Detection of Major River Bed Changes in the River Ebro (north-eastern Spain)

Detection of major river bed changes in River Ebro (northeastern Spain

A Cybernetic Paradigm for Organizational Assessment

The main purpose of this paper is to focus attention in organizations on a cybernetic viewpoint. From this point of view organization and planning are homologous. What a system does does not depend on what it would like to do. A system does what its organization allows it to do, no more, no less. The organization of a system in one way or another represents a measure of the level of environmental situations that it is capable of controlling. The criterion of effectiveness is viability in the long run. To make this criterion of assessment operational, I shall elucidate my concept of organization as opposed to an institution, and provide a cybernetic language to refer to complexity and control. The basic elements of the analysis are variety, or the number of possible states of a system, Ashby's law of requisite variety or the fact that variety can only be absorbed by variety and Beer's organizational model of any viable system. Under this conceptual framework three steps are developed to analyze organizational effectiveness, and they are presented in order of generality. The first is the organizational consistency. It is in general a metasystemic analysis of relevant institutions and their subsystems. Is it possible or not for them, considering their metasystemic relationships, to fulfill their "established purposes"? The second step after testing the consistency is the structural effectiveness. It is concerned with the distribution of variety along the organizational structure. Some structures are more effective than others in matching environmental variety. This step is concerned with the traditional dichotomy -- centralization versus decentralization. The third step is the organizational epistemology or the particular way in which systems acquire knowledge about their relevant environment. The necessary filtering of complexity suggests that systems select a set of variables or quantities which define the system-environment area of stability

A Method to Study the Organizational Dimension of Regional Programs

Our current research activities at IIASA provide the opportunity to study five cases on the organization of regional development. These cases are TVA, Bratsk-Ilimsk Territorial Production Complex, Scotland, Vistula-Lublin and Guayana in Venezuela. The aim of this paper is to present a research method for this purpose independent of the particular characteristics that each case might have. This method is supported by a model of the organizational structure of any viable system. In this case the "regional system" is postulated to be a viable system. If the program is going to be successful it should be viable. This suggests the need to define the "regional system" with precision. The elucidation of the components of this system is seen as a fundamental research step in this method. A second step focuses on the organizational functions that these parts fulfill, and on the linkages among them. A third step relates to the consistency of the regional organization and its effectiveness. The second step seeks to provide the basic structure to support the search for information. A set of questions, supported by this structure, will be presented for explanatory purposes. This "questionnaire" is by no means comprehensive and it is hoped that improvements will be made on it along this research process

Cybernetics of Value Co-creation

The paradigm shift from value creation to value "co-creation" calls for a deeper grasp of organizational learning in marketing theory. This paper adopts a cybernetic view of the process of value co-creation to shed light on its relevant aspects and to supply a framework to implement operations and strategies to foster this process. Can cybernetics help to better understand the process of value co-creation? Can the Viable System Model (Beer, 1979) be a sound approach to shape a more effective value co-creation process able to achieve higher satisfaction and value? In this theoretical paper we will show how cybernetic can be effectively used to give a positive answer to both questions abov

On a class of minimum contrast estimators for Gegenbauer random fields

The article introduces spatial long-range dependent models based on the fractional difference operators associated with the Gegenbauer polynomials. The results on consistency and asymptotic normality of a class of minimum contrast estimators of long-range dependence parameters of the models are obtained. A methodology to verify assumptions for consistency and asymptotic normality of minimum contrast estimators is developed. Numerical results are presented to confirm the theoretical findings.Comment: 23 pages, 8 figure

An Overview of Organizational Research in Regional Development: Five Parallel Case Studies

In this paper we present proposals for a program of research into problems of complex organizations. The area of interest is organization for integrated regional development and our research will be based on five regional development cases undertaken in different circumstances in various parts of the world. Organization theory is not a unified field of research but includes many complementary approaches. The authors of this paper reflect this diversity. However, in designing these research proposals we find important points of commonality. The overall research conception based on a multiorganization approach is one such point. This is supported by a common definition of integrated regional development, which we pose for the purpose of organization study, and a common specification for the case descriptions, which form the first output stages of our program. However, in the analytic stages, which follow these descriptions, we see value in following somewhat different approaches. This diversity should strengthen the value of the final output. In this paper we cover generally the scope and purposes of the overall program. The scope of case descriptions is presented together with an outline of the questions which are addressed in the post-description analytic stages

Arbres fontaines, eau du brouillard et forêts de nuages

A partir des arbres fontaines comme le Garoé (Hierro, Canaries), un reportage photographique commenté est présenté sur la captation des eaux de brouillard par la végétation. Le Garoé était un laurier dont l'eau était bue aussi bien par l'homme que par le bétail jusqu'en 1610, date à laquelle il fut déraciné par un ouragan. Actuellement, hommes et animaux puisent leurs ressources en eau dans des forêts de conifères à Hierro, où pins et genévriers sont plantés ou entretenus en mémoire du Garoé. Les progrès en matière de captation des eaux du brouillard et les recherches menées dans les forêts de nuages sont brièvement passés en revue. La captation de ces eaux se met en place au nord du Chili et au Pérou pour aider des communautés isolées. Les forêts de nuages, appartenant à la classification d'écosystème fragile de la FAO, sont en danger. Les programmes de recherche y sont généralement soutenus par l'UICN et la PHI de l'Unesco. (Résumé d'auteur

Influence of Tillage and Liming on N2O emission from a rainfed crop

Nitrous oxide (N2O) is the main greenhouse gas (GHG) produced by agricultural soils due to microbial processes. The application of N fertilizers is associated with an increase of N2O losses. However, it is possible to mitigate these emissions by the introduction of adequate management practices (Snyder et al., 2009). Soil conservation practices (i.e.no tillage, NT) have recently become widespread because they promote several positive effects (increases in soil organic carbonand soil fertility, reduction of soil erosion, etc). In terms of GHG emissions, there is no consensus in the literature on the effects of tillage on N2O. Several studies found that NT can produce greater (Baggs et al., 2003), lower (Malhi et al., 2006) or similar (Grandey et al., 2006) N2O emissions compared to traditional tillage (TT). This large uncertainty is associated with the duration of tillage practices and climatic variability. Liming is widely use to solve problems of soil acidity (Al toxicity, yield penalties, etc). Several studies show a decrease in N2O emissions with liming (Barton et al., 2013) whereas no significant effects or increases were observed in others (Galbally et al., 2010). The aim of this work was to evaluate the effects of tillage (NT vs TT) and liming application or not of Ca-amendment) on N2O emissions from an acid soil during a rainfed crop