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The changing geopolitical and environmental situation in the world forced many countries and businesses to adapt and develop new economic concepts. By combining economic sustainability and virtually continuous economic development in itself, the term "green economy" has become popular during the ongoing "crisis of the 2020s" among governments, businesses, think tanks, and economists. Azerbaijan, being part of the global economic and political network, is also affected by the socioeconomic turmoil of the third decade of the 21st century. Many roadmaps, presidential decrees, and draft law acts have been passed in order to maintain the continuous development of the country and diversify its economy. Green economy is a new subject in the economic history of Azerbaijan. Currently, the terms green economy and sustainable development are applied to two economic regions in Azerbaijan, which consist of former uncontrolled areas due to war. However, the ongoing success of "green" economic applications in those regions can pave the way for the remaining economic regions of Azerbaijan to obtain green growth. Research has been applied to the potential applications of green economy in the Baku and Absheron-Khizi economic regions of Azerbaijan. Climate change and pollution have considerable effects on the ecology of Azerbaijan, and consequently, these two regions have been greatly affected by the massive concentration of people and intensive industrialization of these areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A team of researchers led by Prof. Dr. Paweł Grata of the University of Rzeszów has received the funding necessary to carry out the project "In Care of the Family: Social assistance in the Polish lands from the 19th to the 21st century. Historical dictionary" under the National Program for the Development of the Humanities. The project will be carried out from 2024 to 2028. The amount of funding amounted to more than one million seven hundred thousand zlotys. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most of the other chapters, however, come from scholars specialising in economic history, rather than the history of economics. Bielschowsky is a development economist who authored a classic work on the history of developmental ideology in Brazil (Bielschowsky 1988), while Boianovsky and Coutinho are two of the longest-standing and most prolific Brazilian historians of economics. A history of Brazilian economic thought: From colonial times through the early 21st century,: edited by Ricardo Bielschowsky, Mauro Boianovsky and Mauricio C. Coutinho, Routledge, Abingdon, 2023, 268 pp., £108, ISBN 978-1-032-02930-6. [Extracted from the article]

The Chafarinas Islands is one of the Spanish enclaves located in the north of Africa, constituting the only border of the European Union in the area. It is an area that enjoys a natural environment of great ecological value. The research makes a historical tour, analyzing the elements that make up its problems until the second decade of the 21st century. It covers geographical, environmental and historical aspects that explain its history and the current status quo. Its location in the Mauritania-Tingitania area, together with its status as an island border, reveals a space not exempt from difficulties in political and economic relations, which should be analyzed, with the aim of finding ways to improve the relationship and cooperation between Spain (the eu) and Morocco, reducing the existing border conflicts. Its future options include cooperation with neighboring countries and the exploitation of its tourist resources within the framework of sustainability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista de Historia Económica / Journal of Iberian & Latin American Economic History is the property of Cambridge University Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper analyses the industrial operations performed in the 1930s by Italy's former state-holding company, Istituto per la Ricostruzione Industriale (Institute for the Industrial Reconstruction — IRI). It is argued that in those years IRI represented a policy-oriented system of state-owned enterprises with 'entrepreneurial' characteristics: reorganising sectors and industrial productions, diversifying into new activities, investing in underdeveloped areas, promoting technical and managerial training as well as scientific research. IRI's historical model of an entrepreneurial state-holding company could suggest relevant policy lessons for 21st century national systems of state-owned enterprises. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We consider a broad class of dynamic portfolio optimization problems that allow for complex models of return predictability, transaction costs, trading constraints, and risk considerations. Determining an optimal policy in this general setting is almost always intractable. We propose a class of linear rebalancing rules and describe an efficient computational procedure to optimize with this class. We illustrate this method in the context of portfolio execution and show that it achieves near optimal performance. We consider another numerical example involving dynamic trading with mean-variance preferences and demonstrate that our method can result in economically large benefits. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

