Social learning in LEADER: Exogenous, endogenous and hybrid evaluation in rural development

This paper considers the relationship between the centralised exogenous, institutions and the embedded, endogenous institutions of rural governance in Europe through an examination the evaluation procedures of the European LEADER programme. LEADER is presented in the literature as progressive in terms of innovation and stakeholder engagement. Yet while the planning and management of LEADER embraces heterogeneity and participation, programmatic evaluation is centralised and held at arms length from delivery organisations. The paper reviews previous efforts to improve evaluation in LEADER and considers alternative strategies for evaluation, contrasting LEADER practice with participatory evaluation methodologies in the wider international context. Can evaluation in itself be valuable as a mode of social learning and hence a driver for endogenous development in rural communities in Europe? The paper concludes by examining the challenges in producing a hybrid form of evaluation which accommodates endogenous and exogenous values

Detection of diffuse and specular interface reflections and inter-reflections by color image segmentation

We present a computational model and algorithm for detecting diffuse and specular interface reflections and some inter-reflections. Our color reflection model is based on the dichromatic model for dielectric materials and on a color space, called S space, formed with three orthogonal basis functions. We transform color pixels measured in RGB into the S space and analyze color variations on objects in terms of brightness, hue and saturation which are defined in the S space. When transforming the original RGB data into the S space, we discount the scene illumination color that is estimated using a white reference plate as an active probe. As a result, the color image appears as if the scene illumination is white. Under the whitened illumination, the interface reflection clusters in the S space are all aligned with the brightness direction. The brightness, hue and saturation values exhibit a more direct correspondence to body colors and to diffuse and specular interface reflections, shading, shadows and inter-reflections than the RGB coordinates. We exploit these relationships to segment the color image, and to separate specular and diffuse interface reflections and some inter-reflections from body reflections. The proposed algorithm is effications for uniformly colored dielectric surfaces under singly colored scene illumination. Experimental results conform to our model and algorithm within the liminations discussed.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/41303/1/11263_2004_Article_BF00128233.pd

Untangling the effects of overexploration and overexploitation on organizational performance: The moderating role of environmental dynamism

Because a firm's optimal knowledge search behavior is determined by unique firm and industry conditions, organizational performance should be contingent oil the degree to which a firm's actual level of knowledge search deviates from the optimal level. It is thus hypothesized that deviation from the optimal search, in the form of either overexploitation or overexploration, is detrimental to organizational performance. Furthermore, the negative effect of search deviation oil organizational performance varies with environmental dynamism: that is, overexploitation is expected to become more harmful. whereas overexploration becomes less so with all increase in environmental dynamism. The empirical analyses yield results consistent with these arguments. Implications for research and practice are correspondingly discussed