L’impatto dell’Intelligenza Artificiale nel settore del lusso e della moda

Dall’ideazione alla produzione, l’AI sta rivoluzionando le industrie creative. La tecnologia crea nuove opportunità, ma anche inedite sfide etich

L’évolution de l’institution du préfet en Italie de l’origine à nos jours

L’évolution du rôle et de l’institution du préfet en Italie est addressée en examinant trois facteurs fondamentaux. Le premier facteur est l’évolution du rôle du préfet en raison des changements du contexte juridique et social de l’État italien et, en particulier, en raison des transformations qui ont affecté l’administration italienne du système savoyard à l’adoption de la Constitution républicaine. Le deuxième facteur correspond aux fonctions actuelles du préfet, c’est-à-dire ce que fait le préfet en Italie aujourd’hui, quelles sont ses missions, démontrant la vitalité particulière de l’institution préfectorale, qui a su se réinventer au fil des années, en assumant un rôle de plus en plus soutenu pour les collectivités territoriales, par exemple dans la gestion des urgences environnementales et de la crise migratoire. Le troisième facteur renverra aux perspectives de réforme du préfet au regard de l’évolution du système juridique et du récent débat politique en Italie

AI and XAI second opinion: the danger of false confirmation in human–AI collaboration

Can AI substitute a human physician’s second opinion? Recently the Journal of Medical Ethics published two contrasting views: Kempt and Nagel advocate for using artificial intelligence (AI) for a second opinion except when its conclusions significantly diverge from the initial physician’s while Jongsma and Sand argue for a second human opinion irrespective of AI’s concurrence or dissent. The crux of this debate hinges on the prevalence and impact of ‘false confirmation’—a scenario where AI erroneously validates an incorrect human decision. These errors seem exceedingly difficult to detect, reminiscent of heuristics akin to confirmation bias. However, this debate has yet to engage with the emergence of explainable AI (XAI), which elaborates on why the AI tool reaches its diagnosis. To progress this debate, we outline a framework for conceptualising decision-making errors in physician–AI collaborations

A popular backlash against globalization?

Is there a popular backlash against globalization? When did it start and in which forms? What do we know about its causes? We address these questions in the context of advanced democracies. We see the ‘globalization backlash’ as the political shift of voters and parties in a protectionist and isolationist direction, with substantive implications on governments’ leaning and enacted policies. We discuss the empirical evidence on the backlash. We develop a theoretical discussion within the framework of the crisis of embedded liberalism. We nest within this framework theoretical results from international economics showing how the backlash may arise within standard trade models when considering the ‘social footprint’ of globalization. These theoretical insights are consistent with available empirical evidence pointing to the role of globalization as a driver of the backlash. Yet, globalization is only one of the drivers of the backlash. There are other economic factors playing a similar role, such as technological change, fiscal austerity, and immigration. Moreover, cultural concerns such as status threat, authoritarianism, and nativism do play a relevant role, with a significant interplay with economic drivers. This calls for a broad and comprehensive approach to the backlash, both from an academic and from a policy making perspective

Obesity epidemic in European countries: from an unaddressed risk factor to a medicalized disease?

The editorial/commentary shortly review the current debate about the determinants of obesity and policy to contrast them. It contributes to the hot debate about the use of new drugs to reduce obesit