I analyze selected views of the well-known Swedish analyst of Nordic economies, Nima Sanandaji, on the reasons for the economic (and social) successes of Sweden and other Nordic countries in the 20th and 21st centuries. My aim is not to provide a detailed and full appraisal of these views but to confront them with the arguments of Sanandaji's critics. Only occasionally do I supplement the arguments of Sanandaji's commentators with additional comments of my own. In particular, my interests include the following theses of Sanandaji: the thesis that Sweden's prosperity arose before the development of the welfare state, which contributed little to its creation; the thesis that other Swedish successes (health, small inequalities, equal opportunities) are wrongly attributed to the Swedish welfare state or are far from complete; the thesis that there is very limited scope for other countries to copy the Swedish (Nordic) experience. In the Conclusion, I comment on the reception of Sanandaji's views in Poland. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the contribution of out-of-town second-house buyers to mispricing in the housing market. We show that demand from out-of-town second-house buyers during the mid 2000s predicted not only house-price appreciation rates but also impliedto- actual-rent-ratio appreciation rates, a proxy for mispricing. We then apply a novel identification strategy to address the issue of reverse causality. We give supporting evidence that out-of-town second-house buyers behaved like misinformed speculators, earning lower capital gains (misinformed) and consuming smaller dividends (speculators). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Vie et Sciences de l'Entreprise is the property of ANDESE and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Since the rise of a "scientific" historiography in the nineteenth century, the role of ideas in history versus that of material forces has been a key philosophical problem. Thomas Piketty's Capital and Ideology (2019), read as a work of global history, offers a provocative rehearsal of this question. On the one hand, the book is an attempt to provide a narrative historical frame for the hard data of the World Inequality Database. On the other, paradoxically, it offers a defiant conclusion that ideology is, or at least could be, the key driver in social and institutional change towards universal progress. St Simon, Comte and Spencer have found their twenty‐first century heir. How can we historicize Piketty's impetus, both understanding its provenance and making sense of its limitations? One key issue is its roots in the traditions of National Accounts, which leads to an approach to the global which is stresses comparison over connection, and to an uncritical reproduction of the portrait of an egalitarian non‐capitalist Twentieth century painted by Kuznets during the Cold War. Another is its presentism, with the historical argument driven by an attempt to understand the c.1980–2020 conjuncture and its alternatives, and a connected overdependence on the support of a few historians. A third, a consequence in part of the inequalities between the quality of data we have for different parts of the world, and of Piketty's provenance and imagined audience, is a Eurocentric, even Gallocentric approach. A fourth is a very French republican refusal to address how class is complicated by identities of race and nation so that neither egalitarian policies nor ideologies provide remedies for the populist politics of right. None of these criticisms are in contradiction with our view that Capital and Ideology is a work of social theory of world historical importance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

After a recent increase in Chinese import competition, European firms increased innovation. We present and rationalise these patterns using 'trapped factors' at the micro level within a stylised equilibrium model of product-cycle trade and growth. Trade integration of the magnitude observed between the OECD and low-wage nations as a whole can considerably increase the long-run growth rate and welfare. In the short run exposed firms devote trapped factors to increased innovation, leading both to increased innovation at these individual firms as well as to a small amount of extra transitional growth overall. China accounts for half of the dynamic trade gains. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Iberian Journal of the History of Economic Thought is the property of Universidad Complutense de Madrid and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article discusses the history of pencil-making on several levels. Firstly it deals with the development of graphite pencils, influenced by the discovery of natural graphite near Borrowdale in England in 1564. Secondly, it addresses the discoveries of artificial graphite by Nicolas-Jacques Conté (patented in 1795) and Joseph Hardtmuth (patented 1804 - the Viennese method), aft er which pencil production grew extensively as it was much cheaper compared to the "true" graphite. Thirdly, the paper describes Nuremberg and its surroundings in relation to the historical roots of pencil production - this natural junction of trade had a great influence on the development of craft and later industrial pencil production. Four of the local companies - Faber-Castell, Staedtler, Schwan-Stabilo, and Lyra have remained world leaders in the industry. Lastly, the paper presents a case study of the brief history of Schwan-Stabilo, placing an emphasis on the second half of the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth century. In spite of being the youngest of the four companies mentioned above, Schwan-Stabilo has seen multiple innovations and continues to thrive as a family business. