Detection of copy-move forgery using a method based on blur moment invariants

In our society digital images are a powerful and widely used communication medium. They have an important impact on our life. In recent years, due to the advent of high-performance commodity hardware and improved human-computer interfaces, it has become relatively easy to create fake images. Modern, easy to use image processing software enables forgeries that are undetectable by the naked eye. In this work we propose a method to automatically detect and localize duplicated regions in digital images. The presence of duplicated regions in an image may signify a common type of forgery called copy-move forgery. The method is based on blur moment invariants, which allows successful detection of copy-move forgery, even when blur degradation, additional noise, or arbitrary contrast changes are present in the duplicated regions. These modifications are commonly used techniques to conceal traces of copy-move forgery. Our method works equally well for lossy format such as JPEG. We demonstrate our method on several images affected by copy-move forgery.     

Sovereign Commitment and Property Rights: the Case of Ukraine’s Orange Revolution

Conventional wisdom in new institutional economics suggests that property rights become more secure following sovereign commitment. The article tests this axiom in the crucial case of the 2004 Orange Revolution in Ukraine. I show that despite the wide-ranging constraints imposed after the Revolution on the upper executive, the security of property rights declined. Theoretically, the article argues that the link between sovereign commitment and secure ownership hinges on vertical accountability in the state apparatus. While institutionalizing commitment by the presidency, the Revolution simultaneously exacerbated principal-agent dilemmas within the bureaucracy. Methodologically, the article contributes by triangulating available historical narratives and cross-national quantitative studies. Instead, the focus on one contemporary developing country and the use of qualitative process tracing dissects sovereign commitment and shows the mechanisms through which it can be subverted at lower administrative levels. Sixty-four semi-structured interviews with entrepreneurs and government officials from six Ukrainian regions, as well as analysis of the local media, provide the data.     

Citizen-candidate mobility and endogenous local policy

In this paper we analyze the influence of personal mobility on the citizens’ willingness to run for a political office in their municipality and on the resulting local policy outcome. Our model portrays heterogeneous policy preferences that are coupled with different exogenous degrees of interjurisdictional mobility. We show that an increase in mobility can be liable to shift the policy outcome towards the preferred policy of the less mobile citizens. We thus identify an endogenous policy response to personal mobility diametrically opposed to the tax competition effect that has hitherto dominated the discussion of the political consequences of personal mobility.     

A conservative convergence? The differences and similarities of the conservative right in the Czech Republic and Poland

This paper compares and contrasts the conservative right in both the Czech Republic and Poland in its historical and contemporary contexts. It argues that the conservative right is strong in both these countries and that they share many similar political features. However, there are also numerous differences between the conservative right in these nations. The reasons for these dissimilarities can be found in the relative historical social-economic development of the Czech Republic compared with Poland. Related to this is the fact that Czech society is a largely secular one, while the Catholic Church retains a strong social position in Poland. However, the paper also argues that it is possible to observe a convergence between the secular and religious forms of conservatism existent in the Czech Republic and Poland and that this is most evident at the level of European Union politics.