Suchergebnisse

Local communities and governments are taking various steps to fight the so-called "digital divide" between well served urban communities and undeserved areas. In order to make broadband access available to these under served areas, several technical solutions are available with the capacity to provide high speed Internet access, video, telephony services, etc. This paper presents a cost-model and a tool for the evaluation of broadband access technologies (xDSL, HFC, FTTx, WiMAX, PLC and satellite), and compares two technologies: FTTx and WiMAX. Our tool compares these different access technologies in different scenarios, and examining the capital expense and deployment of building access networks with the same requisite performance using each technology. The cost model is limited to the access part of the network. The results obtained by our evaluation tool give the possibility to compare several BB access technologies, and support the decision about which is the better technological solution for a given scenario.

Com mais de 75 anos de história, o Banco Mundial tem evidenciado notável capacidade de crescer de maneira incremental, adaptando-se às mudanças da economia política internacional. Este artigo analisa a construção do Banco Mundial como ator político, intelectual e financeiro do desenvolvimento capitalista internacional, discutindo as formas pelas quais se deu essa construção, que meios principais foram utilizados, que contradições ele enfrentou e a quais pressões e interesses respondeu. A despeito da fachada técnica, o Banco sempre atuou, ainda que de diferentes formas, na interface dos campos político, econômico e intelectual, em função da sua condição singular de emprestador, formulador de políticas e indutor de ideias e prescrições sobre o que fazer em matéria de desenvolvimento capitalista. Nessa trajetória sinuosa, mas ascendente, o Banco assumiu um lugar central entre as demais agências de desenvolvimento nascidas após a Segunda Guerra Mundial. O texto se baseia em documentação primária e vasta bibliografia. O argumento central é o de que o Banco Mundial somente se consolida como agência de desenvolvimento com a gestão de McNamara (1968-81).

O artigo discute a agenda educacional do Banco Mundial em perspectiva histórica, questionando se ela sofreu alguma mudança devido à eclosão da contaminação pelo novo coronavírus (Sars-cov2) em escala global, responsável pela pandemia da doença denominada Covid-19. Com base na documentação da própria instituição e tomando como referência o caso brasileiro, argumenta-se que não houve mudança no seu caráter neoliberal, vigente desde a década de 1980. Ao mesmo tempo em que o Banco apoia as medidas de urgência tomadas pelos governos dos países em desenvolvimento (clientes da instituição) para amenizar os impactos da pandemia – o que necessariamente leva ao aumento do gasto público –, a instituição continua a condicionar a liberação de recursos em troca da adoção de políticas neoliberais, além de manter a primazia normativa do ajuste fiscal como base da ação dos governos desses países no pós-pandemia. Inicialmente, o artigo apresenta e problematiza as diferentes atividades realizadas pelo Banco (concessão de empréstimos, aconselhamento, assistência técnica,advocacyem favor de determinadas pautas, articulação de iniciativas multilaterais e pesquisa econômica). A seguir, analisa a evolução histórica da agenda educacional da instituição, à luz do seu programa político mais geral. Por fim, discute a atuação do Banco na educação brasileira, com base em um exame da carteira de empréstimos e em documentos estratégicos da entidade para o país, que abrangem o período 2017-20, aos quais a sua agenda educacional está subordinada. ; This article discusses the educational agenda of the World Bank from a historical perspective, asking whether it has undergone any changes due to the outbreak of contamination on a global scale caused by the new coronavirus (Sars-cov2), responsible for the Covid-19 pandemic. Based on the institution's documentation and taking as a reference the Brazilian case, it is argued that no change has occurred in its neoliberal nature, in force since the 1980s. At the same time that the Bank supported the measures of urgency adopted by governments of developing countries (clients of the institution) to soften the impacts of the pandemic – which necessarily results in an increase in public expenditure –, the institution continues to condition the release of funds on the adoption of neoliberal policies, as well as maintaining the normative primacy of the fiscal adjustment as the basis of action for governments of these countries in the post-pandemic period. Initially, the article presents and problematizes the different activities carried out by the Bank (the granting of loans, advice, technical assistance, advocacy in favor of determined agenda, the linking of multilateral initiatives and economic research). Following this, it analyzes the historical evolution of the educational agenda of the institution, in light of its more general political program. Finally, it discusses the action of the Bank in Brazilian education, based on an examination of the organization's loan portfolio and strategic documents for Brazil, covering the period 2017-20, to which its educational agenda was subordinated.

Dissertação de Mestrado Integrado em Engenharia Mecânica apresentada à Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia ; Across the European Union, in almost every household, an equipment to provide domestic hot water and/or space heating is installed. These equipment's consume a large portion of the energy that is used in the EU. Since the energy sector is one of the biggest contributors to the worsening of the global climate conditions, it is necessary to find more efficient and clean solutions.The objectives of this master's thesis fall into two distinct, yet intrinsically related areas. The first objective was to determine which technologies are currently used in the EU to provide domestic hot water and/or space heating, compare them, and determine which is best. This comparison considered economic factors, performance indicators, inputs and outputs. The second objective is related to the comparison of technologies, since energetic and exergetic analyses were made to the best technology, the boiler, and its most threatening technology, the ORC micro-CHP systems. Within the ORC micro-CHP systems, several variants of this technology were analyzed to determine which is the most suitable for domestic hot water production.Content wise, this document is also divided into two parts. The first part consists of a state of the art of the technologies currently installed in the EU to ensure hot water and/or space heating residential needs. This state of the art includes the characterization of the current energetic scenario in terms of heating needs in the EU, the identification of the main technologies installed, a characterization of each of these technologies (including a SWOT analysis of each one), a direct comparison between all the technologies and finally an evaluation of the capacity of each technology to directly replace the most installed technology (non-condensing boiler). In the second part of this master thesis, energetic and exergetic analyses were performed for four configurations. The first configuration is the ...

ABSTRACTThis article analyses the actions of the World Bank between 1968 and 1981, under the presidency of Robert McNamara, in the context of the Cold War and the directions of US foreign aid policy. It discusses the reasons for, and the means by which the World Bank led, the 'assault on poverty', with an emphasis on rural poverty. It problematizes the theory which supported this initiative, analysing its operationalization in the countryside; it discusses the principal format that it assumed, the reasons which propelled it, the political calculation which guided it, the interests at play, and the results that were reached. Finally, the article argues that the 'assault on poverty' slogan expresses the disposition and the willingness of the World Bank to intervene in domestic questions, aiming to alter, in a selective and focused manner, the condition of particular social groups in client countries, rather than improving the general conditions of economies. This in turn demanded the strengthening of its advisory, technical assistance and economic research functions. If McNamara's policy of fighting poverty can be considered a failure in economic and social terms (a diagnosis widely accepted in the literature), this article argues that, politically, it was successful by constructing the foundations for the neoliberal‐type focused social policies that were in vogue in the following decades.

RésuméLes auteurs recherchent les déterminants des écarts salariaux au sein de l'Union européenne selon la position dans la distribution des salaires, suivant en cela la méthode proposée par Firpo, Fortin et Lemieux (2009) et par Fortin, Lemieux et Firpo (2011). Ils expliquent ces écarts à la fois par un effet de composition et par un effet de structure. Ce dernier effet, plus puissant, dépend surtout des facteurs non observés, alors que l'effet de composition peut ětre attribué principalement au niveau de diplôme, à la profession, à la fréquence des fonctions d'encadrement et, dans une moindre mesure, au secteur d'activité.