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• The twentieth century displays changing patterns of income growth volatility. • The distribution of income growth rates is persistently asymmetry and fat-tailed. • There is a negative scale relation between growth volatility and GDP per capita after the 1950s. • The scale relation is not significant during most of the first half of the twentieth century. • The evidence highlights the complex evolution of the growth process. This paper analyses the international distribution of GDP per capita growth rates and its dynamics during the twentieth century. We show that the century is characterized by a changing distribution of GDP per capita growth rates, which is reflected in different shapes and a persistent asymmetry at the regional level and for countries of different development levels. Interestingly, the well-known negative scaling relation between growth volatility and country size that characterizes the second half of the century is not observed before the 1950s, period dominated by severe global shocks. We discuss possible explanations to the disruption of the scaling relationship. We argue that in a turbulent context, the functioning and interdependence of economic components of countries of different size can be altered, also affecting the scaling relation between growth volatility and country size. Our results contribute with evidence of the underlying complexity of the growth process and its historical evolution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Canadian Journal of Economics is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of E-Journal of Portuguese History is the property of Brill Academic Publishers and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Do international lenders of last resort create financial instability by generating moral hazard? The evidence is thin and plagued with measurement error. We use the number of American troops hosted by third countries to measure the strength of American commitment to ensuring the countries' economic health. We test several hypotheses against a dataset covering about sixty-eight countries between 1960 and 2009. Using evidence from fixed-effects and instrumental-variable models, we find that increasing the number of US troops by one standard deviation above the mean raises the probability of a financial crisis in the host country by up to 13 percentage points. We also investigate the channels through which moral hazard materializes. Countries with more US troops conduct more expansionary fiscal and monetary policies, implement riskier financial regulations, and receive more capital, especially from US banks. While many scholars of international relations view the American overseas military presence as a source of stability, we identify an underexplored mechanism by which it generates instability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract This paper examines the Zipf's law for the size distribution of Pakistani cities using the five census data from 1951 to 1998. We observe that Zipf's law does not hold in any of the five census years at national level. Next, we consider the city size distribution of four Pakistani provinces and find that Zipf's law is more likely to hold for cities at province-level. We attribute these findings to the coherence property of the urban system. In Pakistan the urban systems within provinces are more coherent in terms of common language, common culture and common rules as compared to the urban system as a whole at national-level. Highlights • Zipf's law is examined at national and four provinces-level for Pakistani cities. • City size distribution does not follow Zipf's law at national-level. • City size distribution is more likely to follow Zipf's law at four provinces-level. • Findings are explained based on the coherence property of the urban system. • Urban systems are more coherent in terms of common language, culture and rules at province-level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prenatal and early childhood lead exposures impair cognitive development. We aimed to evaluate the prevalence of elevated blood lead levels (BLLs) among pregnant women in rural Bangladesh and to identify sources of lead exposure. We analyzed the BLLs of 430 pregnant women randomly selected from rural communities in central Bangladesh. Fifty-seven cases were selected with the highest BLLs, ≥ 7 μg/dL, and 59 controls were selected with the lowest BLLs, < 2 μg/dL. An exposure questionnaire was administered and soil, rice, turmeric, water, traditional medicine, agrochemical, and can samples were analyzed for lead contamination. Of all 430 women, 132 (31%) had BLLs > 5 μg/dL. Most women with elevated BLLs were spatially clustered. Cases were 2.6 times more likely than controls to consume food from a can (95% CI 1.0–6.3, p = 0.04); 3.6 times more likely to use Basudin, a specific brand of pesticide (95% CI 1.6–7.9, p = 0.002); 3.6 times more likely to use Rifit, a specific brand of herbicide (95% CI 1.7–7.9, p = 0.001); 2.9 times more likely to report using any herbicides (95% CI 1.2–7.3, p = 0.02); and 3.3 times more likely to grind rice (95% CI 1.3–8.4, p = 0.01). Five out of 28 food storage cans were lead-soldered. However, there was minimal physical evidence of lead contamination from 382 agrochemical samples and 129 ground and unground rice samples. Among 17 turmeric samples, one contained excessive lead (265 μg/g) and chromium (49 μg/g). Overall, we found evidence of elevated BLLs and multiple possible sources of lead exposure in rural Bangladesh. Further research should explicate and develop interventions to interrupt these pathways. