Suchergebnisse

Lo sfruttamento delle risorse naturali ha rappresentato la caratteristica principale dello sviluppo economico e del commercio per la maggior parte della storia mondiale. Attualmente, è generalmente accettato che lo sviluppo economico in tutto il mondo sia la causa dell'esaurimento irreversibile delle risorse naturali, del degrado ambientale e della conseguente minaccia per le generazioni future. Ciò costituisce le ragioni chiave e le sfide per ripensare i modelli economici. Le risorse ambientali sono considerate oggi come beni economici e vengono chiamate "capitale naturale". Questo vale in particolare per i mari e gli oceani. I mari e gli oceani coprono più del 70% della superficie terrestre e sono fondamentali per garantire alcuni dei bisogni fondamentali della società. Contengono il 97% di tutta l'acqua del pianeta e sostengono l'80% di tutte le forme di vita. Questi vasti ecosistemi sono tra i più grandi pozzi di carbonio del mondo, producono la metà dell'ossigeno che respiriamo e sono la fonte primaria di proteine per più di 3 miliardi di persone. I mari e gli oceani sono anche il tessuto di una grande industria che solleva questioni di sostenibilità ambientale e sociale. Quest'ultime sono al centro dell'agenda dello sviluppo sostenibile delle Nazioni Unite (ONU) entro il 2030 e non sono compatibili con un sistema incentrato sull'abuso e sullo sfruttamento dell'ambiente. Una gestione efficiente e sostenibile del capitale naturale degli oceani è quindi un obiettivo politico critico per il processo e il progresso economico. Di fatto, la crescente consapevolezza delle intense pressioni che impattano sul degrado ambientale marino ha portato gli organismi di governance stabiliti negli ultimi decenni a definire strumenti e meccanismi che permettano la conservazione e lo sviluppo più sostenibile del vasto capitale naturale che il mare e gli oceani offrono. Proprio in questa fase di ridimensionamento e di transizione verso una nuova economia sostenibile basata sugli ecosistemi marini, emerge il nuovo concetto della "Blue Economy" (BE). La BE ha recentemente guadagnato una notevole attenzione nelle agende politiche e accademiche, in linea con l'espansione della sua rilevanza rispetto ai settori economici tradizionali. Le strategie di implementazione della BE rientrano negli Obiettivi di Sviluppo Sostenibile (SDGs) delle Nazioni Unite, in particolare l'SDG 14 "Life Below Water". L'SDG 14 mira, tra le altre cose, alla prevenzione e ad una riduzione significativa dell'inquinamento marino, alla gestione sostenibile, nonché alla conservazione delle aree e degli ecosistemi marini e costieri, alla minimizzazione e reversione degli impatti dovuti all'acidificazione degli oceani, a far fronte alla pesca eccessiva, illegale e non regolamentata, all'aumento delle conoscenze scientifiche e al trasferimento di tecnologie marine sostenibili. Come tale, incorporato in queste ambizioni piuttosto all'avanguardia è il principio (e la necessità) che assicurare la crescita economica e l'occupazione devono andare di pari passo con l'imperativo della protezione e ripristino degli ambienti naturali e della lotta al cambiamento climatico. La BE permette di generare valore dagli oceani attraverso l'attuazione di pratiche sostenibili e nel rispetto della loro capacità di rigenerazione. Questo implica che l'impatto della produttività economica generata delle attività umane deve necessariamente garantire la salute e la salvaguardia degli oceani nel tempo. Sia i settori consolidati o tradizionali che quelli emergenti e innovativi della BE offrono importanti fonti di sviluppo economico sostenibile. I primi includono e riguardano le risorse marine viventi e non viventi, le attività portuali, la cantieristica navale, il trasporto marittimo e il turismo costiero. I secondi includono l'energia marina rinnovabile, la bioeconomia e le biotecnologie blu, i minerali marini, la desalinizzazione, la difesa, la sicurezza e la sorveglianza marittima, la ricerca e l'istruzione, le infrastrutture e la robotica marina. Questi settori rappresentano un potenziale significativo per la transizione verso una crescita economica sostenibile, e per la creazione di nuovi posti di lavoro. Ad oggi, i settori tradizionali della BE contribuiscono a circa 1,5% del PIL dell'Unione europea a 27 (UE-27) e forniscono circa 4,5 milioni di posti di lavoro diretti, cioè il 2,3% dell'occupazione totale dell'UE-27. Mentre i settori innovativi emergenti, come per esempio le fonti di energia rinnovabile derivata dall'oceano o le biotecnologie blu contribuiscono alla creazione di nuovi mercati e posti di lavoro. Ciò senza contare gli effetti indiretti e indotti sul reddito e l'occupazione. In questo contesto, la presente dissertazione ha due scopi principali. Il primo, quello di presentare lo stato dell'arte sulla BE nel mondo, mettendo in evidenza le sfide, le opportunità, le tendenze e il potenziale per uno sviluppo sostenibile. Il secondo, quello di servire come uno strumento di valutazione solido e in grado di favorire decisioni informate per definire nuove politiche e iniziative pertinenti. La ricerca si è sviluppata nell'ambito del programma di dottorato industriale Eureka, co-finanziato dalla Regione Marche insieme all'ISTAO - Istituto Adriano Olivetti, una tra le più antiche scuole manageriali d'Italia, fondata nel 1967 dall'economista Giorgio Fuà. Il capitolo I della tesi è una revisione della letteratura che colma il gap su come la BE possa rappresentare un modello di sviluppo economico per le istituzioni e le imprese. Lo fa adottando un approccio esplorativo per la raccolta e la revisione di una serie di contributi scientifici da