The new public corruption: Old questions for new challenges

This paper focuses on corruption in public procurement. It describes the contemporary face of corruption by investigating the role of public accountability in the fight against corruption. The paper describes a specific episode of corruption relative to the awarding of government contracts for big events, such as the celebration of the 150th anniversary of Italian unification. Relying on the philosophical insights of Rousseau, Popper, Kant and others, the study suggests the need for enabling a democratic control and constructing a public ethics for the common good

The new public corruption: Old questions for new challenges

© 2016 Elsevier Ltd This paper focuses on corruption in public procurement. It describes the contemporary face of corruption by investigating the role of public accountability in the fight against corruption. The paper describes a specific episode of corruption relative to the awarding of government contracts for big events, such as the celebration of the 150th anniversary of Italian unification. Relying on the philosophical insights of Rousseau, Popper, Kant and others, the study suggests the need for enabling a democratic control and constructing a public ethics for the common good

Grading and metastable effects in admittance spectroscopy of CIGS-based solar cells

Cu(In, Ga)Se2-based (CIGS) solar cells have achieved efficiencies up to 20%. Despite these excellent results, the understanding of the underlying mechanisms and the influence of defects on their performance is still incomplete. The determination of the energetic position of the defects and of their density of states is important. Admittance spectroscopy is an adequate technique for this. By varying the external voltage during the measurement, the spatial position where the defect distribution is sensed can be varied. However, the application of external biases can lead to metastable effects in the absorber and therefore to defect relaxation and changes in the doping distribution. Hence, it is important to separate between the effects caused by metastable changes and the change in sensing position of the admittance spectroscopy measurement. This can be achieved by varying the applied voltage during the creation of the metastable state and the measurement itself independently or simultaneously. Admittance spectroscopy under different bias voltage conditions performed on a flexible CIGS-based solar cell are presented and assessed

A Vertical Asymmetry in Saccades

Visual exploration of natural scenes imposes demands that differ between the upper and the lower visual hemifield. Yet little is known about how ocular motor performance is affected by the location of visual stimuli or the direction of a behavioural response. We compared saccadic latencies between upper and lower hemifield in a variety of conditions, including short-latency prosaccades, long-latency prosaccades, antisaccades, memory-guided saccades and saccades with increased attentional and selection demand. All saccade types, except memory guided saccades, had shorter latencies when saccades were directed towards the upper field as compared to downward saccades (

Influence of an Sb doping layer in CIGS thin-film solar cells: a photoluminescence study

Sb doping of Cu(In,Ga)Se2 (CIGS) solar cells has been reported to exhibit a positive effect on the morphology of the absorber layer, offering a possibility to lower manufacturing cost by lowering the annealing temperatures during the CIGS deposition. In this work electron microscopy, energy-dispersive x-ray spectroscopy and photoluminescence experiments have been performed on cells deposited on soda-lime glass substrates, adding a thin Sb layer onto the Mo back contact prior to the CIGS absorber deposition. The defect structure of CIGS solar cells doped with Sb in this way has been investigated and is compared with that of undoped reference cells. The influence of substrate temperature during absorber growth has also been evaluated. For all samples the photoluminescence results can be explained by considering three donor–acceptor pair recombination processes involving the same defect pairs

La Sentenza Franzese e la sua applicazione giurisprudenziale negli anni 2002-2010

This thesis concerns the criminal liability of the doctor and brings more clearly into focus the causal connection between the actions or omissions without malice aforethought performed by the doctor and the detrimental or deadly event suffered by the patient. The question at issue has been largely debated by the United Sections of the Criminal Court that pronunced itself on the well-known leading case Franzese in 2002. In the first instance, I ana-lyse the most important and innovative profiles of this pronunciation, trying to highlight the critical points. The thesis’s central part consists in examining the jurisprudence of the Criminal Court of Cassation from 2002 to 2010, in order to verify whether the principles dictated by the United Sections have been incorporated and applied in point of fact both by the Court of legitimacy and by that of merits. It must be underlined that, in spite of the fact that some sentences have made use of those principles actually and essentially, there are others that have made only a simple and formal reference to those principles, diminishing substantially their practical application. In addition to the case law analysis, I give an account of the most in-fluential doctrinal contributions. These are useful for forecasting the nearest future developments of this subject

We are what we tell: An inquiry into NGOs’ organizational identity and accountability

Purpose – This study offers a critical inquiry into accountability vis-à-vis organizational identity formation. It investigates how accountability evolves in the transformation of an NGO operating in the field of migration management from an informal grassroots group into a fully-fledged organization. Design/methodology/approach – The paper is the outcome of a participatory action research project on Welcome Refugees (WR), a UK based NGO. The project involved documentary analysis, focus group and semi-structured interviews, field notes, and participant observation. The analysis draws from poststructuralist theorization to explain the interplay between organizational identity and different forms of NGO accountability over time. Findings – The study shows how different forms of accountability became salient over time and were experienced differently by organizational members thus leading to competing collective identity narratives. Organizational members felt accountable to beneficiaries in different ways and this was reflected in their identification with the organization. Some advocated a rights-based approach that partially resonated with the accountability demands of external donors, while others aimed at enacting their feelings of accountability by preserving their closeness with beneficiaries and using a need-based approach. These differences led to an identity struggle that was ultimately solved through the silencing of marginalised narratives and the adoption of an adaptive regime of accountability. Practical implications – The findings of the case are of practical relevance to quasi-organizations that struggle to form and maintain organizational identity in their first years of operation. Their survival depends not only on their ability to accommodate and/or resist a multiplicity of accountability demands but also on their ability to develop a shared and common understanding of identity accountability. Originality/value – The paper problematizes rather than takes for granted the process through which organizations acquire a viable identity and the role of accountability within them

Assignment of capacitance spectroscopy signals of CIGS solar cells to effects of non-ohmic contacts

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