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Securitisation of international migration is now a widely accepted phenomenon. Human security or insecurity is an important aspect of this broader security concern. International migration raises security issues at different levels because it involves a multitude of agencies that often have conflicting interests. In this conceptual review, main areas and actors of migration associated conflict are discussed. The aim is to explore the possibility of developing a conflict-based model that will facilitate the understanding of contemporary international migration flows and the reasons, mechanisms and dynamics underpinning them. Different stages of migration bring out different sets of conflicting security interests. The concept of environment of insecurity is placed within this multilevel conflict model. This study aims to provide a new understanding of human security and migration nexus from a conflict perspective which is conducive to a comprehensive migration conceptualisation and viable policy solutions.

Poor underprivileged countries face a long period of high population increase, while poverty and natural resource limits provide growing constraints to the management of population increase. Demography appears increasingly to turn to the study of populations well underway in the fertility transition. The "development optimism" implied in this shift needs to be set against the evidence of rapidly growing inequalities, between and within countries. The question needs to be raised whether fertility reductions will reach replacement levels everywhere.

Das Gupta's recent contribution on the role of institutional and socio-political change for the demographic transition appears to offer a very viable framework for further research on historical Europe as well as current non-European states. However, it needs to be extended in the direction given by Castells' theories on the process of social exclusion in the information age in order to incorporate situations where fertility stabilises well over replacement level. The social implications of such a scenario are a challenge to both science and politics.

Over the last couple of decades, governments in developing and developed economies/countries have shown interest in the public-private partnership (PPP) policy. Different governments have different reasons for adopting the PPP concept. This paper aims to investigate the differences and similarities on the reasons for implementing PPP in developing and developed economies/countries, represented by Ghana and Hong Kong. An empirical questionnaire survey was conducted with relevant experienced practitioners in both jurisdictions. One hundred and three completed questionnaires were returned for analysis. The results from the non-parametric test show five reasons with significant differences. Reasons related to the economic and social benefits of PPP are ranked higher in Ghana, whereas efficiency and quality service related reasons are ranked higher in Hong Kong. Further, two reasons for adopting PPP emerged as very important in both jurisdictions; these include: "promotes quick delivery of public infrastructure projects" and "allows for shared risks". The outputs of this study contribute to the international best practice framework for PPP. International private investors would be informed of the expectations of governments when engaging in PPP arrangement particularly in Asia and Africa.

There is a growing consensus in the literature that the occurrence of political budget cycles (PBCs) is highly conditional upon context. Most studies have focused on incumbents' abilities to engage in pre-electoral fiscal manipulation while neglecting their incentives. This is particularly true for studies outside the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), which have attributed to incumbents a uniform and constant motivation to manipulate budgets in order to win elections. We argue that this is not the case. Using new data on state spending from 1960 to 2006 for 76 non-OECD countries, we show that PBCs primarily occur under conditions of uncertain electoral prospects. Thus, incentives to manipulate public spending prior to elections vary according to the incumbent's electoral confidence. Given the particular context of non-OECD countries, we argue theoretically and show empirically that incumbents' electoral confidence primarily depends on the tightness of past electoral results. Past political competition is thus a key driver of fiscal behavior in non-OECD countries.

Using data from the Eurostat Database and European Value Surveys we assess if recent fertility trends in Europe are associated with a change in values. A special emphasis is given to Spain and Italy that, together with the other Southern European countries, are often seen as a homogeneous group sharing the same 'traditional' values and demographic behaviours -as opposed to Scandinavian countries which are seen as progressive. We show that Italy and Spain are not that similar in terms of values. We also show that similarities at the country level with respect to TFR hide considerable variation at the regional level. We argue that an analysis at the regional level, as carried out here, is crucial to better understand changes in fertility levels. Our analyses provide evidence that recent fertility trends are associated with value dynamics, namely that the highest increases in TFR happened in regions where both individualism with respect to relationships and individual autonomy grew at the same time that individualism with respect to children diminished. We also provide empirical evidence in support of McDonald's theory that both gender equity in market-oriented and family-oriented institutions is necessary for fertility to rise.

Experience has shown that bank failure has adverse effects on the economy. It is therefore necessary to identify factors that explain bank failure, in order to prevent it. One of the macroeconomic factors of bank failure is the growth of interest rates. However, when a central bank applies a tightening monetary policy, the interest rates increases. In low-income countries, the sale of treasury bills by the central bank is an alternative source of profit for banks. If the banks become efficient to maximize their profits, in these countries, because of a tightening monetary policy, does that mean that this policy reduces bank failure despite the increasing of interest rates? Regarding the case of Haiti, this thesis shows that although a tightening monetary policy increases the index of bank failure of those that are efficient to maximize their profits as well as those that are inefficient banks, the impact is greater on those that are inefficient. The implication of the results of this thesis for developing countries is that the central banks, when planning their monetary policy should take into account the adverse effect of a tightening monetary policy on profit efficiency and on the level of failure of the banks. One of the main contributions of this thesis to the literature is that it shows that beyond the bank balance sheet, monetary policy also affects the efficiency and the level of bank failure. ; L'expérience a montré que la défaillance bancaire a des conséquences néfastes sur l'économie. D'où la nécessité d'identifier les facteurs qui l'expliquent, afin de pouvoir la prévenir. L'un des facteurs macroéconomiques de la défaillance bancaire que l'on retrouve dans la littérature, c'est la croissance des taux d'intérêt. Or, lorsque la banque centrale applique une politique monétaire restrictive, une augmentation des taux d'intérêt en découle. Dans les pays à faible revenu, la vente de bons du trésor par la banque centrale constitue une source alternative de profit pour les banques. Si cette politique rend les ...