considerare come più significativi e più rilevanti per analizzare come il concetto di BE si lega alla recente letteratura sullo sviluppo economico. Nello specifico, l'approccio esplorativo è stato progettato sulla base di una serie di criteri individuati in conformità con gli obiettivi dell'indagine: 1) inquadrare e valutare lo stato dell'arte sulle politiche e iniziative intraprese a livello globale; 2) rilevare le criticità e le sfide nell'attuazione di tali politiche e iniziative; 3) identificare le implicazioni e suggerimenti a livello di policy. Il capitolo II contribuisce alla letteratura emergente sullo sviluppo di una BE partecipativa presentando un modello innovativo a quadrupla elica. Questo modello non solo mette in collegamento i governi nazionali con il mondo accademico, le imprese e gli utenti, ma agisce anche come un driver che favorisce l'esposizione internazionale del paese in questo specifico settore. Attraverso un approccio esplorativo basato su una ricerca desk integrata da interviste semi-strutturate con otto esperti, il modello è testato a Qingdao, una città all'interno della Blue Economic Zone nella provincia dello Shandong, in Cina. Nel capitolo III, viene analizzata la risposta cinese alla "Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development 2021-2030", il "Decennio del Mare" delle Nazioni Unite. L'analisi di documenti ufficiali di pianificazione strategica rivelano che i leader politici cinesi attribuiscono grande considerazione e importanza agli oceani per la sopravvivenza e lo sviluppo della società umana. Dal lancio del "Decennio del Mare", che rappresenta un'importante risoluzione adottata delle Nazioni Unite per promuovere lo sviluppo sostenibile degli oceani, nonché la più importante iniziativa che eserciterà un impatto di vasta portata sul progresso della scienza e della governance marina globale, varie iniziative sono state intraprese dalla Cina per sostenere il suo impegno basato sulla cooperazione per la protezione ecologica degli oceani. Il capitolo IV conduce un'investigazione sull'industria della cantieristica navale nella Regione Marche. L'importanza del settore nel tessuto industriale regionale, in particolare nella costruzione di superyacht, ha suggerito un approfondimento mirato a valutare in che modo l'industria cantieristica possa rappresentare un driver per lo sviluppo della subfornitura artigianale, altamente qualificata e tecnologicamente avanzata, che l'ecosistema industriale della regione è già in grado di fornire. Nella stesura di questo contributo, realizzato insieme ai colleghi dell'ISTAO per conto della Fondazione Marche, è stato fatto ampio ricorso ai più recenti studi sulla cantieristica navale. È stata poi realizzata un'indagine di approfondimento che ha previsto una serie di interviste semi-strutturate con i vertici dei cantieri regionali e con una campionatura di subfornitori e aziende più rappresentativi, insieme all'incontro con alcuni testimoni privilegiati del settore. ; Natural resource exploitation has been the main feature for economic development and trade for most of global history. At present, it is generally accepted that economic development around the world is leading to the irreversible depletion of natural resources, environmental degradation and consequent threat to future generations, which are key reasons and challenges for rethinking economic patterns. Environmental resources are considered today as economic assets and called "natural capital". This particularly holds true for the seas and oceans. Seas and oceans cover more than 70% of Earth's surface and are critical in ensuring that some of society's most basic needs are met. They hold 97% of all water and sustain 80% of all life forms on the planet. These vast ecosystems are amongst the world's largest carbon sinks, produce half of the oxygen we breathe and are the primary source of proteins for more than 3 billion people worldwide. Seas and oceans are also the fabric of a large industry that raises environmental and social sustainability issues. These are at the heart of the United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development agenda for 2030 which is not compatible with a system focused on abuse and exploitation of the environment. Therefore, an efficient and sustainable management of oceans' natural capital is a critical policy objective for the economic process and progress. The growing awareness of the intense pressures that cause environmental degradation of the natural wealth highlights the need for a sustainable approach. Governance bodies established over the recent decades have defined tools and mechanisms to achieving a more sustainable development allowing the preservation and sustainable uses of the natural capital. At this stage of economy reframing, a new concept of "Blue Economy" (BE) has emerged to foster the shift towards a new, ocean (marine)-based sustainable economy. BE has recently gained considerable policy and scholarly attention, in line with the expansion of its relevance on the political agenda beyond traditional economic sectors. BE implementation strategies are part of the UN's Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), in particular SDG 14 "Life Below Water" which aims, among other things, to prevent and significantly reduce marine pollution, sustainably manage and protect marine and coastal ecosystems, minimize and address the impacts of ocean acidification, regulate harvesting by ending overfishing and illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing, conserve coastal and marine areas, increase scientific knowledge and transfer sustainable marine technologies. As such, embedded