Suchergebnisse

Over the course of a few short years, the city of Bogotá (Colombia) has dramatically transformed the quality of its public space. This session presents primary and secondary data documenting the economic, environmental, and social benefits of improved public space and urban mobility. Bogotá has benefited from a series of political leaders with a highly progressive view on the importance of urban space. This high degree of political will contributed to dramatic changes in several areas, including: 1. Reclamation of public space; 2. Improvement of public transport; 3. Promotion of non-motorised transport; and, 4. Implementation of auto restriction measures. The near simultaneous application of these policies has produced quantifiable benefits to the quality of life of city residents. The research shows that property values in areas with urban upgrades have appreciated considerably when compared to a control group of similar properties. Additionally, the research shows employment benefits from the city's Sunday "ciclovía" (closing of streets to motorised vehicles) is significantly greater than week-day auto-related employment along the same corridors. Air quality monitoring shows emission reductions by as much as 40 per cent for some pollutants. Social indicators related to accidents, crime levels, and equity are also quite positive. Traffic deaths have been reduced from over 1,300 in 1995 to less than 700 in 2002. Bogotá's transformation has attracted visits by city officials from over 50 nations. The replicability of Bogotá's successes will depend upon local circumstances, and especially upon levels of local political will. Further documentation of the economic, environmental, and social benefits stemming from Bogotá's efforts will help instil the confidence of city officials to move ahead with urban transformations of their own.

Voluntary agreements (VAs) are a form of environmental policy that has developed recently and through which polluting firms voluntarily commit to improve their environmental performances. Our analysis takes into account the market structure within the polluting industry as well as within the industry specialized in the abatement activity in order to compare several forms of VAs with the other environmental policy tools. We first compare a VA inspired from a Danish policy to an emission tax in an imperfect competition framework among the polluting firms. We then compare the same form of VA to an emission tax, an emission quota and a design standard when abatement is delegated to an imperfectly competitive specialised industry. Lastly, we study a VA implemented in France in the area of households' waste management in order to compare the theoretical point of view and the real-world observation. ; Les approches volontaires (AV) constituent une forme de régulation environnementale qui s'est développée récemment et dans laquelle les entreprises s'engagent volontairement à améliorer leurs performances environnementales. Notre analyse intègre de manière inédite le rôle des structures de marché qui prévalent aussi bien du côté des industries polluantes que des industries de dépollution afin de comparer certaines AV aux autres instruments de politique environnementale. La thèse compare tout d'abord une AV inspirée d'une politique introduite au Danemark à une taxe dans un cadre de concurrence imparfaite entre les firmes polluantes. Elle compare ensuite la même forme d'AV à une taxe, un quota de pollution et une norme de procédé lorsque la dépollution est déléguée à une industrie imparfaitement concurrentielle. Enfin, l'étude d'une AV appliquée en France dans le domaine des déchets d'emballages ménagers permet de confronter le point de vue théorique et l'observation de la réalité.

Pharmaceutical products are relevant for their contribution to the medicine progress and in health peoples improvement, altough this evidence goes back to the forthy years with the reduction in mortality, morbidity and hospitalisation rates. The ambivalence of drugs, both remedy and poison, needs a careful assessment of risks and benefits. Primitive estimates of health treatments evaluation occurred in the human history but the modern concept of evaluation in health care derived from cost-benefit analysis (welfare economics) and technology assessment. Then a new discipline, pharmacoeconomics and outcomes research, developed with the contribution of health economics, clinical medicine, pharmacology, statistics and epidemiology. Pharmaceutical products are also relevant because of their responsability of health expenditure growth. From 1992, in Italy, several legislative actions were made to face up the pharmaceutical expenditure. The most important one (L. 537/1993) achieved the maximum decrease of 16,8%, in 1994, and modified radically the pharmaceutical policy. Nevertheless, in the following six years the pharmaceutical expenditure grew more than 93%. New actions were made fixing the pharmaceutical expenditure to 13% of health expenditure, any excess being charged to Regions. In the new version for the current year, the excesses will be paid-back by pharmaceutical companies (60%) and Regions (40%). Furtherly, the creation of Agenzia Italiana del Farmaco increases the relevance of cost-effectiveness analyses for drugs reimbursement. However, pharmacoeconomic evaluations have still many methodological problems. Economic variables should be treated in the same manner of biomedical or epidemiological data, that is, by confidence intervals and sample sizes. There would be an "economic significance" besides to clinical and statistical ones. In this way, pharmacoeconomics and outcomes research would be able to add rationality to health care expenditure.

