Defended Theses

Fanny Di Tursi - Geographic information: the architect of emergency management

In France, crisis management is implemented as soon as the prefectoral authority activates one or more ORSEC (organisation of civil security response) plans, as well as its crisis room. Crisis management as established in France is read from an administrative point of view. The aim of this thesis is to change the way in which crisis management is viewed, by focusing in particular on the emergency space, where the concrete actions of crisis management players take place, in order to understand the issues and the organisation specific to this space. More generally, the aim of this thesis is to restore the place of geographical information within the organisation of crisis management, at the time of its response, as well as the spatial and relational organisation of crisis actors.

Key words: geographical information, cartographic tools, crisis management, emergency, governance
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Avenir Meikengang - Heritage Costumes in the Grassfields of Cameroon: identification of knowledge and know-how, social representations and development strategies

Considering the essential role of culture for our societies, appropriate measures must be taken to ensure better protection, management and valorisation of local cultural wealth for sustainable, human development and the improvement of living conditions for local communities. The heritage costumes in the Grassfields of Cameroon are an artistic and ancestral know-how linked to intangible heritage and represent multi-functional objects, as they serve on the one hand as fashion, as religious and ritual support, and as elements of communication between peoples or regions that are more or less distant. On the other hand, they serve to categorise individuals from the same or different social classes. However, hit by a variety of hazards and phenomena, this extraordinary wealth remains underestimated, all too often neglected and misunderstood by those who own it, and the strategies for promoting and safeguarding it are very often limited, leading to its disappearance. This thesis takes an analytical look at the future of intangible heritage, specifically heritage costumes in Cameroon. In particular, it will focus on the analysis of actors, audiences and communities, as well as on the modes and methods of promotion and mediation. The thesis will therefore explore how the identification and documentation of heritage costumes modify the attribution of heritage value and improve the mediation and artistic and cultural valorisation of objects. The aim will be to propose a critical and empirical analysis of the practices and knowledge associated with heritage costumes and to study the prospects for safeguarding and promoting them.

Key words : Heritage costumes, Cameroon, Identification, Enhancement, Local development, Communities
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Lucas Monsaingeon - Designing in the Nord and Pas-de-Calais coalfields. Territory, architecture & post-industrial heritage: from dead ground to living soil

This project-based thesis was carried out at the Humanités, Création, Patrimoine EUR at CY Cergy Paris Université, within the LéaV (architecture) and Places (geography and planning) laboratories. It is conducting a descriptive and prospective study of the architectural, urban and landscape heritage of the Nord and Pas-de-Calais coalfields, and of the contribution of the architectural project as a conceptual and operational process in the current post-industrial transition. It proposes an explanatory framework for the complexity, uncertainty and singularity encountered in the field, as a basis for planning in these places. This approach is based on ten years' experience of project management in this area, as an associate architect with the Philippe Prost architectural studio.
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Chloé Senecat - Urban policies of the European Union: multi-level governance in Berlin, Paris and Warsaw

As metropolises assert themselves on the international stage, the European Union (EU) is developing urban development programmes, even though it has no formal competence to do so. It is thus redefining the boundaries of what constitutes a ‘public policy’ as part of a process of reconfiguring territoriality: multi-level governance based on the principle of subsidiarity is being put in place. A comparison of the cities of Paris, Berlin and Warsaw, capitals where all levels of governance are superimposed, enables us to analyse the impact of these European urban policies on territories with unique needs and to obtain an overview of European opportunities in urban development. The introduction of these urban programmes is an opportunity for towns and cities to assert themselves on the European stage while putting their vision of development into practice by experimenting with urban projects, as the EU sees this field of action as a public policy laboratory. The EU is developing a specific approach to urban development, both tangible - through funding and concrete projects - and intangible - through the networking of cities and the exchange of best practice. Secondly, by comparing the development of these capital cities, which have divergent histories but are linked by the EU, it is possible to analyse European objectives in terms of cohesion between its urban areas. Indeed, the European urban dimension has its place within cohesion policy. The aim of this research is therefore to understand the extent to which the urban dimension of the European Union's regional policy is leading to a simultaneous reshaping of urban areas and a redefinition of the methods of governance within European cities. Does it really manage to go beyond the national level by influencing the governance of its urban territories and by directly addressing cities and municipalities through the implementation of a specific approach to development? In practice, are local players seizing the development opportunities offered by the EU by linking the tangible and intangible dimensions? How are EU urban policies reconfiguring urban space and redefining urban governance?

Key words: Cohesion policy, Urban policy, Europe, Subsidiarity, Urban geography, Networks of cities, Metropolisation
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Laura Louman - A geomatic approach to the dynamics of ornamentation in the Chauvet and Marsoulas caves.

Today, integrated, interdisciplinary approaches are favored in the study of decorated caves. The role of digital tools becomes strategic, given the diversity and quantity of information collected. While 3D tools have been omnipresent in the study of caves for the last twenty years, geographic information systems have not been widely used. Yet the decorated cave is an eminently geographical space: cave art is the result of interaction between humans and the cave. It's a space that lends itself to a spatial reading of information. Given all the spatial properties presented by decorated caves, can geomatics be a genuine avenue of research that will enable us to reconsider the study of these spaces? How can geomatics be applied to the study of painted caves? To what extent could the use of these spatial tools be integrated into the problems of decorated caves, despite the specificities posed (underground space, 3D object, collective research, old data). The aim of this research is to use geomatics as a methodological and conceptual framework to answer the many questions encountered in parietal contexts. 
This thesis develops three lines of research: organizational management of spatial information, chronospatial modeling and human-environment spatial interaction. These three axes are based on two decorated caves: the Marsoulas cave (Haute-Garonne) and the Chauvet cave (Ardèche). 
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Mamé Cheikh Ngom - The stakes of peripheral urban sprawl in Senegal: Analysis of urban dynamics, conflicts and tensions in the Dakar, Thiès and MBour triangle (The case of the toll highway, the Thiès forest and the Diass land)