is this quite a cutting-edge concept is the principle (and need) that ensuring economic growth and employment must go hand in hand with the imperative of protecting and restoring nature and fighting climate change. BE enables society to obtain value from the oceans and coastal regions, whilst respecting their long-term ability to regenerate and endure such activities through the implementation of sustainable practices. This implies that human activities must be managed in a way that guarantees the health of the oceans and safeguards economic productivity, so that the potential they offer can be realized and sustained over time. Both established and emerging, innovative sectors are part of the BE and offer important sources of sustainable economic development. The former include marine living resources, marine non-living resources, marine renewable energy, port activities, shipbuilding and repair, maritime transport and coastal tourism. The latter include ocean energy (i.e. floating solar energy and offshore hydrogen generation), blue bioeconomy and biotechnology, marine minerals, desalination, maritime defence, security and surveillance, research and education and infrastructure and maritime works (submarine cables, robotics). These sectors offer significant potential for the transition to a sustainable economic growth, as well as for employment creation. For instance, BE traditional sectors contribute to about 1.5% of the European Union-27 GDP and provide about 4.5 million direct jobs, i.e. 2.3% of EU-27 total employment. Emerging innovative BE sectors, such as ocean renewable energy, blue biotechnology, and algae production are adding new markets and creating jobs. This is without counting indirect and induced income and employment effects. Against this backdrop, this dissertation has two purposes. Firstly, it provides a comprehensive overview of the current state of the BE in the world, highlighting challenges, opportunities, trends, and their potential for sustainable development. Secondly, it aims to provide a stocktaking tool based on solid foundation that will enable both policy-makers and stakeholders to make informed decisions to support relevant new initiatives and policies. This dissertation has been developed within the Industrial Ph.D. program Eureka, financed by the Regional Government of the Marche along with ISTAO – The Istituto Adriano Olivetti, one of the oldest managerial schools in Italy which was founded in 1967 by the Economist Giorgio Fuà. Chapter I of the dissertation is a literature review which fills the knowledge gap on how BE can represent an economic development model for institutions and entrepreneurs. It does so by adopting an exploratory approach for the collection and review of a series of scientific contributions to be considered as most significant and most relevant in addressing how the BE discourse is tied up in recent literature on economic development. Specifically, the exploratory approach was designed based on a set of criteria identified in compliance with the objectives of the investigation: 1) frame and evaluate the state of the art with regards to policies and initiatives undertaken at global level; 2) detect critical issues and challenges in the implementation of policies and initiatives; 3) identify policy implications and suggestions. Chapter II contributes to the emerging literature on the development of a participative BE by presenting an innovative Quadruple Helix model, which not only connects domestic government, academia, firms and users but acts as a driver boosting the foreign exposure of the country in this specific domain. The model is tested in Qingdao, an exemplary city included in the Blue Economic Zone of the Shandong Province, in China, through an exploratory approach based on desk research integrated with semi-structured interviews with eight experts. In Chapter III, the Chinese response to the UN's "Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development 2021-2030" is unfolded based on documentary analysis of official planning and strategic documents. The ocean is considered of great significance by Chinese political leaders to the survival and development of human society. Accordingly, since the launch of the "Ocean Decade", which represents an important UN resolution to promote sustainable ocean development as well as the most important initiative in the coming decade that will exert a far-reaching impact on the progress of marine science and global marine governance, various initiatives have been undertaken by China in order to uphold its cooperation-based commitment to the ecological protection of oceans. Chapter IV makes the case for the shipbuilding industry in the Marche Region, in Italy. The importance of the Marche Region in the shipbuilding industry, suggested a more in-depth exploration to understand what impact the positive performance of the sector can have on the regional industrial system and how it could represent a catalyser for the system of highly qualified and technologically advanced supply chain. In writing this contribution, which was carried out together with colleagues from ISTAO on behalf of Fondazione Marche, I had ample recourse to the latest studies on the shipbuilding industry and carried out a survey investigating the sector in depth. Semi-structured interviews with top management of the most representative regional shipyards and a sample of subcontractors and companies were conducted to witness the growth of the industry. The results of the analysis provide interesting insights for policy-making to support the development of the regional shipbuilding industry and supply chain.

