"Is My Crown Better than Your Euro? Exchange Rates and Public Opinion on the European Single Currency"

The No to the euro in referendums in Denmark and Sweden has been characterized as a public rebellion against an elite project and a sign of a general Euroscepticism among the citizens. However, it is often ignored that support for the euro fluctuates significantly over time in these countries, and hence analysing referendum outcomes simply in terms on static factors will provide only part of the explanation. In contrast to existing studies, this paper provides an analysis of the short-term dynamics in public support for the euro in the period leading up to the referendums. We thus address the question of why public attitudes towards monetary integration vary over time. We argue that at least part of the answer can be found in exchange rate fluctuations. Existing studies have neglected the fact that the national currency is not only a purely monetary indicator, but also carries symbolic weight. The public is therefore less likely to surrender their national currency when it is strong than when it is weak. They are also less willing to accept a replacement currency (e.g. the euro) when it is seen as weak vis-à-vis other world currencies. Our analysis of the two euro campaigns lends credence to our proposition that exchange rates matter. Moreover, we test impact of exchange rate changes on support of the euro using time series analysis. We find that the rapid fall in the value of the euro vis-à-vis the dollar contributed to the Danish rejection of the euro, whereas the strength of the Swedish currency made the Swedes more reluctant to relinquish their crown

The Global Financial Crisis and the European Integration Project

When the global financial crisis hit the shores of Europe, after crossing the Atlantic, the Eurozone was considered a safe haven. After the first Greek bailout in May 2010, the discourse had now changed completely; the debt crisis was the euro’s fault. As a result, some argued that Greece and eventually other bailed-out member states should abandon the euro and reintroduce their national currencies. If they did not, then countries such as Germany and the Netherlands would give up on supporting them financially, forcing them to abandon the euro anyway. Yet, no such thing has happened. The euro and the European Union are still with us. In fact, European integration has been deepened as a result of the debt crisis. This paper explains why the doomsayers have been wrong on durability of the Eurozone.Debt crisis, Euro, European integration, European Monetary Union, European Union, Financial crisis.,

Understanding EU trade policy in the twenty-first century

The EU has negotiated numerous bilateral trade agreements with countries around the world during the last two decades. As we move into 2020, Patrick Leblond and Crina Viju-Miljusevic take stock of the changes that have occurred in EU trade policy in the twenty-first century and highlight some key future research agendas

Large Extra Dimensions from a Small Extra Dimension

Models with extra dimensions have changed our understanding of the hierarchy problem. In general, these models explain the weakness of gravity by diluting gravity in a large bulk volume, or by localizing the graviton away from the standard model. In this paper, we show that the warped geometries necessary for the latter scenario can naturally induce the large volumes necessary for the former. We present a model in which a large volume is stabilized without supersymmetry. We comment on the phenomenology of this scenario and generalizations to additional dimensions.Comment: Some formulae altered, conclusions unchange

Evaluating Current Practices in Shelf Life Estimation

The current International Council for Harmonisation of Technical Requirements for Pharmaceuticals for Human Use (ICH) methods for determining the supported shelf life of a drug product, described in ICH guidance documents Q1A and Q1E, are evaluated in this paper. To support this evaluation, an industry data set is used which is comprised of 26 individual stability batches of a common drug product where most batches are measured over a 24 month storage period. Using randomly sampled sets of 3 or 6 batches from the industry data set, the current ICH methods are assessed from three perspectives. First, the distributional properties of the supported shelf lives are summarized and compared to the distributional properties of the true shelf lives associated with the industry data set, assuming the industry data set represents a finite population of drug product batches for discussion purposes. Second, the results of the ICH poolability^ tests for model selection are summarized and the separate shelf life distributions from the possible alternative models are compared. Finally, the ICH methods are evaluated in terms of their ability to manage risk. Shelf life estimates that are too long result in an unacceptable percentage of nonconforming batches at expiry while those that are too short put the manufacturer at risk of possibly having to prematurely discard safe and efficacious drug product. Based on the analysis of the industry data set, the ICH-recommended approach did not produce supported shelf lives that effectively managed risk. Alternative approaches are required

An integrated and statistical approach for the valuation of economic status of small scale fisheries

The small scale fisheries are generally unknown over the world due to a crucial lack of data, and particularly costs and earnings data. This is also true for the European fisheries while vessels less than 12 meters represent almost 75% of the total European fleet. Faced to the increasing price of fuel and the depletion of traditional exploiting marine resources, fisheries managers need to know more about the small scale fleet, also in terms of its diversity. This paper first presents an integrated methodology, combining both biological and economic disciplines, used to collect data on small scale fisheries through questionnaires. The first set of collected data is used to produce a revenue model to assess individual earnings depending on technical characteristics and the fishing activity of the vessel. This revenue model allows then to assess the production of small scale fisheries per group of vessels. This revenue model is used in parallel to optimize the following sampling plans for collection of costs and earnings data. Implemented for 6 years in France, this system makes possible the assessment of total and per fleet gross value added and direct employment in the small scale fisheries. The results are presented in this paper and show the significant role of small scale fisheries in the French fishing sector

Genetic markers of Restless Legs Syndrome in Parkinson disease

INTRODUCTION: Several studies proposed that Restless Legs Syndrome (RLS) and Parkinson disease (PD) may be clinically and/or etiologically related. To examine this hypothesis, we aimed to determine whether the known RLS genetic markers may be associated with PD risk, as well as with PD subtype. METHODS: Two case-control cohorts from Tel-Aviv and New-York, including 1133 PD patients and 867 controls were genotyped for four RLS-related SNPs in the genes MEIS1, BTBD9, PTPRD and MAP2K5/SKOR1. The association between genotype, PD risk and phenotype was tested using multivariate regression models. RESULTS: None of the tested SNPs was significantly associated with PD risk, neither in any individual cohort nor in the combined analysis after correction for multiple comparisons. The MAP2K5/SKOR1 marker rs12593813 was associated with higher frequency of tremor in the Tel-Aviv cohort (61.0% vs. 46.5%, p = 0.001, dominant model). However, the risk allele for tremor in this gene has been associated with reduced RLS risk. Moreover, this association did not replicate in Tremor-dominant PD patients from New-York. CONCLUSION: RLS genetic risk markers are not associated with increased PD risk or subtype in the current study. Together with previous genetic, neuropathological and epidemiologic studies, our results further strengthen the notion that RLS and PD are likely to be distinct entities

Homozygous microdeletion of exon 5 in ZNF277 in a girl with specific language impairment

Peer reviewedPublisher PD

GBA mutations are associated with Rapid eye movement sleep behavior disorder

Rapid eye movement sleep behavior disorder and GBA mutations are both associated with Parkinson’s disease. The GBA gene was sequenced in idiopathic rapid eye movement sleep behavior disorder patients (n = 265), and compared to controls (n = 2240). Rapid eye movement sleep behavior disorder questionnaire was performed in an independent Parkinson’s disease cohort (n = 120). GBA mutations carriers had an OR of 6.24 (10.2% in patients vs. 1.8% in controls, P < 0.0001) for rapid eye movement sleep behavior disorder, and among Parkinson’s disease patients, the OR for mutation carriers to have probable rapid eye movement sleep behavior disorder was 3.13 (P = 0.039). These results demonstrate that rapid eye movement sleep behavior disorder is associated with GBA mutations, and that combining genetic and prodromal data may assist in identifying individuals susceptible to Parkinson’s disease