Without purpose and strategy?: a spatio-functional analysis of the regional allocation of public investment in Greece

We utilise a large database on public investment at the prefecture (NUTS-3) level in Greece for the period 1976-2008 to examine the spatial and functional allocation of public investment in the country. We investigate the extent to which expenditures in different types of public investment are complementary across space and over time and examine their redistributive character. We also analyse regional specialisations and the geographical concentration of public investments and complementarily use an exploratory spatial data analysis to examine the extent of clustering of public investment and identify possible patterns in the geography of clusters and hotspots. Although our analysis uses predominantly descriptive tools, our results have confirmatory power, as they reveal a surprisingly random pattern for the spatial and functional allocation of public investment in Greece, thus raising important questions about the rationale for these allocations and, by implication, about the geographical, political and economic dynamics that underlie them. These questions obtain an additional salience in light of the administrative and fiscal reforms pursued currently by the Greek government under the pressure of the country’s sovereign debt crisis

Foreign Direct Investments, Regional Incentives and Regional Attractiveness in Greece

The aim of this paper is to analyze the Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) activity in Greece. The paper starts with defining the main FDI terms and giving a general literature review corresponding to the FDI allocation. Then, there is a description of recent trends in FDI activity both worldwide and Greece. Especially FDI investments in Greece are analyzed presenting the magnitudes of inflows, outflows, inward stock, outward stock, as well as foreign mergers and acquisitions, in terms of sales and purchases. The second part of the paper describes the regional and sectoral allocation of FDI in Greece, emphasizing whether the investment incentive scheme contributes to the attraction of FDI in specific regions, or the growth rate of each region is the main motive for locating foreign investment capital. The analysis is based on the most recent statistical data covering magnitudes until 2002.

Seismic reliability assessment of classical columns subjected to near-fault ground motions

A methodology for the performance-based seismic risk assessment of classical columns is presented. Despite their apparent instability, classical columns are, in general, earthquake resistant, as proven from the fact that many classical monuments have survived many strong earthquakes over the centuries. Nevertheless, the quantitative assessment of their reliability and the understanding of their dynamic behavior are not easy, because of the fundamental nonlinear character and the sensitivity of their response. In this paper, a seismic risk assessment is performed for a multidrum column using Monte Carlo simulation with synthetic ground motions. The ground motions adopted contain a high- and low-frequency component, combining the stochastic method, and a simple analytical pulse model to simulate the directivity pulse contained in near source ground motions. The deterministic model for the numerical analysis of the system is three-dimensional and is based on the Discrete Element Method. Fragility curves are produced conditional on magnitude and distance from the fault and also on scalar intensity measures for two engineering demand parameters, one concerning the intensity of the response during the ground shaking and the other the residual deformation of the column. Three performance levels are assigned to each engineering demand parameter. Fragility analysis demonstrated some of the salient features of these spinal systems under near-fault seismic excitations, as for example, their decreased vulnerability for very strong earthquakes of magnitude 7 or larger. The analysis provides useful results regarding the seismic reliability of classical monuments and decision making during restoration process

The Cultural Environment Approach of Urban Development: the Case Study of the City of Veria, Greece.

The culture of any city undoubtedly promotes its development. The formulation and implementation of cultural policies, a key issue for urban economic development, relate to a variety of economic sectors. Cultural elements that can contribute to urban development could be either a direct promotion of its cultural identity, or their residents’ contribution to the achievement of high quality of life, generating competitiveness between similar cities. The research aim is the investigation of the ways that a city’s cultural reserve can be the means of its development. The particular research methodology was a questionnaire survey, addressed to the inhabitants (200) and visitors (50) of Veria, a medium size city in Northern Greece. The research object was Veria’s cultural environment and its impacts to urban regeneration. It is of vital importance to establish whether Veria’s residents are familiar with their local culture, whether they appropriate it and, consequently, whether they are satisfied from the relevant promotional policy. It was requested from them to evaluate the current management policy of their city’s cultural reserve, followed by their observations and proposals. Furthermore, it was examined whether Veria’s culture could be a stimulant for visitors, by demanding a direct evaluation of the applied cultural promotional policy. It is observed that tourism was one of the main visiting criteria, followed by commuting to working, and using the city as a passage point to other neighbouring destinations. Visitors claim that Veria’s cultural environment could be, undoubtedly, the main stimulant for cultural tourist attraction, if promoted in the appropriate manner. The residents’ discontent was also expressed in terms of the city’s inadequate applied cultural reserve management. They believe that Veria’s local culture could contribute not only to urban regeneration, but also to regional development. A formulation of innovative management policies is critically essential, as well as the immediate need of the inclusion of innovative technologies in Veria’s cultural promotion plans.