I study some economic and institutional drivers of the quality and behaviour of elected politicians. In the first chapter, using a unique database on local politicians in Italian municipalities between 1985 and 1992, I implement a RD analysis to evaluate the causal effect of a wage increase on the characteristics of politicians in local parliamentary systems. I find that higher expected wages attract more educated member of the local council but this positive selection effect actually results in a less educated council-elected mayor. These results are confirmed by other measure of skills (educational attainment and previous occupations). In the second chapter, using the same database, I take advantage of a double discontinuity to identify the causal effect of the switch from single-party to coalition governments. I exploit an identification strategy based on the difference in discontinuities and I highlight an increase in the quality of the elected mayor in term of years of schooling and previous job. Finally, in the third chapter, using Italian MPs micro-data, I study some economic determinants of party discipline. In particular, I study the MPs' behaviour during the XVI, XVII and XVIII legislature focusing on their rebellion rate (i.e. their propensity to vote against their party line) and absenteeism rare by using different estimation methods (OLS, Fractional Logit, Poisson). Our results show that outside income is positive correlated with absences and negative correlated with rebel votes.

This thesis presents empirical evidence on two thematic but related health economics issues for countries in sub-Saharan Africa--a region which trails in many of the world's economic and social indicators. Primarily, investments in human capital--education and health--stimulate opportunities needed for the growth and enhancement of a skilled and healthy labour force. On the one hand, education enables young people to acquire skills to take up high quality jobs and embrace new opportunities needed to boost economic growth. On the other hand, investments in the health systems by way of strengthening and improving the capacities would help address the health needs of children and adults in the region. Subsequently, children can grow into healthy and better adults for whom their contribution to future economic development can be guaranteed. As a result, adverse health shocks in early childhood can have harmful adult consequences particularly in developing countries because of limited mitigating health infrastructures. Improving child health therefore is critical for the development of economies and one potential policy instrument which has been identified is maternal education. However, estimating the effect of maternal education on child health without accounting for the potential endogeneity issues that plague the relationship would not be able to uncover the causal effect. Therefore, the first chapter of the thesis is devoted to estimating the effect of reducing the length of education cycles of mothers on their fertility and children's health by using a comprehensive schooling reform as an instrument for education in Ghana. In 1987, the Ghana government undertook a comprehensive reform in the education sector primarily aimed at addressing the increasing inequities particularly between secondary school and middle school by ensuring that all children of school age had access to higher education. As a consequence, pre-tertiary education duration was reduced from 17 years to 12 years. Specifically, middle school duration was shortened from 4 years to 3 years whereas secondary school duration was shortened from 7 years to 3 years. The argument is that, given the general call to increase female education as a critical policy instrument, could the reduction be detrimental to child health outcomes? Much as maternal education can serve as an instrument to improve child health outcomes, certain exogenous events such as climatic shocks can affect children even before they are born. As such, early life access to nutrition has long-run effects on health and well-being. When exposed to shocks during early life, it affects the fetal programming and consequently lead to undesirable outcomes during adulthood. Thus, the second chapter of the thesis is focused on testing whether extreme heat waves in utero and during early childhood causally affect child health outcomes. The conclusions emanating from the analyses of the two papers are as follows: in the first chapter, I find that focusing on women with equivalent educational attainment/qualification for which the educational reform ultimately affected school cycles' duration, there was a sharp decline in the years of schooling for the affected women. Despite the discontinuous change in schooling induced by the policy, I find that maternal years of schooling (whether basic or secondary) have no effect on fertility and children's low birth weight, and long- and short-term malnutrition. However, there appears to be some evidence of a positive effect in terms of reducing the probability of child mortality for women with basic education. In the second paper, we find negative effects of heat shocks experienced in utero on children's birth and early child health outcomes and potential mitigation strategies in SSA.

