Suchergebnisse

This thesis focuses on the study of the Irish festival of Bealtaine and a comparison with its English and British equivalent, i.e. May Day. Using a thorough comparative analysis of popular proverbs, sayings and folklore accounts written in the first parts of the 20th century by both Irish-speaking and English-speaking farmers, I successfully proved that the dichotomy between the Irish-speaking and English-speaking parts of the country mirrored a dichotomy in the origins of the May traditions in Ireland –when popular theory held that Bealtaine and May Day were in fact two names connected to the same celebration. The two languages therefore echo the history and culture of the British Isles. ; Nous étudions les diverses représentations de la fête du premier mai, dite fête de Beltaine (ou Bealtaine), en Irlande et en Grande-Bretagne à travers les âges (folklore et culture populaire des XIXe-XXIe siècles, fête du Moyen-Age, origines a priori celtiques) afin de comprendre sa symbolique et ses implications sociales, politico-religieuses et identitaires.

This paper explores what is known about the actual impact of the EU on sub-national (local and regional) government. Existing research on the impact of the EU on sub-national authorities appears to have a strong emphasis on the positive effects or the opportunities that emanate from the EU. By contrast, studies on European constraints that limit sub-national autonomy are rather scarce. Moreover, many studies fail to take sub-national government itself as the object of analysis, as a result of which most conclusions are rather hypothetical in nature. Trying to fill the lacunas in the existing literature, the authors present a conceptual framework that includes three dimensions along which the EU might influence sub-national decision-making: by enforcement or invitation, by hampering or improvement, and by obstruction or enabling. A pilot study found that nearly each of these types of influence was present, indicating the conceptual sensitivity and empirical relevance of the three dimensions. © 2006 Taylor & Francis.

We study the problem of a policymaker who seeks to set policy optimally in an economy where the true economic structure is unobserved, and policymakers optimally learn from their observations of the economy. This is a classic problem of learning and control, variants of which have been studied in the past, but little with forward-looking variables which are a key component of modern policy-relevant models. As in most Bayesian learning problems, the optimal policy typically includes an experimentation component reflecting the endogeneity of information. We develop algorithms to solve numerically for the Bayesian optimal policy (BOP). However the BOP is only feasible in relatively small models, and thus we also consider a simpler specification we term adaptive optimal policy (AOP) which allows policymakers to update their beliefs but shortcuts the experimentation motive. In our setting, the AOP is significantly easier to compute, and in many cases provides a good approximation to the BOP. We provide a simple example to illustrate the role of learning and experimentation in an MJLQ framework. JEL Classification: E42, E52, E58

The main purpose of the paper is to explain the divergent paths of development of ethno-territorial protest movements in modern democratic political systems. By focusing on the interaction between these movements and the state, the different systems of accommodation between the relevant regional and central elites will be analyzed. The study concentrates on the case studies of Québec (Canada) and Corsica (France). The paper is divided into three parts. The first part describes the traditional systems of accommodation in France and Canada. The second part is focused on the process of socio-economic modernization in the 1950s and 1960s in those countries that threatened the established patterns of elite accommodation. The third part deals with the consequences for the established patterns of elite-accommodation and new concepts of territorial management that the central states tried to establish. By looking at the different degrees of centralization and decentralization in the mentioned political systems, the question of access to the political system by new social and political actors will be discussed in detail.

What factors shape environmental policies across Europe? In order to answer this question most economists would probably adopt a Public Choice approach. This approach has explained some aspects of environmental policies that exist in a similar fashion across Europe convincingly. But why do many environmental policies differ across European countries? This article argues that in order to understand differences in environmental policies in Europe North's analysis on institutions and institutional change is useful. It demonstrates the relevance of North's approach with a case study: the implementation of the EU's Eco- Management and Audit Scheme in Germany, the Netherlands and the UK. The starting point of the analysis is the observation that participation of companies in the scheme markedly differs between countries. It is shown that in order to understand these differences it is necessary to take into account some key concepts of North's institutional analysis, namely, differences in informal institutions, incomplete information of relevant actors, and path dependence. Recommendations for further research and for environmental policy are derived.