Defining the quality of urban life: Which factors should be considered?

In 2010 the World Health Organisation dedicated the Word Health Day to urbanization and health, highlighting the impacts of urban living on physical and mental health. This is because it is increasingly acknowledged that cities face various problems that undermine the quality of urban life, e.g.social inequalities, urban crime, poor environment, and traffic congestion. Despite this fact, cities continue to play a vital role in development, as they offer higher education, specialized services and jobs. When it comes to an assessment of the living conditions and well-being in cities, economic indices have failed to capture the aforementioned contradiction of urban life. A concept able to monitor the multidimensional nature of cities seems to be the “quality of urban life†(QOUL). The multidimensionality of the QOUL concept reflects the variety of the examined dimensions, but also the range of the different uses of the term. Many different approaches of this concept can be found not only between papers of different disciplines (health sciences, social sciences or planning), but also in the context of the same scientific field. Thus, although there has recently been a remarkable number of comparative studies and papers concerning the evaluation of QOUL in different cities, the factors taken into account are far from being standard. In part, this is because the constituents of the QOUL depend on rather subjective factors, such as culture and tradition in the examined places. However, for a given place and a specific time period there can be an agreement concerning the determinants of QOUL. This will allow for relative research to be comparable and better interpretable. This paper starts with an analysis of the standard approaches of the QOUL concept as they can be found in the relative scientific literature. It continues with the analysis of QOUL determinants in societies, focusing in cities. The criteria taken into account for the measurement of the QOUL in the evaluation of cities and the city rankings are also examined. Finally, a range of factors which can be used as a standard set when examining the QOUL in European cities is proposed.

Topological Properties of Gauge Fields on a Lattice

Euclidean solutions to the classical Yang-Mills equations (instantons, merons, etc.) are important for the non-perturbative description of gauge theories. lt is believed that these (topological in nature) solutions should provide a hint of confinement, chiral synmmetry breaking etc. It was realised by 't-Hooft that there are several types of boundary conditions(Twisted Boundary Conditions) for the gauge field which preserve the periodicity of non-local gauge invariant quantities. In this work we present numerical evidence that on a lattice and using Twisted Boundary Conditions we can have topological objects with non-integer topological charge (second Chern class). The theory of fibre bundles (Chapter 2) is discussed and emphasis is given on its connection with the topological properties of the Gauge Theories. We introduce the gauge invariants twists etamunu and we define non-Abelian fluxes. Since the Z(N) Group does not act identically on the matter field we have to introduce the flavor twist in addition to the color twist on the Psi-field. We express(Chapter 3) the winding number in terms of the twist transition functions in a finite Euclidean box in the continuum and its implications on the lower bounds of the action are discussed. Various combinations of the etamunus were constructed and applied on the lattice. The only assumption for the incorporation of the twist on the lattice is the periodicity of the plaquette. We evaluated (Chapter 4) the eigenvalues of Gamma5M (M is the Fermion Matrix) both for Wilson and Kogut-Susskind Fermions. The spectrum of the eigenvalues showed that under the introduction of color and flavor twist for the fermion field there is evidence for the restoration of a "form" of the Index Theorem on a Lattice. The eigenvalue problem for specific twisted configurations was studied and arguments are presented for the discrepancy between our numerical results and the number of zero modes obtained via the Index Theorem

Strongly coupled lattice gauge theory with dynamical fermion mass generation in three dimensions

We investigate the critical behaviour of a three-dimensional lattice \chiU\phi_3 model in the chiral limit. The model consists of a staggered fermion field, a U(1) gauge field (with coupling parameter $\beta$) and a complex scalar field (with hopping parameter $\kappa$). Two different methods are used: 1) fits of the chiral condensate and the mass of the neutral unconfined composite fermion to an equation of state and 2) finite size scaling investigations of the Lee-Yang zeros of the partition function in the complex fermion mass plane. For strong gauge coupling ($\beta < 1$) the critical exponents for the chiral phase transition are determined. We find strong indications that the chiral phase transition is in one universality class in this $\beta$ interval: that of the three-dimensional Gross-Neveu model with two fermions. Thus the continuum limit of the \chiU\phi_3 model defines here a nonperturbatively renormalizable gauge theory with dynamical mass generation. At weak gauge coupling and small $\kappa$, we explore a region in which the mass in the neutral fermion channel is large but the chiral condensate on finite lattices very small. If it does not vanish in the infinite volume limit, then a continuum limit with massive unconfined fermion might be possible in this region, too.Comment: 27 pages, 16 figure