La qualità della vita è oggi oggetto di numerose rilevazioni su scala internazionale e nazionale e al centro di vivaci dibattiti a livello politico derivanti dalle crescenti pubblicazioni di classifiche e ranking comparativi tra città e paesi. Nel presente lavoro, dopo una breve rassegna della letteratura che analizza il benessere con approcci sociologici ed economici, si analizzano i posizionamenti del sistema piacentino in termini di qualità della vita a partire dalle annuali rilevazioni effettuate dal Sole 24 Ore sul benessere nelle province italiane.

Si avvicina il momento della transizione della Politica europea della pesca relativa al periodo 2007-2013 gestita secondo le regole del FEP verso le nuove prospettive per il periodo 2014-2020. Sono già noti gli orientamenti che la Commissione intende proporre in tema di obiettivi, assi prioritari, competenze, quadro finanziario per dare nuovi impulsi alla politica comunitaria del settore, attraverso il Fondo Europeo per gli Affari Marittimi e la Pesca (FEAMP). La Commissione a tal fine ha già posto in essere un dibattito con gli stati membri al fine di valutare i programmi compiuti nell'attuazione dei piani strategici sulla base dei risultati intermedi. E' il momento, quindi, di fare una verifica, con particolare riferimento alla Sicilia, non soltanto dei risultati finora conseguiti, ma anche delle logiche o meglio delle strategie del cambiamento che sta emergendo. L'attenzione è rivolta ad esaminare l'esperienza ormai ampiamente vissuta sotto l'egida del FEP, nonché la rispondenza dei nuovi orientamenti alle pressanti esigenze che il settore pone all'attenzione di chi ne ha la responsabilità di governo. Si tratta di affrontare questioni cruciali per evitarne l'ulteriore emarginazione del settore a causa dell'accentuarsi dei problemi occupazionali e dell'aggravarsi delle difficoltà economico finanziarie delle aziende, strette da una morsa costituita dai costi operativi crescenti, da un lato, e da condizioni oggettivamente critiche di sostenibilità ambientale, dall'altro. Si richiedono pertanto orientamenti di politica europea certamente più rispondenti di quelli attuali alle particolari condizioni dell'ambiente mediterraneo e alle "logiche operative" degli imprenditori che occupano l'intera filiera, dall'armamento e la cattura alla distribuzione, trasformazione, commercializzazione, ecc. Il distretto di Mazara del Vallo costituisce un interessante osservatorio per l'intera area mediterranea anche in funzione della sua esperienza di cooperazione con i paesi rivieraschi all'interno di una visione strategica che guarda al Mediterraneo come sistema economico-ambientale ma come luogo ove, attraverso la pesca e le attività collaterali, può sperimentarsi la soluzione del problema della sostenibilità sociale con riferimento all'integrazione culturale e religiosa.

