3,495 research outputs found
Tracing cultural change in the reproduction of intolerance : 'secularism', 'Islamism' and others in Turkey’s experience of democratization
Defence date: 16 January 2020Examining Board: Ayhan Kaya, Istanbul Bilgi University; Hanspeter Kriesi, European University Institute – SPS Department; Élise Massicard, CERI, Sciences Po; Olivier Roy, European University Institute – SPS Department (Supervisor)How do cultural resources such as values and beliefs, and their functions in ideology-making, change? In the democratization literature, the value-based approach to culture seeks cultural change based on values. However, the combination of this approach with value-surveys fails to consider several ways in which change may unfold between cultural periods. Instead, this study will delve into a history of conversational texts, which are endogenously grounded within culture, capable of demonstrating culture in action and reflecting what is collective about culture as it operates through dialectical encounters. I focus on change in three landscapes of culture in Turkey, which have witnessed some of the most persistent stories of the unequal relationship between the self and the other
Panacea or producer? Analysing the relationship between international Law and disaster risk
This thesis seeks to critically analyse the relationship between international law and disaster risk.
Despite the increasing global threat that disasters present, international law’s engagement with
their prevention remains at a relatively nascent stage compared to the development of other
areas of the law. However, the progress that has been made since the United Nation’s
International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction in the 1990s suggests that international law
is widely viewed as a valuable tool in addressing the issue and reducing the risk of disasters. In
contrast to this, however, relatively little attention has been paid to the ways that international
law itself may also play a role in the creation of disaster risk.
It is here that the project makes an important and original contribution, by interrogating this
presupposition and analysing the ways that international law itself may be culpable in the
creation and exacerbation of risk. Through a novel, compound theoretical lens combining
Marxist and Third World approaches to international law and insights from disaster theory, the
thesis highlights the longstanding complicity of international law in the production of disaster
risk. The thesis draws on understandings of disasters as processes that reach back through time,
and thus begins its analysis with an examination of the early history of international law and the
role of its colonial doctrines in the historic construction of vulnerability and hazards. It then
turns to modern international law, particularly within the realm of international economic law, to
examine the continuing legacies of these early developments and the ongoing role of
international law in disaster risk creation.
Overall, the thesis offers an original contribution to conversations on the connection between
international law and disaster risk. Rather than focusing only on the positive role that
international law can have in the reduction of disaster risk found in the majority of the literature,
it seeks to highlight more pathological aspects of the relationship between the two and the
implications of this. It ultimately concludes that unless the burgeoning field of international
disaster law engages more with such critical accounts of international law and their
understandings of the harm the law produces, then it will remain blind to a major source of
disaster risk creation and be unsuccessful in achieving its normative aims
A Look at Financial Dependencies by Means of Econophysics and Financial Economics
This is a review about financial dependencies which merges efforts in
econophysics and financial economics during the last few years. We focus on the
most relevant contributions to the analysis of asset markets' dependencies,
especially correlational studies, which in our opinion are beneficial for
researchers in both fields. In econophysics, these dependencies can be modeled
to describe financial markets as evolving complex networks. In particular we
show that a useful way to describe dependencies is by means of information
filtering networks that are able to retrieve relevant and meaningful
information in complex financial data sets. In financial economics these
dependencies can describe asset comovement and spill-overs. In particular,
several models are presented that show how network and factor model approaches
are related to modeling of multivariate volatility and asset returns
respectively. Finally, we sketch out how these studies can inspire future
research and how they contribute to support researchers in both fields to find
a better and a stronger common language
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Towards a Global System of Innovation: the Role of Donors in Immunisation for International Development
This research examines what role donors play with respect to innovation in immunisation for international development. It uses as its conceptual framework the global innovation system (GIS) model to examine the principal donors within the sector. Because the empirical data is in-depth, contextualised, and qualitative, the research design adopted is that of a multiple case-study of donor organisations, using triangulated, mixed-methods qualitative data collection. The examined cases are UNICEF, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance.
Knowledge gaps in the existing literature related to how these donors engage actors and institutions across different spatial levels for innovation; to how donors’ manifold power relations affect this; and to how donor structure and capabilities determine their particular roles in innovation.
The research finds strong evidence of an emerging GIS in immunisation for international development. This consists of a global sub-system and a set of sub-systems at the national level, each representing a country receiving development assistance in immunisation. Donors perform four principal roles within this GIS. Firstly, they provide, maintain and extend structural elements of the GIS, especially its networks and linkages between sub-systems. Secondly, donors generate and utilise resources of financial investment, market access and innovation legitimacy for the valuation of innovation. Thirdly, donors coordinate to ensure complementarity in the activities they and other actors provide, which enables effective distributed agency across the GIS. Fourthly, donors navigate the rules, norms and presumptions of the GIS on behalf of partnerships of actors, variously complying, co-opting or contesting them.