Resource curse theory claims that resource abundance encourages violent conflict. A study of 37 oil-producing developing countries, however, reveals that oil states with very high levels of oil revenue are remarkably stable. An analysis of the ways in which governments spend oil revenues identifies two distinct types of rentier systems - the large-scale distributive state and the patronage-based system - which are strongly linked to instability or its absence. However, some deviant cases, such as Equatorial Guinea and Gabon, illustrate the need for further research. Apparently, the notion of a 'paradox of plenty' has neglected rentier mechanisms that avoid conflict. ; Die Theorie des Ressourcenfluchs behauptet, dass Ressourcenreichtum gewaltsame Konflikte begünstigt. Eine Untersuchung von 37 ölproduzierenden Entwicklungsländern zeigt hingegen, dass Länder mit sehr hohen Ölerlösen bemerkenswert stabil sind. Die Analyse der Art und Weise wie Ölstaaten Ressourcenerlöse verwenden, führt zur Bildung zweier distinkter Typen von Rentierstaaten - dem Distributionstyp gegenüber dem Patronage-Typ -, die eine starke Korrelation mit politischer Instabilität oder deren Abwesenheit aufweisen. Einige abweichende Fälle, wie anhand der Fallstudien Äquatorial-Guinea und Gabun gezeigt werden kann, weisen aber auf die Notwendigkeit zukünftiger Forschung hin. Offenbar hat die Forschung zum 'Paradox of Plenty' und 'Ressourcenfluch' Rentiermechanismen vernachlässigt, die gewaltsame Konflikte verhindern können.

Although the European Union prefers and supports mostly railways in terms of transport investments, the public road network – with a special regard to motorways – is rather underdeveloped in Hungary. Motorway construction has recovered after the change of regime. It is important not only to simply construct motorways but to work on the improvement of accessibility by validating the aspects of regional development, and thus the amounts invested have much more benefits. This view has been gaining ground mainly in the past period in Hungary. This paper analyses the accessibility conditions in 2005 by applying geographical information science methods, and examines if a favourable accessibility implies clearly a favourable level of development. The study also analyses which areas need new transport investments taking into consideration the circumstances of accessibility in 2005. By comparing the level of economic development and accessibility, the article seeks to answer at last how much favourable basis the present economic situation is for new public road investments.

In this study, we analyse the sustainability of fiscal policy of EU member countries within the panel cointegration and error-correction frameworks. Unlike the previous empirical papers in this area, we apply the test for panel cointegration between the primary budget deficit and the public debt defined in GDP ratios. Based on the cointegration test results, we conclude that the fiscal policy is consistent with the intertemporal budget constraint, i.e., it is sustainable in the panel of fifteen EU member countries over the period from 1970 to 2004. Hence, we show that the fiscal balance exhibits a significant structural change in the year 1992, when we apply the Banerjee and Carrion-i-Silvestre (2006) test for a structural break in the panel cointegration relationship. In a next step, we search for the politico-economic factors which explain the variation in the sustainable fiscal balance among the European countries. We evidence that the European fiscal rules have a significant positive effect on the improvement of the fiscal position of the governments of the EU member countries.

National identity and citizenship are the most significant phenomena in the context of European integration. The text of this article reveals the main components of these two concepts and describes social, political, cultural and historical factors which influence the formation and the expression of citizenship and national identity The theoretical background and empirical study of pupils at the age of 17 provide the opportunity to analyse the relationship between civic attitudes and national identity, to characterise the main differences of perception of these phenomena among the ethnic groups of Lithuanian, Russian and Polish pupils. ; Svarstant tautinio tapatumo ir pilietiškumo reikšmę besikuriančios vieningos Europos kontekste svarbu ne tik apibūdinti juos kuriančius ir palaikančius socialinius, kultūrinius ir istorinius veiksnius ar kylančias išorines bei vidines grėsmes, bet ir apibūdinti kiekybinius bei kokybinius jų parametrus. Remiantis teorinėmis prieigomis ir atliktu moksleivių empiriniu tyrimu analizuojamas tautinio tapatumo ir pilietiškumo ryšys, atskleidžiamas skirtingas tautinio tapatumo ir pilietiškumo suvokimo ir raiškos lygmuo lietuvių, rusų ir lenkų moksleivių grupėse.