Despite a great deal of studies, the relationship between firm leverage and its impact on growth remains still unclear. We offer an analytical framework, which based on a comprehensive literature review and of related empirical reasoning, helps explaining the long-term leverage and firm growth nexus. Both the theoretical views and empirical evidence are mixed, and the lack of consensus may be the result of inconsistent estimation techniques and of the dual interpretation that firm leverage has. Analysing debt from credit institutions to firms in France, Italy, and Spain, and observed from 2010 to 2016, we bring a selection framework to trial. The comparative perspective seeks the establishment of regularities, while the use of a dynamic quantile panel estimator unravels its heterogeneity. Strong non-linearities are detected, but the selection framework finds no support. On the contrary, only firms in the lowest-growing deciles of the growth distributions benefit consistently from leverage.

In this paper, we investigate the potential benefits of implementing performance- based university research funding systems (PRFSs) in terms of both the quantity and «quality» (i.e. citation impact) of research outputs (measured through the Web of Science database). The Italian experience of the first two Research Evaluation Exercises is examined. We use a difference-in-differences in reverse (DDR) strategy, in which a country where a PRFS was always in place during the period of analysis – the «always treated» country, the UK – is compared with a country that switched from not having to implementing a PRFS – the «switched» country, Italy. Our analysis highlights that PRFSs are associated with an improvement in the average «quality» of research output (percentage of documents cited in the Web of Science database), although they do not positively impact output quantity (number of articles), which actually decreases, or «excellent» outputs (measured as the percentage of top-cited articles). An analysis of heterogeneous effects by scientific discipline shows that the effect on research «quality» concerns all fields except the humanities, with some positive effects on excellent research outputs in most hard sciences. Effects on research quality were not generalised but were observed only for the second research evaluation exercise. Other innovations introduced in the university system (the National Scientific Habilitation) may have partly contributed to this result.

Europe 2020 is the European Union's growth strategy for the coming decade. In a changing world, policy makers want the EU to become a smart, sustainable and inclusive economy. These three mutually reinforcing priorities should help the European Union and the Member States deliver high levels of employment, productivity and social cohesion. The main aim of this paper is to analyze whether those partially new guidelines in regional policies may be beneficial to reduce the Mezzogiorno socio-economic differentials. This question is important for Southern regions after a partial failure highlighted in the new regional policy (NRP) applied in Italy since the 1990s. Procedural utility is introduced in the paper. According to Frey procedural utility means that people not value actual outcomes, i.e. the what but also the conditions and processes that leads to these outcomes. Procedural utility means that people may have preferences about how instrumental outcomes are generated. Procedures require good institutions and their lack in the Italian Southern regions may annul any planned growth strategy giving us insights on some potential drawbacks of these new European regional policies.

Abstract. The article analyses the spatial polarization processes of innovative activities, with particular attention to the United States and Europe, assessing the economic and political effects in the regions left behind. The contribution is part of the research program launched by the essay "The revenge of the Places that don't matter" by Rodriguez-Pose (2018), which has attracted increasing attention. The article proposes a review of the international debate developed on this topic, adding two further elements: first of all, new keys to understanding the causes of spatial polarization processes such as proposed from the approaches of the Knowledge Economy; secondly, the discussion on post-Covid 19 spatial trends, which are reopening a window of opportunity in favour of a territorial rebalancing of location processes. The article also proposes a first review of case studies of "competitive peripheries", i.e. places outside the main metropolitan centres that have nevertheless been able to deploy effective development processes through the combination of endogenous factors and the attraction of external innovative resources.

