River contracts (RCs) are voluntary agreements between stakeholders for managing water bodies and involve participatory, evidence‐based action plans. Increasingly, European authorities recognise that effective water policies require bottom‐up, inclusive decision‐making. Despite widely held assumptions about the benefits of including stakeholders in river basin management and encouraging participatory mechanisms of decision‐making, the growing rhetoric about the need for public engagement implies that this “new” paradigm of water management remains filled with ambiguities. Adopting ethnographic methods and drawing on a variety of primary and secondary sources, this paper analyses three RCs in the Friuli Venezia Giulia region of Italy. These case studies reveal the potential for RCs as tools not only for water management, but also for increasing stakeholder involvement through place‐making activities conceived as potential hydrophilic encounters. In order to understand whether RCs contribute to a fluvial sense of place, we looked at the effects of top‐down versus participatory processes. We asked whether RCs were considered participatory processes designed to achieve a co‐designed outcome or simply territorial management projects that objectify the river as something to be developed. We found that ratifying an RC was not, in itself, proof of an effective process; rather the nature and quality of an RC was determined by the degree and type of participation. We contend that participatory events and sharing information are not sufficient in themselves to achieve the active involvement of all stakeholders. We argue that the best framework for enabling place‐making and enhancing a sense of place is to develop RCs within a process that includes a high degree of participation. This enables citizens to shift from simply being passive recipients of plans to becoming effective territorial actors.

The book aims to study the relationship between the contractual instrument and succession law, in order to identify the categories into which the general device of the succession contract currently seems to be divided. The book starts from an analysis of the 'bans' on succession settlements as per art. 458 of the Italian Civil Code, before going on to examine the categories of 'alternative instruments to wills' and 'exceptionally admitted mortis causa deeds (other than wills)' (that is, the first two forms taken on by the wide-ranging genus of contracts for the purpose of succession). Then it deals with the institution of the 'family settlement' (articles 768-bis of the Italian Civil Code), a device which can be traced back to the phenomenon of 'anticipated succession' (constituting the 'third form' of contracts for the purpose of succession). Having clarified the regulations as well as giving a systematic outline of the institution, the analysis then concentrates on the relationship between the aforesaid contract and the sphere of 'necessary succession'. The concluding part of the book contains an outline of a set of applicative models for the category of anticipated succession; additional innovative models distinct from the current formulation in articles 768-bis et seq. of the Italian Civil Code, which therefore enable the interpreter to make out, from a de jure condendo perspective, the possible lines of development both of contracts for the purpose of succession and for necessary succession.

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Environmental education is vital for raising awareness of sustainable development. Zero Waste is a holistic model that goes beyond waste reduction and recycling, and calls for a reshaping of contemporary modes of production and consumption while also promoting active citizenship awareness. Exploring Zero Waste principles, this article situates and demonstrates its alignment with key international documents, such as the United Nations’ 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Already used in some educational contexts, the Zero Waste model has the potential to encourage a new perspective to fundamentally reconsider and redesign our relationship to what it means to be actively more sustainable, through a systemic and circular approach. We outline how educational geography and sustainability practices can both benefit from, and support, a dialogue with Zero Waste principles.