Regulations,Brokers, and Interlinkages: The Institutional Organization of Wholesale Markets in India

There is a vigorous debate on the liberalisation of heavily regulated agricultural markets in India. A crucial institutional characteristic is the role of state regulated brokers in wholesale markets. Relying on data from a unique survey in Uttarakhand, a state in North India, we find that regulations on margins are ineffective as most brokers charge rates that significantly exceed the regulated ones. We also find that a majority of farmers self-select into long-term relationships with brokers. These relationships allow some of the farmers to interlink credit and insurance markets to the agricultural output market. This interlinkage does however not appear to be an instrument for farmer exploitation (as it does not lead to worse inputs, high interest rates, or lower implicit output prices), but is seemingly an extra service by brokers as to establish farmer loyalty to them and thus to ensure future supplies.     

Predictive Policing as a New Tool for Law Enforcement? Recent Developments and Challenges

Decision-making processes are increasingly based on intelligence gained from ‘big data’, i.e., extensive but complex datasets. This evolution of analyzing complex data using methods aimed at prediction is also emerging within the field of quantitative criminology. In the context of crime analysis, the large amount of crime data available can be considered an example of big data, which could inform us about current and upcoming crime trends and patterns. A recent development in the analysis of this kind of data is predictive policing, which uses advanced statistical methods to make the most of these data to gain useable new insights and information, allowing police services to predict and anticipate future crime events. This article presents the results of a literature review, supplemented with key informant interviews, to give insight into what predictive policing is, how it can be used and implemented to anticipate crime, and what is known about its effectiveness. It also gives an overview of the currently known applications of predictive policing and their main characteristics.