Level of services,spatial dependence and allocative efficiency in local governments

In the public economics literature expenditure needs, allocative efficiency and spatial dependence of local governments costs have been widely analysed separately implying bias estimations of the expenditure needs at local level. An original procedure that simultaneously takes into account the standard level of services, the allocative efficiency and the spatial proximity among Municipalities, has been proposed. The estimation strategy has been applied on a very detailed database of more than 4,000 Italian Municipalities for the year 2013.     

Age estimation from the human os coxa: a test on a documented Italian collection*

Current standards for age at death estimation from the pelvis are based on Americans of European and African ancestry. Our limited understanding of population variability hampers our efforts to apply these techniques to the various skeletal populations around the world, especially in global forensic contexts. However, documented skeletal samples are rare, limiting our ability to test our techniques. This study tested the Suchey-Brooks pubic symphysis aging method and the auricular surface method originally developed by Lovejoy et al. on a large sample (n = 404) of known sex and age from the Sassari Collection, housed at the Museum of Anthropology at the University of Bologna, Italy. The results indicate that for both methods, bias and inaccuracy increased with age and actual age tended to be underestimated over the age of 40. The auricular surface method performed slightly better, exhibiting slightly lower levels of bias and inaccuracy, especially for males.     

The UN and Corporate Environmental Responsibility: Between International Regulation and Partnerships

This article analyses the successive attempts of the United Nations to ensure the responsible conduct of transnational corporations, and of business in general, with reference to the protection of the environment. The article will concentrate mainly on the UN draft Code of Conduct for Transnational Corporations, the 'partnership with business' approach of the Global Compact and the human-rights-based approach of the Norms on the Responsibilities of Transnational Corporations and Other Business Enterprises with regards to Human Rights. After considering recent developments at the UN Commission on Human Rights, the article evaluates the continued efforts, diverse strategies and multi-faceted institutional role of the UN in keeping the issue of corporate environmental responsibility on the international agenda and in trying to identify the international environmental standards directly applicable to business entities.