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article takes a close look at La Borda, a housing cooperative being developed in Barcelona. The article encompasses the economic and social context in which the housing initiative emerged, the organisational features that define the cooperative, and its origins in the process of urban renewal of the former industrial site of Can Batlló. The article also analyses its current development and its potential for scalability. Drawing on Moulaert's definition of social innovation, the authors argue that La Borda goes beyond the mere provision of housing to include public participation as a key component of the model. The Andel Model for cooperative housing is presented as the main source of inspiration for La Borda's model, including its roots in the social and cooperative economy and the role of the cession of use housing tenure. The article concludes there are reasons to believe La Borda will succeed in providing long-term affordable housing while engaging its residents in its daily management. The authors consider the suitability of La Borda's model elsewhere to be dependent on the economic, social and political context in which it is implemented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 2010 Census showed population increases in urban core neighbourhoods in US shrinking or legacy cities. Influenced by Florida’s creative class theory, municipal leaders in shrinking cities have sought to attract and retain creative and college-educated residents as a revitalisation strategy and implemented amenity-based policy initiatives. Nevertheless, when compared with strong market cities, weak market cities have fewer amenities and less robust job markets. Why college-educated professionals would choose to live in cities with weak job markets and declining services is not well explained. Based on findings from two sets of interviews conducted five years apart with college-educated professionals living and working in New Orleans, we found that a subset of professionals seeking opportunities to assist in the recovery were drawn to New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. They subsequently stayed because they valued the pace of their life and the ease at which they could maintain professional and personal networks, more than specific amenities. They stayed even though they found professional opportunities to be limited and considered some amenities and services including parks and transit worse than other cities where they had lived. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: We describe a public good experiment, a type of economic experiment commonly used to examine feelings of prosociality—that is, behaviour which is positive, helpful and intended to promote social acceptance and friendship—and community cohesion, carried out in Rwanda. Contributions in different parts of the country are affected by the local intensity of the 1994 genocide, with more generous contributions being made in areas where violence was greater. This supports earlier research indicating that conflict experience leads to greater prosociality. However, we also find that people who have not, themselves, been targets of violence give lower contributions than people who have. The considerable group‐related and regional differences in social behaviour may have implications for the country's policies to deal with social cohesion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT: Based on extensive fieldwork, this article examines new informality in Pakistan's land market by which vacant plots of land are transacted informally between market actors in rapidly reversed short‐term holdings. The analysis pivots around the changing economic environment in Pakistan with the shift from heavy regulation of money and controlled pricing, to the liberalization of money and markets. The author explores how liquidity is taken up as a microeconomic strategy to protect against new financial risk in this environment, and how this is played out as a preference for informal transactions. These practices inform a case study that contributes to the established literature on the links between globalization and the informal economy by articulating a driver of growing informal transactions that is novel to the literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Northern hardwood species display a variety of forms and defects that can reduce stem quality and complicate their timber management. However, for the most part, growth and yield models do not account for the influence of stem form and damage. This study determined the influence of stem form and damage on growth, survival, and projected future sawlog value among several northern commercial hardwood species. To accomplish this, hardwood trees on 112 permanent plots across three long-term research sites in Maine were assigned stem form and risk classes using a tree classification system developed in New Brunswick. A highly significant influence of stem form and risk on annualized individual-tree diameter increment and survival was found. Inclusion of these equations into a regional growth and yield model highlighted the importance of stem form and defects on long-term simulations as projected stand-level future value was significantly reduced by over 17%, on average (range of 13% to 28%), when compared with projections that did not include that tree-level information. The results highlight the importance of stem form and defects, as well as the need to account for them, in growth and yield applications that assess the forecasted value of commercially important hardwood stands. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