La Corte di Giustizia UE sulla vendita dei farmaci online

Il capitolo descrive la sentenza della Corte di Giustizia dell’UE Dictopharma Sas c. Union des Groupements de pharmaciens d’officine. La questione vede protagonista la società francese Doctipharma, creatrice di un sito fungente da piattaforma al quale gli utenti possono accedere al fine acquistare prodotti farmaceutici e medicinali, raggiungendo in tal modo siti di farmacie collegate. Tale piattaforma si pone in contrasto con la normativa francese. Dopo un iter presso le corti nazionali, la questione è arrivata in CGUE, la quale ha affermato che si rende necessaria una valutazione caso per caso, tentando di fornire una cornice ai giudici nazionali, ma lasciando margini di indeterminatezza. Rispetto al sistema italiano, urge segnalare in proposito l’esistenza di due circolari ministeriali che non ammette l’utilizzazione di piattaforme o simili per facilitare la commercializzazione di farmaci. Di certo, tali circostanze non paiono essere in linea con il recente fenomeno dell’home delivery, che ben consentono al cliente registrato di selezionare una farmacia ed incaricare il vettore di andare a ritirare il prodotto desiderato. A fronte della sentenza citata, pare ammissibile ritenere che il Ministero della Salute sia indotto a rivedere le proprie posizioni in materi

Essays in Barriers and Pathways to Equitable Development

This dissertation examines how policy interventions can shape individual behavior and development across three distinct contexts: admission tests, mandatory markets for pension savings, and early childhood development. The first paper explores how textual context in Brazil’s ENEM affects performance gaps by socioeconomic status, gender, and ethnicity, revealing that semantic features in test questions significantly influence disparities and identifying pathways for fairer test design. The second paper evaluates a pro-competition reform in Chile’s pension system that made cheaper options available but saw limited uptake due to high levels of inertia. By exploring the timing and consequences of changes in fees, the study finds that participants are much more sensitive to price increases than to equivalent cost reductions. The third paper, co-authored with Diana Krüger, Matias Berthelon, and Rafael Sánchez, leverages an exogenous shock to breastfeeding caused by an earthquake in Chile to estimate its causal effects on child development, showing significant cognitive benefits of extended breastfeeding. Together, these essays highlight the nuanced ways in which policies can mitigate barriers to equity and promote development, offering evidence-based insights for designing effective interventions

The bidirectional link between left ventricular hypertrophy and chronic kidney disease. A cross lagged analysis

Background:Heart failure (HF) is known to reduce glomerular filtration rate (GFR), while chronic kidney disease (CKD) significantly increases the risk of left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH) and HF. Although these connections have been explored in separate studies, comprehensive research examining the mutual links between CKD and LVH progression is lacking.Methods:Our study investigates the longitudinal relationship between estimated GFR (eGFR) and left ventricular mass index (LVMI) in a cohort of 106 CKD patients across stages G1-5. Using a cross-lagged model, we paired each predictor (eGFR or LVMI) with subsequent outcome measurements, adjusting for previous values to ensure accuracy. Over a three-year follow-up period, we analyzed 257 paired LVMI and eGFR measurements.Results:At baseline, the median eGFR was 54 ml/min/1.73 m2, and the LVMI was 134 ± 48 g/m2, with a 62% prevalence of LVH. Our adjusted models revealed that a decrease in eGFR by 1 ml/min/1.73 m2 predicted an increase in LVMI of 1.12 g/m2 (95% CI: 0.71-1.54, P < 0.001). In contrast, high LVMI did not predict a reduction in eGFR over time. This analysis highlights a significant risk of LVH worsening due to GFR loss, while the reverse risk does not achieve statistical significance.Conclusions:Although these observational analyses cannot establish causality, they suggest that the risk of cardiomyopathy driven by kidney disease in stable CKD patients may be more substantial than the risk of CKD progression driven by heart disease. This insight underscores the importance of monitoring kidney function to manage cardiovascular risk in CKD patients

Seasonality and spikes in the natural gas market

In this paper we propose and examine an arbitrage-free model for the natural gas spot price and its convenience yield. Performing an empirical analysis of the European natural gas spot and futures markets, we observe that log spot prices are non-stationary, exhibit mild seasonality, and display almost continuous behaviour. In contrast, the implied convenience yield is stationary, shows strong seasonality, and experiences frequent spikes. Motivated by this evidence, we model the spot convenience yield as a combination of a deterministic seasonal component and a mean-reverting stochastic process with jumps. By assuming an appropriate distribution for the jump component, we derive a closed-form expression for futures prices. Our model demonstrates an excellent fit to European data, both before and after the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russia–Ukraine war