Old and New Actors in the Italian Drug Trade: Ethnic Succession or Functional Specialization?

The article analyses Italian and foreign organized crime involved in the drug market from two perspectives. The first, called “criminal succession”, assumes that the great presence of foreign criminal groups into this illegal market would represent a menace to the traditional hegemony exercised by Mafia-type associations in Italy. From a different perspective, defined as “functional specialisation”, the involvement of foreign criminal groups in the drug market could also be seen in terms of criminal “labour force” tending to follow the same mechanisms occurring in the general market at large, where immigrants fill low-paying jobs not requested by the local population. Through the analysis of data provided by the Italian Central Antidrug Bureau and recent court records the article tests these two perspectives. In particular, the in-depth analysis of three case studies from northern, central and southern Italy – i.e. Milan, Florence and Naples – has allowed us to identify the main changes that occurred in the drug market since the early 1990s. In effect, in Milan and Florence, we register the emergence of foreign criminal actors in the high- and medium-level positions of the local drug trade, while in Naples, where Camorra clans hold very strong positions, it leaves small areas of autonomy to foreign criminal groups.     

Fighting Windmills: The Coalition of Industrialists and Environmentalists in the Climate Change Issue

This paper extends the political economy idea developed by Ackerman and Hassler [Clean Coal/Dirty Air, or How the Clean Air Act became a Multibillion-Dollar Bail-out for High Sulfur Coal Producers and What Should Be Done About It. New Haven: Yale University Press], which suggested that a coalition of environmentalists and industrialists successfully lobbied the US Congress. More strict technology-based standards for new emitting sources than for existing sources was the resulting policy outcome serving the common interest of the coalition because it offered both a barrier to entry for new firms and improved environmental quality. We focus on the case of international climate negotiations and the promotion of wind-based energy. Along the lines of the Ackerman and Hassler approach, we suggest that one reason for EU eagerness to push forward ambitious reduction target levels (and thereby promote new green industries) could be a similar coalition between industrialists and environmentalists. Such a strategy can be seen in the context of the Bootleggers and Baptist theory developed by Yandle [Bootleggers and Baptists: the Education of a Regulatory Economist, Regulation, 7, 12–16], where the Baptists (in our case the environmentalists) demand changes in behaviour on moral grounds. In contrast, the Bootleggers (the producers of renewable energy), who profit from the very regulation, keep a low profile. The actual heavy subsidisation of renewable energy sources, such as wind energy, can be viewed as a successful policy outcome for the coalition of industrialists and environmentalists offering both market protection and improved environmental quality. Solving the current dead-lock in international climate negotiations may well imply fighting the strong coalition of industrialists and environmentalists. Such a political battle may turn out to be just as tough as fighting windmills and needs to be addressed in future and more rigorous empirical research. At the end of the day, transparent incentives of relevant stakeholders in the climate change issue are necessary preconditions for progress in the climate change negotiations.JEL Classification: Q28,H2, H4     

Reforming International Environmental Governance: An Institutionalist Critique of the Proposal for a World Environment Organisation

This article argues that a World Environment Organisation (WEO) does not promise to enhance international environmental governance. First, we claim that the establishment of an international organisation alone in a policy field currently populated by regimes cannot be expected to significantly improve environmental governance because there is no qualitative difference between these two forms of governance institutions. Second, we submit that significant improvement of international environmental governance through institutional re-arrangement must rely on a modification of decision-making procedures and/or a change of institutional boundaries. Third, we develop three principal models of a possible WEO. A WEO formally providing an umbrella for existing regimes without modifying issue-areas and decision-making procedures would be largely irrelevant. A WEO integrating decision-making processes of existing regimes so as to form comprehensive world environment rounds of intergovernmental bargaining would be largely dysfunctional and prone to a host of negative side-effects. A supranational WEO including large-scale use of majority decision-making and far-reaching enforcement mechanisms across a range of environmental issues might considerably enhance international environmental governance, but it appears to be grossly utopian. In conclusion, a WEO cannot be at the same time realistic, significant and beneficial for international environmental governance. Available political resources should be invested in advancing existing and emerging sectoral environmental regimes rather than in establishing a WEO.     