More than 70 per cent of the largest 1,200 US banks of 2011 avoided annual losses in 2008 or 2009 largely because their operations were controlled. Bankers, faced with unexpected reverses, worked to reestablish control and profitability. Our examination of banking's record leading up to the 2008-2009 financial crisis indicates there were several abnormal changes bankers might have observed between 2005 and 2007 to put their organizations on alert. Such alerts before the crisis could have helped some banks minimize their losses or even avoid them. Looking ahead, bankers who apply the lessons identified, herein, should report more stable profitability during the volatile phases of future business cycles. Analysts and regulators alike should be able to use these same lessons to sort resilient banks from the rest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This paper presents a holistic description and assessment of the European Union's financial services policy since the start of financial crisis in mid‐2007. The decade‐long sequence is divided into four themes, in broadly chronological order: the initial reaction to the 2007–08 financial shock; subsequent initiatives framed by political developments at the EU and G20 level; the banking union from mid‐2012; and more recent events centered on the UK vote to exit the EU (Brexit). The analysis identifies banking union as the watershed moment, and correspondingly assesses the EU policy response as mostly inadequate in the first half and mostly effective in the second half of the period covered. Recommendations for future reforms are made in the conclusion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We evaluate whether the impact of EU Structural and Cohesion Funds (EUF) on Member States' regional economic growth depends on the intensity of treatment,measured by the normalized amount of funds distributed in each region.We use an original data set that covers all the main sources of EUFand extend the regression discontinuity design to the case of continuous treatment. The results suggest an average positive effect on regional growth. The estimated conditional intensity-growth function is concave and presents a maximum value. Therefore, the exceeding funds could have been allocated to other lagging regions without reducing the effect on growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper analyzes the relevance of domestic institutions for export performance of Cambodia. Regulatory quality, control of corruption, rule of law, government effectiveness, and political stability are introduced in an augmented gravity model with a panel data set over 1996-2015. The research is the first application to Cambodia, until 2015 a least developed country which is generally believed to have poorly developed institutions. Due to high multicollinearity among the variables, the institutional variables are introduced in the model one by one. Estimation is by the Hausman-Taylor method, which reduces or removes the correlation between the composite error terms and the included variables. All institutional variables show a highly significant positive relationship with Cambodia's exports, with rule of law having the largest impact. It is concluded that the government should give high priority to the further improvements of the legal environment and to strong enforcement of property rights and contracts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the most disturbing contemporary episodes in human history that has been decried globally is the recent Libyan experience of slave trade, where migrants captured end-up being sold as slaves. We contribute to the understanding of this phenomenon by investigating the role of cognitive human capital on slave trade. To this end,weuse the historic intelligence and slave trade variables, respectively, as the independent and outcome variables of interest. Our findings show a negative relationship between slave trade and cognitive human capital. Hence, the slave trade is more apparent when cognitive human capital is low. The Ordinary Least Squares findings are robust to the control for outliers, uncertainty about the model and Tobit regressions. We substantiate why from the perspective of massive sensitization and education, the non-contemporary relationship between cognitive ability and slave trade established in this study has contemporary practical policy relevance in efforts to stem the tide of clandestine travel to Europe through countries in which clandestine migrants are captured and sold as slaves. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Home ownership has implications for a family’s empowerment and quality of life, especially post-retirement. Economic conditions, the cost of living, and child-rearing create barriers to accumulating immovable assets, including the home. This study identifies the determinants of home ownership among retirees—geographic, demographic, social and economic variables—and explains the effect using data drawn from five administrative areas in Saudi Arabia (Riyadh, Madina, Eastern, Jazan, and Jouf) representing planning regions (Northern, Southern, Eastern, Western and Central). A large proportion of retirees (82%) own a home (purchased before or after retirement), with regional differences. Retirees from Jouf and Jazan have higher ownership rates than their counterparts in Riyadh, Madina, or Eastern, with rates affected by geographic, demographic, social, and economic factors. As determinants, geographic and demographic factors have major roles while economic factors play a typical role in decision-making. A mix of higher education, professional employment, longer duration of employment and higher salaries, when combined with locational preferences and family requirements, motivate or enable home ownership. Retiree home-ownership is important to dignified post-retirement (old-age) life, and so measures and policies may be strengthened to empower people to own homes during their working life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the legal aspects of American military entitlements as of 2018, and it mentions changes to the U.S. Uniformed Services Former Spouses Protection Act of 1982, as well as the treatment of military retired pay as divisible community property under Idaho law. Qualified Domestic Relations Orders and qualified pension plans are examined, along with a definition of disposable retired pay, U.S. Veterans Administration Disability Compensation, and divorce and post-divorce laws.