BACKGROUND: Although an effective measles vaccine has been available for almost 40 years, in 2000 there were about 30 million measles infections worldwide and 777,000 measles-related deaths. The history of smallpox suggests that achieving measles eradication depends on several factors; the biological characteristics of the organism; vaccine technology; surveillance and laboratory identification; effective delivery of vaccination programmes and international commitment to eradication. DISCUSSION: Like smallpox, measles virus has several biological characteristics that favour eradication. Humans are the only reservoir for the virus, which causes a visible illness and infection leading to life-long immunity. As the measles virus has only one genetic serotype which is relatively stable over time, the same basic vaccine can be used world-wide. Vaccination provides protection against measles infection for at least 15 years, although efficacy may be reduced due to host factors such as nutritional status. Measles vaccination may also confer other non-specific health benefits leading to reduced mortality. Accurate laboratory identification of measles cases enables enhanced surveillance to support elimination programmes. The "catch-up, keep-up, follow-up" vaccination programme implemented in the Americas has shown that measles elimination is possible using existing technologies. On 17th October 2003 the "Cape Town Measles Declaration" by the World Health Organisation and the United Nations Childrens Fund called on governments to intensify efforts to reduce measles mortality by supporting universal vaccination coverage and the development of more effective vaccination. SUMMARY: Although more difficult than for smallpox, recent experience in the Americas suggests that measles eradication is technically feasible. Growing international support to deliver these programmes means that measles, like smallpox, may very well become a curiosity of history.

ABSTRACT Objective: To determine how the tobacco industry has worked behind the scenes in the state of Colorado to influence the public and defeat public health efforts to control tobacco. Methods: Information for this study was gathered through examination of internal tobacco industry documents, Colorado Secretary of State records, local campaign contribution records, published articles, interviews, reports, web sites and telephone calls. Results: The tobacco industry has been pervasively involved in fighting public health efforts to reduce tobacco use in Colorado since the early 1980s. Up until the early 1990s, the industry's involvement was apparent. Shortly thereafter, significant efforts were made to conceal its opposition in Colorado. The industry has primarily applied its resources to defeat tobacco tax increases, derail efforts to limit public smoking and preserve smoking as a socially acceptable behavior. Tactics include influencing and co-opting state legislative processes, strategic utilization of philanthropy, sponsorships and advertising to fight public health efforts, working to divert funding away from existing tobacco education and prevention programs, camouflaging corporate involvement , engagement of paid consultants and front groups, and extensive media and local policy involvement. Conclusions: The tobacco industry has fought public health efforts to regulate tobacco at both the state and local levels in Colorado for more than two decades. Involvement in opposing public health initiatives has grown, but at the same time become less clear to the public. Industry opposition has been highly organized and well funded, and is increasingly carried out on the local level by third parties rather than the industry itself. The industry's efforts have slowed the progression of public health efforts to address tobacco issues in Colorado, primarily through derailing efforts to enact clean indoor air laws and blocking increases in state tobacco taxes.

In recent years, NATO and U.S. military forces have decided to implement a single fuel (JP-8) for all land-based military aircraft, vehicles, and equipment during war and peace times. This is referred to as the single fuel forward concept. However, possible environmental pollution problems have been identified in the process of implementing this single fuel concept. This work presents data on the operational and, especially, environmental evaluation of the JP-8 fuel that is burned in diesel engines and furnaces. The investigation is conducted in a comparative manner between the JP-8 fuel and the proverbial Diesel Oil No. 2, which is being substituted. The two fuels were burned under identical conditions in disparate types of combustors, including direct injection (DI) and indirect injection (IDI) diesel engines as well as a laminar-flow muffle furnace. The primary goal was to contrast the emissions of the two fuels, because JP-8 is a substitute for diesel oil in military applications, such as engines of ground vehicles and power generators, as well as other burners. Regulated emissions of CO, particulate matter (soot), oxides of nitrogen, and total unburned hydrocarbons have been examined. In the case of the combustion of the two fuels in the furnace, unregulated organic compounds have also been monitored. Moreover, the operational behaviors of the two fuels in the engines have been discussed. Results demonstrated that, for both fuels, the magnitude of the emissions, as well as the trends with operating conditions, were influenced by the type of combustor. However, the emissions from the two fuels, when burned in the same combustor, were comparable overall, both qualitatively and quantitatively. © 2004 American Chemical Society.

Changes of land use pattern and urban form could be seen as a dynamic result of the trade off by public and private interests. Private interest – individual residents or firms – tries, according to micro economic theory, to maximize their individual utility. Public interests – conveyed by government institutions on different geographical levels - on the other hand, try according to macro economic theories to maximize the general welfare in a community according to the preferences of the political system. The focus is to measure the importance of spatial locations factors regarding new residential and commercial buildings in relation to the existing urban form, political guidelines and ecological features. In the region transportation infrastructure systems, as high speed commuting train and highways, have been implemented in the middle of the period. The time period investigated is 1992-2000. The importances of the location factors were obtained by logistic regression analysis and transformation of the ß -values into elasticities. The dependent variables were settlements of new urban elements in pixels of 50*50 meters. Independent variables where distances to existing urban elements, presence of public interests and some ecological features as south faced hill slopes, distance to water areas and geology. Results from this projects reveals that new urban settlements in general are located in proximity to existing urban settlements of the same kind, in remotness to existing urban focal points and to some extend within planned areas. National/regional transportation nodes do not have any apparent influence on the location. A general conclusion from this investigation is that the built environment develops towards a further dispersed rural spatial pattern though with some correspondence to the comprehensive land use plan.