With rapid population growth and accelerated urbanization, the cities of sub-Saharan Africa have experienced forms of peripheral sprawl that threaten to compromise the interdependent relationship between town and country. Dakar is no exception, as its sprawl has given rise to land conflicts that are the focus of this research. To better understand the issues at stake in this urban crisis, the study focuses on the toll highway right-of-way, the agricultural and pastoral lands of Diass and the Thiès classified forest right-of-way. The methodology consisted of a literature review, qualitative and quantitative data collection and information processing. The study shows that government projects have led to urban fragmentation, and that sprawl has had an impact on cities and the environment. The conurbation between Dakar-Thiès and Mbour raises conflicts due to land expropriations in residential, agricultural and classified areas. Dakar's sprawl is due to population growth, its off-center location and dysfunctional land-use planning policies. Because of its proximity to Dakar and its central position in the interface, Diass is becoming a focal point for major government projects. Externalities, induced by gentrification, peri-urbanization and the territorial division between Thiès and Fandène, accentuate encroachments on the Thiès classified forest right-of-way. These asymmetrical land conflicts stem from the persistence of urban and rural poverty and the hazards generated by territorial reconversions and socioeconomic mutations. Conflict regulation strategies, based on resettlement and compensation, are uncertain because the approaches are exclusive and the accompanying measures insufficient.

Key words: sprawl, urban, conflict, land, forest, right-of-way, freeway, land and interface.
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Ly Madior - A geographical approach to crime in the urban agglomeration of Dakar: observations from the department of Pikine

Crime, as a subject for study in the humanities and social sciences, has always been the domain of sociologists, historians and jurists. Few geographers have taken an interest in it, despite the revival of spatial analysis tools and the increasingly sustained involvement of the immediate environment in socio-spatial facts. The aim of this project is to demonstrate the importance of taking the spatial dimension into account when analyzing crime.
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Victor Santoni - Use of digital social networks in a context of territorialized crisis management, a comparison between Ile-de-France and the Brussels-Capital region

Since Sandy in 2012, social networks have been seen as a potential source of information in the event of a major crisis. Citizens of New York City used the social network Twitter to report on the situation in real time. Citizens equipped with their smartphones become citizen-sensors. They provide information from the field that can be used in crisis management with an immediacy that no team of first responders could cover. In France, public authorities are present on social networks and have integrated a Social Media in Emergency Management (MSGU) component to communicate with populations during a crisis. However, communication seems to be a one-way street, to the detriment of information feedback.
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Maria Di Stefano - Living in an eco-neighborhood or an “ordinary” neighborhood: what impact on the perception of environmental issues?

The aim of the proposed thesis is to define the socio-urban parameters used in the design of an eco-neighborhood born of an urban renewal process or created ex-nihilo, and to examine the devices (political actions and social practices) put in place by residents, but also the specific practices observed there, especially if this distinguishes them from neighboring neighborhoods and gives eco-neighborhoods a special place in the urban system. The realization of an eco-neighborhood presupposes, in fact, the implementation of “lifestyles” in line with the principles of sustainable development, and which differ from the aspirations of current neighborhoods: social mix and compact housing density, fewer parking spaces and access to public transport, the development of cycling and pedestrian spaces represent a new way of thinking and “living the eco-neighborhood together”. The thesis will also compare the practices of the population in eco-neighborhoods with those in 'ordinary' neighborhoods, and study the implications in terms of resource management and quality of life.
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Laurence Lafitte - Participatory school architecture in rural areas as an expression of a new model for local development: a comparative study of two “experimental” school projects in Breton communes with fewer than 500 inhabitants.

As the physical embodiment of the principles and symbols conveyed by the educational institution, and as the spatial projection of its organization, school architecture partly defines individual and collective behavior and representations. It has a long-term impact on the territory and conditions the development of future generations. In a context of globalization of children's education, territorialization of the school question and decentralization of architectural competence, school architecture is today obliged to integrate not only the pedagogical dimensions, but also the social, cultural and political dimensions of the local context, all of which interact to compose a global project that translates into the expansion of the teaching team and the development of partnerships, the pooling of spaces for extracurricular activities, and openness to the city, the village and the territory.
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Madina Missoumi - Peri-urbanization in Algerian cities: the case of Oran

Over the past few decades, the city of Oran in north-western Algeria has expanded disproportionately on its outskirts. The scale and rapidity of this sprawl pose problems for monitoring the phenomenon of peri-urbanization. Against this backdrop, the use of remote sensing to monitor urban development is raising expectations. This study led to the analysis of the spatio-temporal evolution of the Oran agglomeration through the implementation of a methodology based on the use of multi-temporal satellite images. Specific processing was applied to extract qualitative and quantitative information on the evolution of the peri-urban territories of the Oran conurbation.
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Yong Seungchan - Urban conflicts and the participatory approach in the urban renewal process: a comparative study between France and South Korea

Based on a comparative approach between France and South Korea, the thesis aims to identify and explain a fairly universal trend in the participatory approach through an international comparison, and also the priority and determining factors for the development of “inhabitant participation” through an inter-territorial comparison. In the context of the current administration, which emphasizes the importance of decentralization and local governance, resident participation has long been considered an imperative.
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