Over the past two decades consumption inequality has risen within Laos, while absolute poverty incidence has halved. The estimated Gini coefficient of private household expenditures per person rose from 0.311 to 0.364. This increase in the sample‐based estimate of inequality was statistically significant and occurred in all regions, in both rural and urban areas and among all major ethnic, educational and sectoral employment categories. Within‐group increases in inequality dominated between‐group changes. Official policy largely overlooks this point, focusing on reducing inequality between rather than within major groups. Economic inequality seems certain to become a more pressing policy concern. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author reviews the basic facts necessary to understand the specific process of Montenegro's capitalist transformation in the past thirty years or so, a process particularly influenced by certain characteristics of the political system. The survival in power of one political party throughout the period of systemic changes, as well as the more than twenty-year personal rule of Milo Đukanović which continued despite the introduction of liberal-pluralist principles, are primarily explained by the control of the state apparatus by the ruling elite. Alongside that was a low level of economic development. In addition, ambivalent attitudes of the populace to Montenegro's independence from Serbia and the interethnic relations of Serbs and Montenegrins have played their own role. In the second part, the text displays the leitmotif underlying the contributions to the thematic section on Montenegro in this issue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author analyses economic inequalities among the main social groups in Montenegro at the end of the socialist system and during the postsocialist transformation. Economic inequalities are analysed based on an economic status index, which is a composite index made up of multiple indicators: income, consumption, and asset ownership. The empirical basis for the analysis are survey results from 1989, 2003, and 2015. The findings show that there were economic inequalities during the entire period. In the late 1980s, the economic differentiation of social classes was very pronounced, despite the principle of equality with which the socialist system had legitimized itself. The period of postsocialist transformation raised the economic status of all social groups. Notwithstanding such improvement, the differences between the higher and lower social classes persisted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Policy makers often rely on theoretical wisdom and tend to allocate huge resources towards hedging strategies against oil price and exchange rate movements without considering to first test these theories on a context basis. To overcome this limitation, we model both upward and downward movements in oil prices and exchange rates in order to study the oil – exchange rate – growth nexus for a small net-importing country like Liberia. We estimate an unrestricted VAR model and document the following results: First, a rise in the price of oil appears to stimulate Liberian GDP. Second, depreciation in the value of the Liberian dollar causes real GDP to fall while appreciation of the Liberian dollar tends to have no impact on real GDP in Liberia. Third, trade balance has a positive correlation with growth of the Liberian economy. Finally, consumer prices are found to also correlate positively with economic growth in Liberia. Contrary to bulk of the literature, this paper provides general insights that a rise in oil price is sometimes good for net-oil importers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The 21st‐century developmental state is envisaged as implying democratic participation. Rwanda both explicitly aspires to follow the developmental state example and eloquently ascribes to far‐reaching participatory ideals, and a number of development programmes, “home grown initiatives,” have been launched, allegedly reviving traditional participatory practices. Based on original material, this article analyzes local experiences of the participation entailed in some of these programmes. In the conclusion, the poor practice of participation reported is found to point to inherent contradiction of the idea of a democratic and participatory version of the developmental state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With power plants in Saudi Arabia consuming 27% of the kingdom’s oil and 100% of its natural gas, a host of strategic projects are under way to boost the prominence of alterative resources in the overall mix. The nation is targeting 54 GW of renewable energy and 17 GW of nuclear power by 2040. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista UNISCI is the property of Unidad de Investigaciones Sobre Seguridad y Cooperacion International (UNISCI) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Afghanistan has been practicing market economic system since 2002. Since then, the government has been initiating different policies and announced various incentives to attract foreign direct investment (FDI) to the country. However, the outcome has not been satisfactory due to several political and economic factors. This paper explores the relationship between security, economic growth and FDI in Afghanistan, using ARDL model. The paper covers a period from 2002 to 2016. The empirical results of this study show that there is a negative long-term relationship between security and FDI. Hence, the author concludes that, to attract FDI to the country, insuring security should be the top priority of the government of Afghanistan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

