08:30-10:10 Paper sessions (Chair: BornaFuerst-Bjeliš)
08:30-08:55 Vladimir Drozg: Spatial inequality
08:55-09:20 Rahman Nurković: Viticulture and organic production of wine as a driver of economic development in rural areas of Bosnia and Herzegovin09:20-09:45 Igor Žiberna: Land use changes in Svečinske gorice in the period 2000-2015 in relation to selected physical geographical features
09:45-10:10 Conference conclusions
11:30-13:00 Maribor walking tour
13:00-14:30 Lunch break
14:30-17:15 Maribor city region excursion
17:15-19:00 Return trip to Ljubljana
Organizing and Scientific Committees
Organizing committee
Dr. Stanko Pelc, assoc. prof., president
Dr. Miha Koderman, assist. prof.
Dr. Valentina Brečko Grubar, assist. prof.
Dr. Alenka Janko Spreizer, assist. prof.
Dr. Katja Vintar Mally, assist. prof.
Dr. Uroš Horvat, assist. prof.
Dr. Mitja Prelovšek, research assist.
Dr. Janez Nared, assist. prof.
Prof. dr. Mirko Markič
Simon Kerma, assist.
Scientific Committee
Prof. dr. Anton Gosar, University of Primorska
Prof. dr. Milan Bufon, University of Primorska
Prof. dr. Aleksander Panjek, University of Primorska
Prof. dr. Roberto Biloslavo, University of Primorska
Prof. dr. Igor Jurinčič, University of Primorska
Prof. dr. Metka Špes, University of Ljubljana
Prof. dr. Vladimir Drozg, University of Maribor
Dr. Drago Perko, Anton Melik Geographical Institute
Prof. dr. Tadej Slabe, Karst Research Institute
Conference Statement
The location of the 2016 Conference is Slovenia with its three most important cities Ljubljana, Maribor and Koper that are also the seats of the only three public universities in Slovenia (the fourth is not entirely public).
Ljubljana is the national capital, the administrative and business centre of the country. With a quarter of a million inhabitants it is a relatively small city for a capital but it is becoming more and more attractive for foreign visitors. Ljubljana is European Green Capital 2016. The University of Ljubljana was formally established after the collapse of the Habsburg Empire in 1919, and that is also the year when the Department of Geography started to educate geographers. In 1922 students of that department established the first geographical association as a predecessor of today's Association of Slovenian geographers. The first issue of the Geographical Bulletin (Geografski vestnik) was published in 1925. It is therefore our scientific geographical journal with the longest tradition. Apart from the Department of Geography in Ljubljana there is also the Geographical Institute Anton Melik where many prominent Slovenian geographers are doing their research work.
Maribor is the second biggest city in Slovenia with about 100.000 inhabitants. It used to be the most important industrial centre of Slovenia in the time of socialist Yugoslavia. It became a university town in 1975 with the establishment of the second Slovenian university. The work of the Department of Geography started before that already in 1961.
Maribor is nowadays less an industrial and an increasingly tertiary and quaternary sector oriented administrative and cultural center of North-eastern Slovenia. In 2012 Maribor was the European Capital of Culture.
Koper is a city on the Adriatic coast with its history going back to Roman times. It has long been under Venetian rule, which can be observed on every step you make through old medieval part of the city. Once a city on the island, it is nowadays one of the most important Northern Adriatic ports.
The Faculty of Humanities was established in 2000 and was one of the constituting members of the newly established Universityof Primorska (Università del Litorale) in 2003, as were the predecessors of today's Faculty of Management and Faculty of Tourism Studies – Turistica. The university comprises just under 6.000 students and slightly more than 700 employees (including administration and part time employees) and is very important for the city with only 25.000 inhabitants, and for the region as well. It is a contact region from several points of view (sea and land, Slavic and Romance language groups, neighbouring nations: Slovenia-Croatia, Slovenia-Italy, tertiary hills and karst plateaus etc.). The first study program of the Department of Geography was therefore called “Geography of contact spaces”. Today we still pay a lot of attention to topics such as border regions, Mediterranean studies, regional/spatial planning, marginality and marginalization etc. The Faculty of humanities, the Faculty of Management, and the Faculty of Health Studies are involved in joint interdisciplinary graduate study programme called “Management of Sustainable Development”. Marginality, marginalization, sustainability and development are therefore not just research but also educational topics and are fully present at the University of Primorska.
The trips between three conference venues will be an important part of the conference. There will be time for discussions as well as an opportunity to get more information about the host country (visiting places of interest). Half way between Ljubljana and Koper, Postojna hosts the KarstResearch Institute. Some researchers from this institute as well as from the GeographicalInstitute Anton Melik from Ljubljana are teaching special courses at the Department of Geography in Koper (Fb). As Slovenia is the land of karst (the region named Karst - Kras in Slovenian, Carso in Italian - is in Slovenia and partly in Italy), one of the subtopics of the conference is dedicated to karst.