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The purpose of this paper is to assess the heritage values of two case study sites in the Kathmandu Valley using a living heritage approach by emphasising the role of the core community. The core community in a living heritage site is the community that created the site and maintained it over centuries, and will continue to do so into the future while adapting to change. Understanding the value of a site is important for the conservation of heritage because values help shape decisions on conservation. Assessment of heritage values helps to identify the values associated with heritage sites.

A case study approach was employed for the research. Questionnaire surveys were conducted with the core community and stakeholders. Surveys of the stakeholders looked for any difference in opinion between them and the core community. The empirical data were collected at two living heritage sites located in Kathmandu and Lalitpur in Nepal.

The findings of the paper provide insights for the conservation of living heritage in the Kathmandu Valley. It shows how the community perceives and assesses the significance of heritage sites. It also shows the values considered important by the core community and stakeholders, and the values that have changed over the years. Aesthetic and architectural values were ranked high by the core community.

The approach employed was adopted to assess heritage values by the core community. A living heritage site is dependent on the core community, so their perception of heritage value is important and should be the basis of conservation of living heritage. This paper provides a framework for conserving and managing heritage sites by the core community with support and guidance from wider community members and government authorities.

Culture has always been important for the character of the cities, as have the civic and public institutions that sustain a lifestyle and provide an identity. Substantial evidence of the unique historical, urban civilisation remains within the traditional settlements in the Kathmandu Valley in Nepal, manifested in houses, palaces, temples, rest houses, open spaces, festivals, rituals, customs and cultural institutions. Indigenous knowledge and practices prescribed the arrangement of houses, roads, and urban spaces giving the city a distinctive physical form, character, and a unique oriental nativeness. In a technical sense, these societies did not have written rules for guiding development. In recent decades, the urban culture of the city has been changing with the forces of urbanisation and globalisation and the demand for new buildings and spaces. New residential design is increasingly dominated by distinctive patterns of Western suburban ideal comprising detached or semi-detached homes and high rise tower blocks. This architectural iconoclasm can be construed as a rather crude response to the indigenous culture and built form. The paper attempts to dismantle the current tension between traditional and contemporary ‘culture’ (and hence society) and housing (or built form) in the Kathmandu Valley by engaging in a discussion that cuts across space, time, and meaning of architecture as we know it.

The purpose of this paper is to apply social theory to the creation of a mass-media communications intervention designed to encourage earthquake-resistant construction in Nepal.

A three-step process was employed in this study: first, a narrative literature review was completed regarding the motivation of protective action. Second, key informant elicitation interviews with 15 community members at five public schools who supported making their buildings earthquake-resistant informed the script for a documentary film. Finally, the film was reviewed with stakeholders, plus 16 community members associated with a school in need of seismic work. Sociograms were used to determine relative closeness of the study participants to the film role models.

Motivating factors identified in the literature synthesis were included in the film, which focussed on effective actions taken by role models, and avoided the use of fear-based appeals. Key informant interviews yielded role-modeling details for the film script, including triggers and obstacles faced by the community members, and outcomes of their actions. Sociogram outcomes guided film editing and increased relative screen time for those community members with whom the study participants felt greater closeness. A pretest-posttest cluster randomized trial (details reported elsewhere) showed greater gains in knowledge, perceived outcome effectiveness, and intended behaviors among intervention film viewers than control participants.

This three-step process yielded the information required by a practitioner to develop a theory-based, culturally appropriate mass-media intervention designed to motivate reduction of disaster risk.

Accra, the capital of Ghana is far away from major earthquake zones of the world, but has a history of destructive earthquakes. However, its seismic risk does not attract the requisite attention. The purpose of this paper is to give an overview of Accra's seismic risk, discuss challenges faced and risk‐reduction initiatives, and then to propose specific strategies that are necessary to reduce this risk.

The approach taken is to: give an overview of Accra's profile and seismicity; discuss disaster management structures in place and the challenges faced; discuss seismic risk‐reduction programs; discuss the risk‐reduction strategies of two cities in other developing countries, with the view of identifying specific strategies that would be helpful to Accra; and conclude with specific risk‐reduction action measures that are important for Accra.

A number of specific recommendations to reduce Accra's seismic risk are made at the end of the paper. Among these, the need to set up a national organization with the sole mandate of championing seismic risk reduction is identified as a critical step needed. Without this, and others, the paper contends that Accra would not experience any significant reduction of its seismic risk.

The paper presents a viewpoint of important action steps that need to be taken to reduce Accra's seismic risk. The points raised in the paper are considered as important first steps necessary for any form of sustainable disaster risk reduction. The paper would thus be of interest to any person or organization interested in helping reduce Accra's seismic risk.

This is the first paper to put Accra's seismic risk in a global context, and then propose action steps that are necessary to help reduce this risk.

Obtaining building permit certificate is an essential component of construction endeavors, but it can be cumbersome sometimes. The process is frequently beset with obstacles, including bureaucratic impediments, red-tapism, prolonged authorization protocols and insufficient inter-agency collaboration which result in project timeline extension, cost escalation and applicant dissatisfaction. Therefore, this study aims to examine customer satisfaction with the assessment of building construction permit certificates in Lalitpur, Nepal.

Following the notion of evaluation model theory, this study adopts an explanatory research design to determine the causal relationship between latent and observed variables. People who have recently completed the construction of their building and those people whose construction work is pending make up the population for the study. A total of 198 samples were collected by following the convenience sampling method from Lalitpur, Nepal. The primary data are collected by using the structured questionnaire with the interview process where the data are statistically evaluated using descriptive and inferential analysis using the KOBO toolbox, SPSS and AMOS. The connection between variables was examined using structural equation modeling (SEM).