New growth theory argues that education and human resources is the key variables to promote economic growth. There are several empirical studies on causality between economic growth and education in developed and developing countries. These studies used several approaches to investigate the relationship between two variables. However, the empirical result between growth and education are mixed. Most of finding shows that the education stimulates economic growth. However, some empirical study find that the relation between education and economic growth is weak. Some scholars also argue that there is no causality running from education to economic growth. Despite increasing school enrollment, the percentage of enrollment is still low compared to neighboring countries in Laos. Further, the quality of education is relatively low. Therefore, the relation between education and growth in Laos is a relevant topic for several reasons. Moreover, there is no study related with issue. We investigate the relation between education and economic growth in Laos for the period from 1984 to 2013. For this investigation, we apply the Johansen cointegation and Granger causality approaches. In our study, we choose three indicators of education: primary school enrollment (PRI), secondary school enrollment (SEC), and higher education enrollment (HE) to investigate the their relationship on economic growth. The Johansen cointegration test confirms the existence of a long-term relation between education and economic growth at all levels. The Granger approach indicates the existence of feedback causality between education and economic growth at all levels. Thus, this study recommends more investment in education in order to foster economic growth. In sum, the promotion of education (at all levels) stimulates economic growth, at the same time economic growth also supports education development in Laos. This empirical result is consistent with many studies. For instance, Qazi et al (2014) for Pakistan. In contract, the finding of this study is contradiction with some studies. For instance, Self and Grabowski (2004) for India, Benhabib and Spiegel (1994) for Greece. Lao education is still low in all level. As result, the promotion education development could improve the labor productivity in economic sector. As the quality of education is low in Laos, and it face various challenges. One of the most challenges in education development is lack of funding, facilities and qualified teachers and lecturers. Therefore, policy makers should invest more education at all levels to improve education quality in order to promote the long-term economic development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to document Qatar’s recent contribution of humanitarian aid to the Palestinians. We consider Qatar as an example of a mini state that relies on its wealth and soft power to further its interests in the Middle East and support a beleaguered Arab-Muslim state. The paper carries out analysis of Arabic newspapers and other documentary evidence to contextualise and estimate Qatar’s financial contribution 2010-2016. Contextualising Qatar’s aid necessitates considering Israel’s military control of the Palestinian Territories, and its ability through hard power to regulate the inflow of aid to Palestine. The paper concludes by calling for adopting the political economy perspective in dealing with humanitarian aid. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines foreign relations between Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and discusses the impact the relationship has within the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). It covers the UAE's national security efforts since its creation in 1971 and how Saudi Arabia has viewed the UAE as a competitor within the GCC in both politics and economics.

In this paper, we reconsider the defining but often overlooked 'hinge' function of megalopolises by analyzing how megalopolises have articulated national and international urban systems in the context of a globalizing knowledge economy. Taking the case of China's Yangtze River Delta (YRD) region, we particularly focus on knowledge circulation within and beyond the YRD region by analyzing the pattern and process of knowledge collaboration at different geographical scales during the 2004-2014 period. Results show that the structure of scientific knowledge collaboration as reflected by co-publications has been strongest at the national scale whereas that of technological knowledge collaboration as measured by co-patents has been strongest at the global scale. Despite this difference, the structure of both scientific and technological knowledge collaboration has been functionally polycentric at the megalopolitan scale but become less so at the national and global scales. The 'globally connected but locally disconnected' pattern of Shanghai's external knowledge collaboration suggests that the gateway role of the YRD megalopolis in promoting knowledge collaboration at different geographical scales will take time before it is fully realized. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]