Part of a symposium on David Rodin's War and Self-Defense (New York: Oxford U Press, 2003) argues the despite some laudable achievements, his rejection of a plausible version of national self-defense fails. His conclusions ultimately do not hold up because of two transitions in his arguments: the move from individual to national self-defense & from the absence of world government to the illegitimacy of self-help. Focus is on liberal arguments for self-defense, whereby self-defense is the protection of vital rights or interests of individuals. Asserting that Rodin is right in rebuffing efforts to reduce self-defense to a collection of individual rights of self-defense, it is suggested that permissibility to kill in a defensive war can be rooted in a richer form of liberalism that he overlooked: self-defense wars are carried out by governments as agents of the citizens. Rodin's two reasons for rejecting the liberal view -- that it is wrong to consider humanitarian intervention & self-defense as having the same underlying rationale & use of force against a bloodless invasion is not warranted -- are countered. While Rodin sees that much of what is deemed self-defense is really law enforcement, he fails to connect the idea to the international system, which, although regulated by laws, lacks a superior authority to enforce them. Rodin asserts that under these circumstances, self-help is never justified, which is seen here as implausible. Further, Rodin's notion of proportionality means a state is not justified to defend against an invader looking to destroy the political system as opposed to the peoples; this is patently rejected. It is concluded that Rodin takes the analogy between individual & national self-defense too seriously. J. Zendejas

Remnant buloke (Allocasuarina luehmannii) woodland and scattered buloke trees appear to provide an important seasonal food resource for the endangered south-eastern red-tailed black-cockatoo (Calyptorhynchus banksii graptogyne). The factors that differed between buloke trees in which the cockatoos fed and those in which they did not feed were investigated in two consecutive years (Season 1 and Season 2). Tree diameter at breast height (DBH), individual mean seed dry mass, individual mean cone dry mass, mean number of seeds per cone, and proportion of total cone mass comprising seeds (seed ratio) were all significantly greater in feeding than non-feeding trees in both Season 1 and Season 2. A predictive model incorporating these five variables correctly classified 83% of trees measured in Season 1 as either feeding or non-feeding trees. Validation of predictive models with new data is essential in evaluating model performance, so the model was used to classify the feeding and non-feeding trees from which the variables were recorded during Season 2. The model, although derived only from the data collected during Season 1, was equally as effective in predicting the feeding status of trees in Season 2, despite the fact that the trees in which the cockatoos fed during the second year were not the same individual trees as those used in the previous year. The differences between feeding and non-feeding trees suggested that cockatoos choose to feed in trees in which they are able to optimise their foraging efficiency. As individual buloke trees appear to vary in their suitability for cockatoo foraging from year to year, it is not possible to exclude any buloke within the range of the cockatoo as a potential future food resource for this endangered bird.

Property markets are considered efficient when the market price of a transacted property equates with its market worth. If this condition holds then identical properties should sell or let for the same price. However, properties are heterogeneous, and information and operational constraints exist. Consequently, events in the transaction process and factors like time on the market, buyer and seller psychology and agent behaviour influence property prices, whereas in a perfectly efficient market they would have no impact. This gives rise to similar units selling for different prices. This paper examines the relationships between commercial property prices and time on the market for property. Tests fail to find evidence of a direct relationship between time on the market and transacted rents, time on the market and asking rents, and asking rents with transacted rents. The reason for the insignificant results could be because landlords would rather offer potential tenants non‐price incentives such as rent‐free periods, rent break clauses, shorter leases or fitting‐out costs to achieve a faster let than discount the agreed contractual rent. A more detailed examination of the physical, location and market conditions that determine the expected time on the market for a property to let is undertaken. Results suggest that the state of the property market is an important influence on the time it takes to let a property, and concurs with the evidence found in housing studies. With the support of our empirical findings and evidence from the housing market, we conclude that including measures of non‐price incentives, landlords' motivation, tenants' characteristics, and search costs in our model may explain the relationship more fully.