A very commonly observed phenomenon in developing and emerging market economies is the use of another country's currency (US dollar or other) in lieu or in addition to the local currency. Governments in these countries have been encouraging dollarization for years by allowing their citizens to save and borrow from local banks in foreign currency, posing risks to the health and stability of their banking systems. Emre Ozsoz, State University of New York - FIT, New York, USA; Erick W. Rengifo, Fordham University, New York, USA

Literature on sex occupational segregation has typically focused on the micro and macro determinants of it, on mobility patterns over the life course, on implications of segregation and mobility for gender inequalities. Rarely the link between sex-type of occupations and women's risk of labour market interruptions over family formation has been explored. In this article we analyse whether women who are working in female-dominated, male-dominated or integrated occupations have more or less chances to remain attached to the labour market, controlling for qualifications, class, sector and contract positions. By drawing from ECHP, and comparing Italy, Spain, Denmark and the UK, we consider whether the effect of the sex-type of occupations varies across countries with different institutional and cultural configurations. We find that, ceteris paribus , only in the UK the sex-composition of an occupation matters: women in female occupations are more likely to move to inactivity than women in mixed or male occupations. In the other countries considered the main determinants of women's labour market continuity lie elsewhere. In Italy what matters most is the sector of employment (public vs. private). In Spain the sector is relevant too, but also class and the type of contract held (permanent vs. temporary). In Denmark, where policies and culture universally support maternal employment, women's transitions to housework are largely independent of their human capital and their location in the labour market.

China has since the mid-1980s witnessed an increasing trend in sex ratio at birth (SRB) imbalance. While the literature agrees that SRB is caused by parents' need to have a son, it is not clear if an increase in SRB reflects an increase in son preference. This study aims at bridging this gap by developing a model to estimate prenatal son preference based on SRB and total fertility rates (TFR). Data on SRB and TFR from China are applied to the model. The results show that since the mid-1980s, prenatal son preference has fluctuated, and trends in SRB and prenatal son preference by province and by rural, township and urban areas sometimes diverge. In order to interpret these results, changing trends in prenatal son preference is discussed in relation to social change in China. The study draws conclusions at two levels. First of all, theoretically, it concludes that increased SRB does not have to signify increasing prenatal son preference when fertility rates fall. Secondly, it concludes that in China, the process of socioeconomic development has diverging impact on son preference, weakening it in some instances, while reinforcing it in others. Modeling son preference as suggested is useful for posing relevant questions with regard to how and why son preference changes. It also has important implications for where, if and how interventions that address skewed SRB should be planned.

High rates of infant mortality in Africa continue to be a major public health concern today, despite the fact that most deaths can be prevented from well known, relatively low cost technologies. Using multiple years of DHS from four countries, we estimate the change in the relative risk of death as well as the main contributions to the change in mortality over time. We find significant declines in the mortality hazard in each of the 4 countries, with the largest declines in Malawi (44 percent) and Tanzania (22 percent) between the mid 1990s to mid 2000s, although there is significant variation by age group in the hazard rate across time. In Zambia for example, the hazard increased for children ages 25–60 months in spite of on overall decline in mortality, while in Mozambique the largest decline in mortality was exactly among this age group. The decomposition analysis illustrates that some of the main correlates of mortality did not contribute to overall declines over time, because the levels of these correlates did not change during the study period. This is particularly true for birth spacing, attended births and breastfeeding. The analysis also demonstrates the overall lack of explanatory power of the individual and household level variables available for use in the DHS, indicating the need to collect complementary supply side information, through community questionnaires for example, that can be linked to DHS households and thus expand the set of covariates available for modeling child survival and other health outcomes.

In this paper we use unique longitudinal data sources to study the relationship between poverty and fertility at household level in Albania, Ethiopia, Indonesia and Vietnam. These countries differ greatly in their history, average income, social structure, economic institutions and demographic features. We find that there is a substantial difference in the relative importance of the determinants of poverty dynamics and fertility; the persistence of high levels of fertility and poverty in Ethiopia is driven by lack of economic growth, high demand of children and poor access to family planning; education is a crucial element in reducing poverty and fertility, as is clear from Vietnam, Indonesia and Albania.