Il capitolo contiene un esame aggiornato dello stato di avanzamento delle misure relative al fondo strutturale per la pesca nel periodo 2007-2013 (FEP) al fine di valutarne gli effetti su una possibile ripresa economica del settore. Tale analisi, in una fase di quasi completamento del FEP, viene messa in rapporto agli interventi previsti nel nuovo programma per il periodo 2014-2020 (FEAMP) allo scopo di: a) valutare la coerenza e la continuità delle strategie dei fondi strutturali destinati al settore della pesca siciliano in rapporto all'obiettivo di arrestare il declino strutturale del settore; b) individuare i possibili raccordi tra le politiche strutturali della vecchia e nuova programmazione al fine di elaborare un patto di sviluppo maggiormente rispondente alle esigenze manifestate dalle imprese del settore; c) analizzare i processi di aggregazione e gli assetti cooperativi in atto a livello locale nell'ambito del FEP, nonché i possibili scenari in relazione ai nuovi indirizzi del FEAMP nella prospettiva di una maggiore efficacia degli interventi pubblici.

This paper contributes to the debate on institutions and economic development by assessing the relationship between landownership concentration and education in Post-Unification Italy (1871-1921). Using historical data both at a district- and provincelevel, I nd evidence of a negative eect of land inequality on literacy rates. This result is conrmed when a large set of control variables is included in the analysis. IV estimates using the presence of malaria as a source of exogenous variation rule out further concerns regarding the presence of potential endogeneity. Further evidence is provided once I explore the panel dimension of the dataset. In addition, by analysing the impact on intermediate outputs such as enrolment rates in primary school, child-teacher ratio, school density, child labor and municipality expenditures, this paper provides insights on the mechanism behind this relationship. Land inequality may have adversely aected literacy rates not only by influencing the supply of schooling through the political process, but also through the private demand for education.

f innovation on firms' economic performance pinpointing complementarities between product and marketing innovation during the period 1998-2008. Firms' profitability and productivity are simultaneously estimated, thus allowing for consistent and robust estimates of the relationship being tested. The conceptual framework in which we have developed the analysis bridges the gap between the management (organization) approach, from which we grasp the notion of a firm's market orientation to innovation, and the economics of innovation perspective. The results show that being a persistent product-innovating and marketoriented firm significantly affects profitability, although the estimated impact is relatively mild. The gain in productivity determined by investing in R&D is relatively small and in line with the corresponding gain attributable to investing in marketing and organizational innovations. Conversely, capital deepening— as measured by the capital-labor ratio—exerts a larger impact on productivity, thus underlining how knowledge capital plays a less relevant role. This result emphasizes a crucial weakness of Italian manufacturing firms, because knowledge investment is the key to future economic growth. The estimates we have presented cover a sufficiently long time interval, thus enabling us to perform different robustness tests.

This thesis is an empirical analysis of the effects of relaxing land use regulation on the housing market and local economic activity. The existence of a political cycle and a term-limit effect on the issue of building permits to benefit voters is also investigated. The first chapter provides quasi-experimental evidence on the effects of a relaxation of land use constraints on the housing market and local economic activity. I exploit the fact that in 1999 the central government imposed fiscal rules on municipal governments and in 2001 relaxed them for municipalities below 5,000 inhabitants. I find that municipalities rely on urban revenues they collect from releasing building permits to avoid fiscal distress and finance current expenditure. The rise of building permits is concentrated in the non-residential market and has represented de facto a reduction of entry barriers. As downstream effects, I find an increase of employment and firms' entry. This second chapter provides evidence on the existence of an opportunistic electoral cycle in the issue of building permits at the local level in Italy from 1995 to 2014, using monthly data for the universe of municipalities. Mayors tend to exert pressure on administrative offices to ease or speed-up the release of permits, an outcome which is more controllable and targetable than fiscal ones. A within-term analyses shows the absence of cycle in the last-term, since the lack of incentive for the incumbents that cannot run for re-election: this allows to exclude any reputation incentive. The political cycle is significant for cities below 15,000 inhabitants and it is visible both in the northern and southern regions.