The relationship is shown between each of these principal roles and the system’s spatial levels, inter-actor power relations and donors’ structure and capabilities. This offers new, detailed understanding to close significantly the previously-identified knowledge gaps
Coupling for climate intervention: Sectoral and sustainability couplings for carbon removal and solar geoengineering pathways
Solar geoengineering and negative-emissions technologies are attracting greater attention as prospective ways to tackle and mitigate the worst impacts of climate change. Until now, such options have rarely been examined in a comprehensive manner. Rather, insofar as this has been done, research focused on one or the other, rather than considering a portfolio contribution and, more often, has taken a sectoral approach that looks at the options germane to the agriculture or energy sectors, but not in relation to climate change. Arguing for the need for a wider lens, the current article aims to understand the kinds of couplings and linkages most germane for the effectiveness of a particular option. In specific, we employed a novel dataset garnered from a large expert-interview exercise (N = 125) to conceptualize and consider crucial couplings to solar radiation management and carbon dioxide removal at many levels (across different sectors, differing dimensions of sustainability, productive or destructive impacts, and direct and indirect relationships). Our analysis thereby provides insights into the understanding of climate transitions by explicitly considering the most salient couplings in general as well as how, and to what extent, the various options relate to each other, as a portfolio for climate intervention, and together to climate mitigation and adaptation
Bayesian Forecasting in Economics and Finance: A Modern Review
The Bayesian statistical paradigm provides a principled and coherent approach
to probabilistic forecasting. Uncertainty about all unknowns that characterize
any forecasting problem -- model, parameters, latent states -- is able to be
quantified explicitly, and factored into the forecast distribution via the
process of integration or averaging. Allied with the elegance of the method,
Bayesian forecasting is now underpinned by the burgeoning field of Bayesian
computation, which enables Bayesian forecasts to be produced for virtually any
problem, no matter how large, or complex. The current state of play in Bayesian
forecasting in economics and finance is the subject of this review. The aim is
to provide the reader with an overview of modern approaches to the field, set
in some historical context; and with sufficient computational detail given to
assist the reader with implementation.Comment: The paper is now published online at:
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijforecast.2023.05.00
Yritysten uusiutuvan energian hankinnan kehittymisestä ja tuntikohtaisten vihreän sähkön sertifikaattimarkkinoiden taloudellisesta mallintamisesta
Sähkö on nopeimmin kasvava lopullinen energiamuoto, ja sen kysynnän odotetaan kasvavan nopeasti tulevina vuosikymmeninä. Markkinoille tarvitaan läpinäkyvämpää ja tarkempaa päästölaskentaa, vihreän siirtymän ja kansallisten hiilidioksidipäästötavoitteiden nopeammaksi saavuttamiseksi. Monet organisaatiot kehittävät parhaillaan strategioita tuntitason hiilineutraaliuuteen, sillä monien yksityisten uusiutuvan energian hankintojen kunnianhimo ylittää olemassa olevan sääntelyn tavoitteet. Yritysten kestävyysjohtamisen korkeat standardit ohjaavat siirtymistä kohti uusiutuvan energian ajallista täsmäytystä tai "24/7-täsmäytystä", mikä voisi myös lisätä uskottavuutta hiilineutraaliusväitteisiin sekä vähentää päästöoikeuksien kaksinkertaista laskemista ja viherpesua.
Toistaiseksi sähkön alkuperää on seurattu markkinapohjaisilla vihreillä sertifikaateilla; Euroopassa Guarantees of Origin, jotka mahdollistavat sähkön vuosittaisen tai kuukausittaisen kulutuksen yhdistämisen uusiutuvaan energiaan. Vihreän sähkön osuuden kasvaessa sähköntuotannossa, sähköntuotanto kuitenkin siirtyy aiempaa ajoittaisemmaksi ja vaihtelevammaksi. Kaikilla uusiutuvan energian teknologioilla on omanlaisensa tuotantoprofiilit sekä kausittaiset ja päivänsisäiset vaihtelut. Täten vihreän sähkön kulutus ei aina vastaa sen tuntikohtaista saatavuutta. Lisäksi nykyiset vihreät sertifikaattijärjestelmät eivät heijasta riittävästi uusiutuvan energian oikea-aikaista saatavuutta eivätkä näin ollen edistä investointeja, jotka voisivat tarjota järjestelmän joustavuutta ja vihreän energian ympärivuorokautista saatavuutta. Tämän ongelman ratkaisemiseksi on parhaillaan kehitteillä pilottiversioita vihreän sähkön sertifikaattijärjestelmästä, joka mahdollistaisi sähkön tuotannon ja kulutuksen tuntikohtaisen täsmäytyksen, sillä siirtyminen kohti vihreän energian 24/7-täsmäytystä herättää yhä enemmän kiinnostusta.