This article extends democratic peace research, which has predominantly focused on the absence of war, to the field of internal security cooperation. It argues that the mechanisms suggested by democratic peace research (responsiveness of democratic leaders to public demands, democratic norms and culture, and institutional constraints) can also be applied to the field of internal security cooperation: democratic leaders can be expected to respond to citizens' demands for enhanced internal security and to strive towards international cooperation in internal security. Moreover, democracies tend to form security communities and to define their security in common terms, which also encourages mutual assistance on issues of internal security. At the same time, however, democratic leaders' ability to engage in international cooperation is circumscribed by domestic institutions that safeguard individual rights. In sum, the mechanisms suggested by democratic peace research can capture both the incentives and difficulties of international cooperation on internal security among democratic states. The case of extradition politics, which impacts both on the internal security of states and on standards of individual rights (such as fair trial), serves to illustrate this point: since there is no general obligation for states to extradite fugitives, extradition has traditionally been based on a series of bilateral treaties. Starting in the 1950s, the members of the Council of Europe, all of which are liberal democracies, have negotiated multilateral conventions designed to facilitate extradition among them. The high level of interdependence and trust among the members of the European Union has led to more far-reaching agreements, culminating in a European arrest warrant, which effectively overcomes remaining barriers to extradition. In congruence to the democratic peace perspective, requests from non-democratic states to become part of that regime have been turned down.

This study examines the relationship between racial composition and individual, voluntary turnover for minorities (i.e., Asians, blacks, and Hispanics) in a large organization. We present a critical test for two sets of contrasting predictions. The first draws on similarity attraction, social contact, and social identity theories to suggest that working with racially similar others enhances the work environment in terms of perceived career opportunities, mentoring relationships, and network ties, all of which would increase the likelihood of remaining in an organization. The contrasting predictions draw on group competition and group threat theories and propose that working with racially similar others might increase competition for resources and generate a backlash effect against minorities that would induce their turnover. We suggest the paradox that these two approaches might be compatible if the effect of demographic composition is nonlinear. Our data analyses show that individuals' likelihood of turnover decreases as the proportion of employees in a job from one's own race increases. Furthermore, this relationship is nonlinear: Members of minority groups with very small representation benefited more from the increased presence of their own race than minorities who already had a substantial presence. This finding suggests a potential backlash effect at higher minority proportions. Results also show that turnover decreases as the proportion of employees from one's own race increases in the level above an employee's job. Overall, these findings suggest that working with others of the same race reduces the likelihood of minority exits. Interestingly, the proportion of other minorities in a job has a marginally significant, negative effect on employees' voluntary turnover. Thus, increasing racial diversity from one's own race and other minorities appears to strengthen minority workforce retention.

AbstractThe ongoing programme for reform and reduction of the public service in Uganda relies heavily on the devolution of provision and delivery of most major public services to the lowest appropriate levels (primarily the District Councils1), and therefore local government is becoming a key element in the search for new ways of governance. The rationale is that the overriding problem, as in much of Africa, is poverty and that the most effective way of tackling it is by the empowerment of the people to provide the services that they judge necessary and to decide their own local priorities in the allocation of resources. Whether the experiment succeeds will be determined in large measure by the ability and desire of the Government to ensure that local authorities have access to at least the same levels of resources as the previous service providers. Of equal importance is the capacity and ability of local government to meet the challenge, and this begs the question as to whether professional staff have the experience and competence and whether the elected members have the political skills, probity and integrity for the task. The policies have been well thought‐out and the solutions appear to be capable of implementation, but the 'people factor' will also be critical to success. The present scenario is guardedly encouraging; the devolution programme will probably meet sufficient of its objectives to justify the changes, given continuing donor support, and performance will improve as local authorities gain experience and self‐confidence. For its part, Government will need to resist the temptation to over‐supervise, and intervene only sparingly.
These are large units of administration, with average populations in excess of 500,000.

Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

The Marxists had it right all along, they just got tripped up by their materialism. Early modern capitalism opened vast new worlds, particularly in the arts and sciences, only the traffic went both ways. Creative agents invented new markets and pushed commerce in directions that favored enterprises immensely cosmopolitan and innovative, often solely for the sake of beauty and display. Commerce offered a context but the nobility, and not an imagined bourgeoisie, had the edge when it came to exploiting the market for objets. Paintings could be traded for property, land, and houses. Princes could sponsor natural philosophers, and the fluidity in values meant that good investors, like good practitioners of the arts and sciences, took an interest in all aspects of learning. The interrelatedness of the representational arts and natural philosophy stands as one of the central themes in this tightly integrated collection of essays. We now have a vast historiography telling us that we should no longer teach early modern science without reference to the art of the time, and vice-versa. The point is beautifully illustrated by an exhibition recently held at the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles (spring 2002) on the art of Pieter Saenredam. Working in Utrecht in the 1630s, he used geometry to regularize and make precise the angles and corners found in the exquisite paintings he made of the city's churches. He knew as much about geometry as he did about chiaroscuro. At precisely the same moment, an hour or two away by barge, Descartes in Leiden put the final touches on his Discourse on Method (1637). In effect he explained to the world why precision and clarity of thought made possible the kind of beauty that Saenredam's paintings would come to embody.