The Role of Social Institutions in Determining Aid Effectiveness

In recent years, scholars and policymakers have placed growing attention on the issue of aid effectiveness, that is, the efficiency of donor assistance in achieving stated economic and human development objectives. While research has tended to highlight the need for greater capacity building and improved governance as mechanisms to make aid 'effective', the social origins of such mechanisms have not been thoroughly examined. Using the latest cross- country indicator series on aid effectiveness from the OECD and the Indices of Social Development, hosted at the Institute of Social Studies in the Hague, this paper examines the determinants of effective aid spending, and finds a significant effect linking the quality of aid assistance to social institutions relating to public order and trust. These effects are verified when instrumenting social ins

Methodology of the Indices of Social Development

In recent years, international organizations, think-tanks, and the social sciences have contributed to a dramatic expansion in the range of composite indices measuring concepts such as human development, governance, or social capital. This paper discusses challenges faced in the design of composite indices, and suggests the method known as matching pe

Social Institutions as a Form of Intangible Capital

In recent years there has been growing interest in including estimates of "intangible" capital, such as knowledge, skills, and institutions, in national asset accounting. In accordance with these efforts, this paper attempts to provide the first worldwide evaluations of "social" institutions, understood as the norms and networks that reduce transaction costs and enable collec

The last mile in analysing well-being and poverty: Indices of Social Development

Development practitioners worldwide increasingly recognize the importance of informal institutions -- such as norms of cooperation, non-discrimination, or the role of community oversight in the management of investment activities -- in affecting well-being, poverty, and even economic growth. While there have been many country- or region-specific studies that explore relationships between such social development indicators and other development outcomes, there has been less empirical analysis that tests these relationships at the international level. This is largely due to data limitations: few reliable, globally- representative data sources exist that can provide a basis for cross-country comparison of social norms and practice, social trust and community engagement. The International Institute of Social Studies (ISS) now hosts a large database of social development indicators compiled from a wide range of sources in a first attempt to overcome such data constraints, at a low cost (www.IndSocDev.org). It will continuously expand the power of the database by including new data and variables and by developing new techniques to integrate, enrich and analyze the data to make the best possible use of this rich dataset. The Indices of Social Development (ISD) are based on over 200 measures from 25 reputable data sources for the years 1990 to 2010. These measures are aggregated into five composite indices: civic activism, interpersonal safety and trust, inter-group cohesion, clubs and associations, and gender equity/equality and non-discrimination against women. Not all data sources provide observations for indicators in each country, but together these data sources allow for comprehensive estimates of social behavior and norms of interaction across a broad range of societies, and increasingly with possibilities to track changes over time. The indices allow the estimation of the effects of social development for a large range of countries, broadening the scope for cross-country statistical and analytical work on social development and the relationship with economic development. This paper presents this database, highlight the differences, similarities and complementarities with other measures of well-being, including around income poverty, multi-dimensional poverty, and human development

The European Hematology Association Roadmap for European Hematology Research. A Consensus Document

Abstract The European Hematology Association (EHA) Roadmap for European Hematology Research highlights major achievements in diagnosis and treatment of blood disorders and identifies the greatest unmet clinical and scientific needs in those areas to enable better funded, more focused European hematology research. Initiated by the EHA, around 300 experts contributed to the consensus document, which will help European policy makers, research funders, research organizations, researchers, and patient groups make better informed decisions on hematology research. It also aims to raise public awareness of the burden of blood disorders on European society, which purely in economic terms is estimated at Euro 23 billion per year, a level of cost that is not matched in current European hematology research funding. In recent decades, hematology research has improved our fundamental understanding of the biology of blood disorders, and has improved diagnostics and treatments, sometimes in revolutionary ways. This progress highlights the potential of focused basic research programs such as this EHA Roadmap. The EHA Roadmap identifies nine sections in hematology: normal hematopoiesis, malignant lymphoid and myeloid diseases, anemias and related diseases, platelet disorders, blood coagulation and hemostatic disorders, transfusion medicine, infections in hematology, and hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. These sections span 60 smaller groups of diseases or disorders. The EHA Roadmap identifies priorities and needs across the field of hematology, including those to develop targeted therapies based on genomic profiling and chemical biology, to eradicate minimal residual malignant disease, and to develop cellular immunotherapies, combination treatments, gene therapies, hematopoietic stem cell treatments, and treatments that are better tolerated by elderly patients. Received December 15, 2015. Accepted January 27, 2016. Copyright © 2016, Ferrata Storti Foundatio

Search for standard model production of four top quarks in the lepton + jets channel in pp collisions at √s = 8 TeV

Open Access, Copyright CERN, for the benefit of the CMS Collaboration. Article funded by SCOAP3.Abstract: A search is presented for standard model (SM) production of four top quarks (Formula presented.) in pp collisions in the lepton + jets channel. The data correspond to an integrated luminosity of 19.6 fb−1 recorded at a centre-of-mass energy of 8 TeV with the CMS detector at the CERN LHC. The expected cross section for SM (Formula presented.) production is (Formula presented.). A combination of kinematic reconstruction and multivariate techniques is used to distinguish between the small signal and large background. The data are consistent with expectations of the SM, and an upper limit of 32 fb is set at a 95% confidence level on the cross section for producing four top quarks in the SM, where a limit of 32 ± 17 fb is expected

Empirical Studies on Cash Payments

Cash is still the most common means of daily payments. The large number of cash payments is supported by a costly distribution system in which retailers, banks and central banks participate. Currency is issued in a range of bank note and coin denominations to facilitate efficiency in cash payments. The purpose of this thesis is to study the performance of a currency range in practice. It presents a number of empirical studies on cash payments at the individual payment level, whereby cash payments are viewed as the outcome of a choice process. This type of analysis calls for labor-intensive data collection methods and the development of a sophisticated econometric model. This thesis introduces such a model for cash payments, and it reviews its application to three unique data sets of cash payments. The data concern payments in the Netherlands before and after the transition from the guilder to the euro in 2002, and payments in an experimental setting. The estimation results allow for an assessment of the use of different bank note and coin denominations in cash payments, and of possible preferences for one of more denominations. Currency research generally approaches currency use from a macroeconomic point of view. The novelty of this thesis is that it contributes to currency research by focusing on individual cash payments.Jeanine Kippers (1973) obtained her master´s degree in econometrics from the Erasmus University Rotterdam in 1997. In the same year she was employed by De Nederlandsche Bank. She participated in the preparations of the cash changeover from guilder to euro in 2002, and contributed to the development of a European cash distribution system and the restructuring of the national distribution system. During her employment at the central bank she started her research on currency use, which resulted in several papers that have been published or are currently under review. In January 2004 she joined the Pensionand Insurance Supervisory authority, as a policy advisor in the (international) field of insurance supervision