Outward FDI from Central and Eastern European Countries

In Central and Eastern Europe, outward foreign direct investment (FDI) has not yet become as a prominent factor in the region’s reintegration into the world economy as trade liberalisation used to be in the early 1990s or inward foreign direct investment is currently. In the terminology of the investment–development path, with the notable exception of the Russian Federation, the region is in stage 2, whereby inward flows are still growing faster than outward flows. This article argues that a combination of the latecomer status of the region’s transnational corporations and the transition shock can explain most of that laggard situation. It hypothesises that the enlargement of the European Union (EU) would give a major push to the outward foreign direct investment flows of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), on condition that adequate government policies to promote those investments are put in place. The impact on the investment–development path, however, is uncertain, because accession to the EU is often accompanied by a surge in foreign direct investment inflows, too. Finally, the article also looks at the options available to deal with the specific problems of the Russian Federation in relation to capital flight, including ways of regularisation and potential return to the home economy.     

Policy networks and multiple lobbying strategies in EU trade policy-making. A Korean perspective

The EU trade policy has been a crucial matter of concern not only for the EU member states but also for the rest of the world as a whole. However, only a limited number of policy actors have been able to exercise effective power in the EU trade policy process on the basis of the formal and informal relations formed among core policy actors in policy networks. As a result, the interests of the European industrialists have been best served in the EUs trade policy relations with non-member countries. Consequently, Korean firms, as outsiders of the policy networks, have recognized the need to develop effective lobbying strategies as significant means to have greater influence on EU trade policy-making, so as to overcome the disadvantages existing in the policy process. In this regard, Korean firms need to develop multiple lobbying strategies by taking advantage of the various routes of EU trade lobbying. Otherwise, Korean firms will continue to experience difficulties in exploiting the benefits of the large European common market with a single currency.     

The International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. In need of a better performance?

Since the Mexican crisis in 1994, international financial markets are characterised by frequent turbulence. The two most important international organisations in that field, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, have been unable to provide sufficient stability. Surprisingly, the World Bank is in deeper trouble than the IMF. The decreasing importance of public capital flows has made the World Bank much less important than it used to be. Globalisation has led to increased private flows to the developing world, primarily in the form of foreign direct investment. In the long run, there will not be an important function for the World Bank any more. The opposite assessment has to be made for the IMF. The more globalisation progresses, the greater the need for an IMF. However, this does not mean that the Fund will survive in its current form. International financial markets have gained in importance, but they still lack many of the features that characterise the national financial sector. If globalisation shall be continued, we need those governance structures, e.g. a lender of last resort, at the international level. Markets need rules and regulations, and today these are often not existent at the international level. The need for an IMF will even rise, but it will have to be a different one.Abbreviations  CCL Contingent Credit Line - IMF International Monetary Fund - LTCM Long-term Capital ManagementSenior Research Associate, German Institute for International and Security Affairs, Berlin, and Associate Fellow, Centre for the Study of Globalisation and Regionalisation, University of Warwick.     

The interrelationship among stress,anxiety, and depression in law enforcement personnel

The current investigation was designed to explore the interrelationships among stress, anxiety, and depression in a population of law enforcement personnel. The Depression Anxiety Stress Scales (Lovibond & Lovibond, 1995) were administered to police officers from a medium sized police department in Massachusetts (N=43). Correlation coefficients were conducted on the data. Additionally,t-tests were performed on demographic data regarding marital status and exercise to examine possible mediating factors in the development of symptoms. Implications for these findings and possibilities for future research are discussed.     

Eyewitnesses: A comparison of live,video, and photo line-ups

An experiment was conducted in which the effectiveness of three line-up methods (live, video, and photographs) was compared. Participants witnessed a staged event and were subsequently required, by one of the three methods, to identify the target. Both target-present and target-absent line-ups were used. The results showed that all methods led to an equal number of correct identifications (hits). In the target-absent line-ups, participants more often incorrectly identified a person in the video and photographs condition than in the live condition. Presenting photographs simultaneously or sequentially did not affect the number of correct judgments. Dynamic video images, showing locomotion and facial expression, had a marginal significant effect on the number of correct judgments as compared with the static video images. Practical implications are discussed.     

Time and Punishment: Delayed Consequences and Criminal Behavior

This article develops two distinct explanations for the failure of potential consequences to influence behavior. Discounting is the tendency to deliberatively devalue the future. In contrast, poor impulse control refers to the failure to consider the future. The implications of this distinction were investigated with data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Adolescent Health. The study produced several findings. First, both forms of present-orientation independently predicted a range of problem outcomes among respondents. Second, high discounting was a better predictor of deliberative or future-related problem outcomes, whereas poor impulse control was a better predictor of urge driven behaviors or conduct involving little forethought. Third, only poor impulse control but not high discounting predicted violent offending among respondents. While both forms of present-orientation were associated with property offending, high discounting was a stronger and more consistent predictor. These three findings were far more evident for males than they were for females.