Executive summary The Lancet Countdown is an international collaboration that independently monitors the health consequences of a changing climate. Publishing updated, new, and improved indicators each year, the Lancet Countdown represents the consensus of leading researchers from 43 academic institutions and UN agencies. The 44 indicators of this report expose an unabated rise in the health impacts of climate change and the current health consequences of the delayed and inconsistent response of countries around the globe—providing a clear imperative for accelerated action that puts the health of people and planet above all else. The 2021 report coincides with the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change 26th Conference of the Parties (COP26), at which countries are facing pressure to realise the ambition of the Paris Agreement to keep the global average temperature rise to 1·5°C and to mobilise the financial resources required for all countries to have an effective climate response. These negotiations unfold in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic—a global health crisis that has claimed millions of lives, affected livelihoods and communities around the globe, and exposed deep fissures and inequities in the world's capacity to cope with, and respond to, health emergencies. Yet, in its response to both crises, the world is faced with an unprecedented opportunity to ensure a healthy future for all. Deepening inequities in a warming world Record temperatures in 2020 resulted in a new high of 3·1 billion more person-days of heatwave exposure among people older than 65 years and 626 million more person-days affecting children younger than 1 year, compared with the annual average for the 1986–2005 baseline (indicator 1.1.2). Looking to 2021, people older than 65 years or younger than 1 year, along with people facing social disadvantages, were the most affected by the record-breaking temperatures of over 40°C in the Pacific Northwest areas of the USA and Canada in June, 2021— an event that would have been almost ...

The development strategies being promoted in the EU – Europe 2020 and the 2014-2020 Cohesion Policy – aim to supersede the presumed incompatibility between efficiency and equity through a policy approach tailoring interventions to the key specificities of all territories, including the most disadvantaged. In this view, the socio-economic progress of lagging regions would help keeping under control any increase in inequalities potentially associated with the economic development process. However, the idea of promoting spatially-targeted interventions in economically backward areas has been conceptually questioned, and the effectiveness of the Cohesion Policy programme in poorer regions is yet to be convincingly proven. In the policy framework underpinning EU strategies, a key role is assigned to the quality of regional and local government institutions. Public institutions are conceived as instrumental for identifying and solving the bottlenecks inhibiting economic growth and perpetuating social exclusion in poorer places. Nevertheless, local governments may also be responsible for wastes and misallocations of financial resources. While theoretical contributions on the importance of government institutions for regional and local development abound, empirical evidence on their functioning is scarce. Through which mechanisms they influence the design and outcomes of public policies is unclear. Drawing from cross-country investigations and case-studies in the European context, the four quantitative studies composing this Thesis contribute to shed light on these related issues. Focusing on the United Kingdom, the first paper evaluates the economic and labour market impact of EU Cohesion Policy. Counterfactual analyses demonstrate that EU regional policies may have a beneficial impact on the labour market and growth path of peripheral regions. The study warns over possible negative repercussions of a discontinuation of EU financial support to poorer areas, a result of obvious relevance for the country after 'Brexit'. By exploiting panel samples of EU regions, the second and third papers shed light on the role of government institutions for the returns of regional investments and for labour market and social conditions in Europe. The second paper examines the link between institutional quality, transport infrastructure investments, and economic growth. It shows that improvements in secondary (local) roads are conducive to a better economic performance only in presence of sound regional governments. The third paper investigates the extent to which the factors at the centre of European growth strategies – institutions, innovation, human capital and transport infrastructure – contribute to the generation of employment and to social inclusion in EU regions. The evidence produced suggests that regional government institutions have been essential to mitigate social exclusion issues in EU regions. The fourth paper focuses on Southern Italy to examine how public finances are distorted by 'local governments captures' operated by organised crime. Collusions between mafia and local politics have a significant impact on the selection of investments and on the collection of fiscal revenues. The local policy agenda is modified to the advantage of the interests of organised crime. Overall, the evidence emerging from this Thesis suggests that policy interventions have the potential to boost the economic and labour market performance of the less developed EU regions. However, any favourable policy outcome (both in terms of efficiency and equity) is conditioned by the competence and the goodwill of government institutions responsible for defining development targets and enforcing investment plans. When politicians are conditioned by illegal pressures from criminal groups, investment decisions follow special interests rather than general welfare goals. In turn, inadequate governance harms the economic impact of selected interventions. The results are particularly relevant for the lively debate, within economic geography, on the pre-conditions and policy measures enabling 'smart and inclusive' development at the sub-national level.