Urban Regeneration Policy from the Integrated Urban Development Model in the European Union: an Analytical Approach Based on the Study of Spanish Cities

For several years, local governments have been tackling new challenges related to the regeneration of their cities within the physical sphere, as well as in their economic and social aspects. This task is developed in accordance with what has been called the Integrated Urban Development Model, understanding the integrated nature of this approach not only in terms of the spheres of public policy involved, but also in relation to their management. In this paper, this management is analysed in terms of the development of mechanisms for New Local Governance and New Public Management (NPM). Using Spanish municipalities as a case study, this paper develops an analytical tool for the analysis of this model of urban intervention within the European context, paying close attention to the development of mechanisms for New Local Governance from a multilevel perspective, as well as the development of mechanisms for NPM.     

What Makes Them Successful? Influential Interest Groups in Hungary (1990–2014)

Although many scholars of Central and Eastern Europe politics write about the relative weaknesses of civil societies, some studies delivered evidence of cases where interest groups were able to influence particular decisions and policies. Therefore, we aimed at identifying and examining the most influential national interest groups of eight different policy areas in post-communist Hungary hoping to explore the reasons for their success. Older generations of organisations benefit from political embeddedness, while newer advocacy groups rely more on legal instruments and public mobilisation. The operation of successful groups has not been affected by the strong political polarisation of the Hungarian party system.     

Fair Trade and justice: a comment on Walton and Deneulin

In this article we first point out that the different conceptualisations of Fair Trade, which are sometimes analytically contradictory, actually form a coordinated set. Understanding the Fair Trade project is impossible without taking these interlinked conceptualisations into consideration. Second, this set basically forms a mechanism of structural, institutional and moral reforms that guide actions. In this way Fair Trade sets out to produce less injustice than is usually the case with the structures and institutions that govern conventional trade. Nevertheless, it does not try to define what a just society is or even to perfectly define ‘fair trade’. This implies the adoption of a comparative justice angle. It is precisely by linking comparative individual situations with the structures that produce these situations that relative justice can find its strength and purpose.     

The emergence of regulatory regionalism: transnational networks and the diffusion of regulatory agencies within regions

The regulatory regionalism approach has increasingly claimed that a new mode of regional governance is emerging globally. Regional policy regimes, developed in broad social and economic territorial areas, affect the internal transformation of the state. The authors plan to provide comprehensive empirical evidence about the emergence of worldwide regulatory regionalism by identifying how regulatory agencies have diffused very successfully within the regional level in recent decades. The paper aims to identify, using an original methodological design, the ways in which such diffusion of agencies occurred, as this may have theoretical relevance for the study of regulatory regionalism. The authors' hypothesis suggests that transnational political interactions in each regional cluster triggered agency diffusion, contributing to the development of the regulatory state within the countries of each region. To test this hypothesis, the authors employed a data set of regulatory agencies including the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development), and most Asian and Latin American countries (+59) from 1950 to 2007, for 15 sectors related to finance, risks, utility and competition. Bayesian data analysis was used to estimate the parameters of interest.     

Volatile Organic Compounds,Spectral Characterization and Morphology of Ammonium Nitrate Fuel Oil (ANFO) Samples

Ammonium nitrate fuel oil is an explosive mixture found in most antipersonnel landmines (APL) buried throughout the Colombian territory. During more than 50 years of internal conflict, the Colombian government has found that trained dogs are the most effective method to detect APL. However, the olfactive signature in ANFO is unknown and also if there are differences in detection related to the explosive manufacturing origin. Therefore, this work begins with the analytical validation of the method used to determine ammonia, in its derivatized form as carbamate, released by home-made ANFO using HS-SPME-GC-FID. Once validated, the method was used to identify ammonia and other organic volatile compounds present in ANFO, under laboratory and simulated field conditions. The validation process includes the evaluation of the optimum conditions for the derivation and extraction of butylcarbamate, the determination of the working ranges with linear response in FID, the limits of detection and quantification, the sensitivity, and the precision. The results of the validation established linearity and sensitivity in a concentration between 20 and 120 mg/L, as well as low limits of detection and quantification of 6.4 and 21.4 mg/L, respectively. Also, an intermediate precision of 11% for butylcarbamate with a repeatability of 8%. The validated method showed in real samples of home-made ANFO besides ammonia, the presence of low molecular methylamines, and also exhibited differences in volatile compositions according to the origin. The objective of this work is to offer a reliable analytical methodology for the extraction and analysis of volatile compounds from ANFO.     

The Scharff technique: training military intelligence officers to elicit information from small cells of sources

ABSTRACT

Studies have demonstrated the efficacy of the Scharff technique for gathering human intelligence, but little is known about how this efficacy might vary among different samples of practitioners. In this training study we examined a sample of military officers (n?=?37). Half was trained in the Scharff technique and compared against officers receiving no Scharff training. All officers received the same case file describing two sources holding information about a terrorist attack. University students (n?=?74) took the role of the semi-cooperative sources. Scharff-trained officers adhered to the training as they (1) aimed to establish the ‘knowing-it-all’ illusion, (2) posed claims as a means of eliciting information, and (3) asked fewer explicit questions. The ‘untrained’ officers asked many explicit questions, questioned the reliability of the provided information, pressured the source, and displayed disappointment with the source's contribution. Scharff-trained officers were perceived as less eager to gather information and left their sources with the impression of having provided comparatively less new information, but collected a similar amount of new information as their untrained colleagues. The present paper both replicates and advances previous work in the field, and marks the Scharff technique as a promising technique for gathering human intelligence.     

The contribution of the right to information laws in Europe to local government transparency on sustainability

The aim of this paper is to examine the influence of the right to information laws on sustainability transparency in European local governments. This goal is novel, in that previous studies have examined the effects of various factors on the dissemination of government information (demographic, socioeconomic, political and financial) but not the contribution of legal factors to online transparency on environmental, social and economic sustainability. Our research question is this: Do information laws contribute to transparency on sustainability? Using the Global Reporting Initiative guidelines and a statistical regression analysis, we studied the websites of 106 local governments in ten European countries. The results obtained show that when transparency laws clearly stipulate the rules applicable and the procedures established for appeals, exceptions, refusals and requests, this can favour transparency on environmental, social and economic sustainability. Our findings advance understanding of this field and reinforce the basis for legal reforms to enhance sustainability transparency.

     

Postmortem stability of DNA

High-molecular-weight DNA was recovered postmortem in sufficient quantities from various human organ tissues as well as from blood, although not all organs were equally well suitable. Good DNA stability was found in brain cortex, lymph nodes and psoas muscle over a period of three weeks postmortem. Spleen and kidney showed good DNA stability up to five days postmortem but after longer periods, rapid degradation was observed. Yields of DNA from blood were not consistent because of the non homogeneity of samples. Blood clots were rich with DNA. Generally, the amount of degraded DNA correlated directly with the duration of the postmortem period. However in some cases, DNA degradation was already prominent after a short period. However in some cases, DNA degradation was already prominent after a short period. Case histories showed that high environmental temperature at the site of death and/or infectious diseases prior to death were the main factors for rapid autolysis. Gradual disappearance to complete loss of the long fragments (15-23 kb) was observed in DNA fingerprinting using the minisatellite probe 33.15. No extra-bands were noted, thus excluding erroneous conclusions. However, evidentiary value of older samples was lower.