Ennen uusien instrumenttien ottamista mukaan markkinoille on kuitenkin välttämätöntä selvittää niiden mahdolliset markkinavaikutukset. Tässä tutkielmassa esittelemme tuntisertifikaattimarkkinoiden taloustieteellisen mallin ja vertaamme 24/7-täsmäytyksen volyymi- ja hintavaikutuksia vihreän sähkön sertifikaateilla perinteisiin sertifikaattimarkkinoihin, joissa sähkönkulutusta täsmäytetään uusiutuvan energian kanssa vuosittain. Analysoimme myös, kuinka kuluttajan hyöty tuntikohtaisista vihreistä sertifikaateista vaihtelee eri ajankohtien välillä, kun uusiutuvan energian saatavuus vaihtelee. Havaitsemme, että kuluttajien hyöty tuntikohtaisten sertifikaattien hankinnasta laskee uusiutuvan energian tuotannon kasvaessa. Näin ollen kuluttajan hyöty sertifikaateista on suurin silloin, kun myös korkeapäästöisen energian osuus on korkea. Tuntikohtaiset vihreät sertifikaatit voisivat siis tarjota eniten hyötyä sekä kuluttajille että tuottajille niinä tunteina, jolloin uusiutuvaa energiaa on tarjolla vähemmän.
Havaitsemme myös, että tuntikohtainen täsmäytys voisi joko lisätä tai vähentää kuluttajan uusiutuvan energian hankintakustannuksia ja tuottajan tuloja yksittäisten tuntien sisällä verrattuna vuosittaiseen tai kuukausittaiseen täsmäyttämiseen. Näin ollen tuntikohtainen sertifiointi voisi tarjota lisähyötyä teknologioille, joita tarvitaan täydelliseen järjestelmän laajuiseen hiilidioksidipäästöjen nollaamiseen, kuten energian varastointiratkaisuille. Näin ollen tuntikohtaisen sertifikaattijärjestelmän kehittämisessä tulisi keskittyä tämän vaikutuksen korostamiseen, mikä voisi edelleen kannustaa investointeja sähkömarkkinajärjestelmän joustavuuteen. Tarvitaan kuitenkin lisätutkimusta mahdollisten vaikutusten selvittämiseksi erityisesti sähkömarkkina-alueilla, joissa uusiutuvan energian osuus on jo korkea. Lisäksi täytyy vielä selvittää, onko tällaiselle järjestelmälle kysyntää yksityissektorilla ja johtaisiko tuntikohtainen täsmäytys yhteiskunnan kannalta optimaalisesti korkeampiin päästövähennyksiin kuin perinteiset sertifikaattijärjestelmät.Electricity is the fastest-growing final form of energy, and its demand is expected to increase rapidly in the coming decades. More transparent and accurate emission accounting is needed to accelerate green transition and achieve national decarbonization targets. Many organizations are currently developing strategies to reach carbon neutrality on an hourly basis as private renewable energy procurement is outpacing regulatory targets. The high standards of corporate sustainability management are driving the movement towards temporal matching or “24/7 matching” of renewable energy, which could also provide more credibility to net zero claims as well as decrease double-counting and greenwashing.
Thus far, electricity has been tracked with tradable green certificates, Guarantees of Origin in Europe, which enable matching electricity consumption on an annual or monthly basis with renewable energy. However, while the share of green power grows in the electricity generation mix, it also comes with problems of intermittent and variable production. All renewable energy technologies have unique resource profiles and seasonal and intra-day fluctuations. Thus, supply from green energy is unlikely to always align with the actual timing of consumption. In addition, the current green certificate systems do not adequately reflect the timely availability of renewable energy and hence do not drive investments that could provide system flexibility and around-the-clock availability of green energy. To address this issue, pilot versions of tradable certification instrument that would enable hourly or sub-hourly tracking of electricity are currently under development as the movement towards 24/7 matching of green energy is gaining more interest.
However, before introducing new instruments to the existing markets, it is essential to study the possible market effects. In this thesis, we introduce an economic model for the hourly certificate market and compare the volume and price effects of 24/7 matching with hourly renewable energy certificates with traditional certificate markets, where electricity consumption is matched on an annual basis. We also analyze how the consumer’s utility from hourly green certificates varies between times with more available renewable energy generation and when green power is less abundant. We find that consumers utility from purchasing hourly certificates decreases when the share of renewable energy surges. Accordingly, the consumer’s utility from hourly certificates is the highest when also the share of emitting energy is high. Therefore, hourly green certificates could provide the most benefit to both, consumers, and producers, in hours when renewable energy is less abundant.
We also find that hourly matching could either increase or decrease the consumer’s procurement costs and the revenues of the producer within single hours or sub-hours than matching with an annual or monthly goal. Consequently, hourly certification could provide additionality to technologies needed for complete system-wide decarbonization, such as energy storage solutions. Thus, the scheme’s development should focus on accentuating this effect that could further spur investments into system flexibility. However, more research is needed to examine the possible system effects especially in grids with already high renewable energy penetration, whether there is demand for such a system from the residential sector, and whether hourly certificates would lead to higher grid decarbonization than traditional schemes in a socially optimal way
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