Results indicate that the negligence of the employees, the attitude of the employees, the need for additional costs and the hiring of the agent are the most significant obstacles encountered by customers during the process of getting construction permit. Regarding the whole assessment system, the general population expresses displeasure. SEM results indicate that environment and quality are significantly related to customer satisfaction.

This paper's novelty lies in its Nepal-specific inquiry into the relationship between building permit acquisition procedures and customer contentment. The study provides a distinctive viewpoint on this context by combining evaluation model theory and SEM. The localized approach emphasizes the importance of customized strategies to improve customer satisfaction, adding to the current literature on the subject. The study's use of SEM as a quantitative analysis tool enhances its methodological rigor. This interdisciplinary research offers valuable insights for academics, practitioners and policymakers in Nepal and contributes to the wider field of construction and customer satisfaction.

Relying on the theoretical lens of a knowledge-based view, the purpose of this study is to explore the sources and roles of experiential knowledge in the rapid internationalisation of an emerging market-based micro export firms (EMMFs).

This is an inductive theory building study, which attempts to understand the “how” and “why” questions. In so doing, the study used nine micro export firms operating in the handicrafts sector of Nepal.

The findings suggest that internationalisation of resource-poor EMMFs relies on the entrepreneurs’ experiential knowledge, which is mainly acquired through prior experience, social networks and participation in international trade-fairs.

This study contributes by formulating a number of propositions on the sources and roles of experiential knowledge, which could be tested in pursuit of theory building on micro firms’ internationalisation based in emerging markets.

The paper advances an understanding on the patterns of firms’ internationalisation, and discusses EMMFs’ possibilities to emerge as a faster internationalising firm, so-called “born globals”.

The purpose of this paper is to understand the traditional practices of safeguarding intangible cultural heritage (ICH) through “Guthi”, that is continued by the indigenous community of Kathmandu Valley. It explores the ancient system as a management practice rather than just a social costume. By analyzing existing laws and policies relevant to intangible heritage of Nepal, it aims to find scope for the Guthi in the formal heritage conservation practice and its relevancy in present context of 2003 Convention, where community participation plays a pivotal role.

To study the traditional method of safeguarding heritage “Guthi system”, the case of “Yehya Punhi Festival” also known as “Indra Jatra” of Kathmandu was taken as a case. Qualitative research methodology was used to study various sub festivals within Yenya, its functions, funding mechanism and its way of continuity by Guthi. Review of various legislations associated with the heritage of Nepal, published and unpublished official documents as well as international conventions and recommendations were done. In addition to semi-structured interview with Guthi members, experts and locals; the observation of eight days long festival was also conducted,

The study found that traditional Guthi system still holds a strong value in the social structure and safeguarding of traditional practices even with negative impact of modernization. Guthi is the main reason for the continuity of the Yenya Punhi festival, along with various associated rituals, while the national legislations of Nepal do not recognize Guthi as a safeguarding practice. Traditional practice could be a way forward for implementation of 2003 convention in Nepal when Nepal has already ratified the convention. Guthi could be sustainable way of safeguarding heritage if integrated well in the formal heritage practices.

Guthi has been studied by many researchers from anthropological perspectives and even conservation for tangible heritage but not as a mechanism of safeguarding ICH. Guthi could be one of the excellent examples of Safeguarding Intangible Heritage and could also be a good recipe for management with community participation, sustainability and indigenous knowledge. More research and publication like this is necessary to push government to look into homegrown solutions than implementing new management plan.

Nepal's urban population is estimated to be around 15 percent. This is a tremendous increment considering that the urban population some 50 years back was just around 3 percent. The rapid increase in urban population in the last five decades has resulted in unplanned and haphazard urban growth. Urbanization causes a shift in employment, from the agricultural sector to the nonagricultural sector. However, in Nepal, despite the increase in the urban population, the economy is still largely dictated by the agricultural sector. Urbanization is creating and adding new risks to the existing risks from natural hazards such as earthquakes, landslides, and flooding. Building a culture of safety is the key to building resilience of communities to disasters and the involvement of the community in managing risks is instrumental in reducing the adverse impacts of these disasters. Public awareness in dealing with disasters and in responding to emergency situations can save a great number of lives.

This paper aims to explore how different risk perceptions of experts, institutions and laymen have to be taken into consideration if non-governmental organizations and donors want to include the community in disaster risk reduction. Otherwise, community-based disaster risk management will not be community-based.

This research is based on an intensive literature review, as well as a four-month felt study in Kathmandu (November 2011-February 2012). This study explores, from a social constructive point of view, the relationship among international, national and local actors in the effort to conduct disaster risk reduction in Nepal through a community-based approach.

The Kathmandu Valley is at risk of being hit by an earthquake at anytime. If an earthquake hits, it will cause total devastation. Although the Nepalese are aware of the risks of a potential earthquake, very few have begun preparations. The author finds that the lack of preparation is partly caused by different risk perceptions among experts, institutions and laymen.

Involving the community in disaster risk reduction today is widely accepted as the right way to work with disaster risk reduction. But, rarely the question is made: are we really involving the community by taking their risk perception serious, and not just accepting the risk perceptions from experts and institutions of science as being the right way to perceive disaster risk. The author finds that there is a tendency to ignore the community in community-based earthquake preparedness in Nepal.