The focus of this paper is the impact of fiscal policies on international migration flows. The Tiebout hypothesis proposes that individuals consider differences in tax rates and social spending when making migration decisions. While evidence of the Tiebout hypothesis has been found in several domestic U.S. and Canadian studies, this is the first paper to test the Tiebout hypothesis using bilateral international migration flows. The Maastricht treaty has created a unique opportunity to study migration in an international context by removing legal barriers to migration within the European Union. Using data from EU countries throughout the 1980s and 1990s, this paper finds significant statistical support for the Tiebout hypothesis with regards to international migration flows. These results suggest that achieving greater fiscal harmonization across countries would lower migration flows. The results also imply that EU countries which are resistant to achieving fiscal harmonization with members may, as a result, have problems in attaining their other goal of reducing immigration (inward) from these countries. ; info:eu-repo/semantics/published

The advantages and disadvantages of public sector decentralization are widely discussedin economics and political science. While some authors argue that decentralization leads to an optimal provision of public services and a promotion of economic growth, others emphasize the dangers of competition associated with decentralization between subnational governments especially for redistributive reasons. These authors argue that poorer regions could not compete for mobile factors with the richer ones and, therefore, poor regions would get poorer and rich regions richer. This paper studies empirically the impact of fiscal decentralization on regional disparities using panel data for 17 OECD countries from 1980 to 2001. As the measurement of decentralization and regional disparity is one of the main difficulties of this research, both are discussed extensively and different measurement concepts are elaborated. The findings of this study are that a high degree of decentralization is connected with low regional disparities. Hence, poor regions have no disadvantages from decentralization, quite the contrary.

Este artículo consiste en un estudio de legislación comparada de cinco países latinoamericanos. Compara legislaciones acerca del tema del derecho de acceso a la información pública gubernamental, el ejercicio de ese derecho y las limitaciones que la ley le impone. Además, la autora analiza los modos de que dispone el ciudadano para controlar el contenido la información a él referida, así como su revelación a otras personas, cuando los datos personales forman parte de bases de datos públicas o privadas. / This chapter consists in an study of compared legislation among five latinamerican countries. It compares legislations about the subject of the right to access to the gubernamental public information, the execution of this right and the limitations that the law imposes. Besides, the author analyzes the ways that a citizen disposes in order to control the content of information that refers to him, thus as the revelation to other persons, when personal data form part of basis of public or private data.

Автор на основе исследования оборонно-промышленного комплекса обосновывает вывод, что доминирование в нем государственной собственности способствует тому, что они попадают в институциональную ловушку неэффективного собственника и неэффективного менеджера. Предлагается в качестве комплексного инструмента ее исследования «Матрица исследования институциональных ловушек», использование которой позволяет выявить основные особенности институциональных ловушек, что способствует осознанному проведению институциональных трансформаций общества. ; It is stressed that to solve these problems it is necessary to take measures to reduce the cost of raw materials to stimulate the reduction of grain products prices. The situation with ownership and management in the military-industrial complex has been studied. The results of the analysis show that domination of government property contributes to the presence of an institutional trap for inefficient owners and managers in this sphere. The author suggests «The matrix for institutional traps studies» to be used as an instrument for complex investigations of this phenomena. The objective of the study is to find out the main peculiarities of institutional traps in order to achieve sensible institutional transformations in the society.

This paper examines the role of historical preservation in spatial restructurings of postindustrial cities, through a detailed case study of Xintiandi, a preservation-based redevelopment project in inner city Shanghai. At Xintiandi, two blocks of Shikumen houses, a Shanghainese tenement built by Western landlords for Chinese tenants in the colonial period, are turned into a chic entertainment quarter by international developers and architectural firms, with support from local governments. The history of Shikumen as dwellings of lower-middle-class tenants for most part of the twentieth century is carefully erased. Instead, by emphasizing Shikumen's international linkages, such as its Western-influenced architectural features, the private-public coalition has repackaged Shikumen into a symbol of Shanghai's cosmopolitan colonial past, and used it to project an even brighter global future. The paper argues that historical preservation in post-industrial Shanghai serves the same development goal of urban growth, and in the process, historical elements in the built environment are selectively recycled and inserted in the newly created transnational space.

This paper seeks to analyze the prospects for development in a changed international context, where globalization has diminished the policy space so essential for countries that are latecomers to development. The main theme is that, to use the available policy space for development, it is necessary to redesign strategies by introducing correctives and to rethink development by incorporating different perspectives, if development is to bring about an improvement in the well-being of people. In redesigning strategies, some obvious correctives emerge from an understanding of theory and a study of experience that recognizes not only the diversity but also the complexity of development. In rethinking development, it is imperative to recognize the importance of initial conditions, the significance of institutions, the relevance of politics in economics and the critical role of good governance. Even if difficult, there is also a clear need to create more policy space for national development, by reshaping the rules of the game in the world economy and contemplating some governance of globalization. – globalization ; development ; policy space ; initial conditions ; institutions ; markets ; state ; democracy ; governance