The effect of board size and composition on European bank performance

Banks are “special” financial institutions generating distinct corporate governance challenges. The present paper examines the relationship between two of the most pertinent corporate governance factors—that is, the size of the Board of Directors and the proportion of non-executive directors—and firm performance on a sample of 58 large European banks over the period 2002–2004. The empirical analysis embraces a number of bank-specific variables. Our results reveal that bank profitability is negatively related to the size of the Board of Directors, while the impact of Board composition, although positive in all models, is, in most cases, insignificant. The results are robust after controlling for firm-specific variables.      

Zum Regelungsumfang des Art 16 Z 2 LGVÜ/Art 22 Z 2 EuGVVO

Klagen gegen einen internationalen Sportverband, die auf Feststellung der Unwirksamkeit einer Sperre eines bei einem nationalen Sportverband besch?ftigten Trainers von Wettbewerben dieses Sportverbandes und auf Unterlassung von Handlungen, die eine Akkreditierung verhindern bzw erschweren, gerichtet sind, unterliegen der ausschlie?lichen inl?ndischen Gerichtsbarkeit des Sitzstaates; eine Verbindung solcher Klagen mit einer gegen den nationalen Verband gerichteten gleichartigen Klage ist daher unzul?ssig. – Eine damit zusammenh?ngende Schadenersatzklage gegen den internationalen Verband steht auch nicht in dem von Art 6 Nr 1 LGVü geforderten Zusammenhang mit einer Klage gegen den nationalen Verband wegen Aufl?sung des Trainervertrages aufgrund der Sperre.     

Anticorruption agencies: expressive,constructivist and strategic uses

This article explores the reasons for the introduction of anticorruption agencies of a specific type in Eastern Europe. It is argued that one of the important functions of these agencies—which are stronger on information gathering, coordination and strategy rather than on investigation of concrete cases—is to give to the government some leverage over the anticorruption discourse. Presenting the anticorruption commissions and agencies as (discourse-controlling) instruments gives an answer to the troubling question why governing parties are at all interested in the introduction of such bodies. Apart from instrumentalization in political discourse, anticorruption bodies in Eastern Europe have had other effects as well. As shown in the Baltic case, institutional engineering provides for a brief window of opportunity during which political forces committed to integrity could gain the upper hand. The problem in Eastern Europe, however, is not the lack of such windows of opportunities—it is more the lack of really committed political forces capable of continuous and consistent anticorruption effort.     

Can college courses in prison cut crime after release? A review of follow-up studies of prison higher education and recidivism

This paper discusses empirical findings and theories about prison higher education and recidivism. The research designs of available evaluations of prison higher education are discussed. Their results in regard to arrest and return to prison after release are presented in tables and figures. Both opportunity theory and moral development theory have been used to justify such prison programs as crime prevention measures. A critical examination of the actual findings of the evaluations carried out up to now suggests that prison higher education may have had only a slight impact on recidivism. One could, therefore, doubt the value of opportunity theory and moral development theory to justify prison higher education as a crime control measure. However, the methods used in the evaluations of this program have been generally weak. Thus, there is a continuing need to carry out well-designed research on this question. The findings of follow-up studies of prison higher education have significance for issues of correctional education policy as well as criminological theory.     

Quantitative analysis of chlorpromazine by electron spin resonance (ESR) spectroscopy

A simple and sensitive method is described for quantitative analysis of chlorpromazine in blood, serum, urine and tissue homogenate. The chlorpromazine cation radical produced by adding perchloric acid and 2,3-dichloro-5,6-dicyano-p-benzoquinone to the sample can be detected by the ESR method at room temperature. The sensitivity limit is 10 ng, that is, 20 μl of the solution containing 0.5 μg chlorpromazine/ml. The time needed for the measurement is within 10 min. The chlorpromazine radical thus produced is very stable; for example, 95% of the radical was observed after 24 h. The advantage of this method is discussed by comparing with the ordinary spectrophotometry which requires the purification of the sample.     

Constructing Population Control: Social and Material Factors in Norm Emergence and Diffusion

To demonstrate that norms have independent causal power, constructivists de-emphasise material factors related to state interests and highlight social factors. Similarly, they conceptualise international organisations as autonomous from state influence, and focus on cases featuring non-state actors that stimulate a “tipping point” of norm diffusion among states in advance of state sponsorship. By contrast, this article utilises an historical materialist approach that admits both social and material data to examine the contrasting case of population control. It finds that US corporate foundations, eugenist demographers, feminist birth control activists and related NGOs conceptualised and promoted population control in the United States, at the United Nations, and across developing countries. However, the tipping point of norm diffusion occurred only after the United States publicly advocated population control. Indeed, material and social factors were inextricably bound together.     

Radiographic demonstration of esophageal and tracheal fistulas at autopsy using a contrasting medium that vulcanizes at room temperature

Esophageal and tracheal fistulas, which occur in 0.05% of medicolegal autopsies, were demonstrated in three cases by a postmortem radiographic technique using silicone rubber/lead oxide as a contrasting medium that vulcanizes at room temperature. In one 83-year-old male, a tracheoesophageal fistula was detected, which had developed after surgical repair of an esophageal rupture caused by a flexible fiberoptic endoscope. In a second case, carcinoma of the esophagus in a 78-year-old male had eroded the trachea and arcus of the aorta creating a fatal tracheoesophagoaortic fistula. In a third case, 55-year-old female developed a tracheobrachicephalic artery fistula as a result of an infiltrating cystic adenocarcinoma of the trachea, resulting in a fatal hemorrhage into the trachea. The results of this study indicate that diagnostic radiologic methods using a vulcanized contrasting medium are useful in supplementing normal dissection in autopsy cases with suspected fistulas of the esophagus or trachea.