The Effect of Monetary Unification on Public Debt and its Real Return

We explore the implications of monetary unification for real interest rates and (relative) public debt levels. The adoption of a common monetary policy renders the risk-return characteristics of the participating countries more similar, so that the substitutability of their public debt increases after unification. This implies that the average expected real return on the debt increases. Also, the share of the unionwide debt issued by relatively myopic governments or of countries that initially have a relatively dependent central bank increases after unification. This may put the political sustainability of the union under pressure. A transfer scheme that penalizes debt increases beyond the union average is able to undo the interest rate effect of unification, but magnifies the spread in relative debt levels.monetary union, (relative) public debt, interest rates, externalities, substitutability, central bank independence

The time of the metropolis: Understanding urban and systemic dynamics

How come that some EU cities are often presented as examples and monopolize the best positions in various rankings? They act not according to models, but according to a method which is mostly similar to Edgar Morin’s concept of auto-eco-organization. Theirs actions are based on values: they are agile creative, supportive, sustainable. So how do they implement those guidelines

Comparative environmental law and orientalism : reading beyond the 'text' of traditional knowledge protection

This article uses traditional knowledge as a case study to address multiple discussions in the field of comparative law. First, it addresses the theoretical challenge of the role of comparative law as a critical research tool in the development of environmental law. Second, within the context of transnational legal processes, it questions the extent to which comparative law as a method can further the relationship between different levels of law making by distinct legal actors. It is timely to bring mainstream comparative law into conversation with critical perspectives from other disciplines such as postcolonial theory and poststructuralism when studying non-Western law. These issues have been firmly placed on the research agenda of comparative law scholars for quite a few years but studying these questions from the perspective of traditional knowledge brings a new outlook to these debates

Special issue : Epistemic violence and environmental justice

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Shared neural representations of cognitive conflict and negative affect in the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex

Influential theories of dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) function suggest that the dACC registers cognitive conflict as an aversive signal, but no study directly tested this idea. In this pre-registered human fMRI study, we used multivariate pattern analyses to identify which regions respond similarly to conflict and aversive signals. The results show that, of all conflict- and value-related regions, only the dACC/pre-SMA showed shared representations, directly supporting recent dACC theories

On the origin of bursts in blue compact dwarf galaxies: clues from kinematics and stellar populations

Blue compact dwarf galaxies (BCDs) form stars at, for their sizes, extraordinarily high rates. In this paper, we study what triggers this starburst and what is the fate of the galaxy once its gas fuel is exhausted. We select four BCDs with smooth outer regions, indicating them as possible progenitors of dwarf elliptical galaxies. We have obtained photometric and spectroscopic data with the FORS and ISAAC instruments on the VLT. We analyse their infrared spectra using a full spectrum fitting technique, which yields the kinematics of their stars and ionized gas together with their stellar population characteristics. We find that the stellar velocity to velocity dispersion ratio ((nu/sigma)(star)) of our BCDs is of the order of 1.5, similar to that of dwarf elliptical galaxies. Thus, those objects do not require significant (if any) loss of angular momentum to fade into early-type dwarfs. This finding is in discordance with previous studies, which however compared the stellar kinematics of dwarf elliptical galaxies with the gaseous kinematics of star-forming dwarfs. The stellar velocity fields of our objects are very disturbed and the star formation regions are often kinematically decoupled from the rest of the galaxy. These regions can be more or less metal rich with respect to the galactic body and sometimes they are long lived. These characteristics prevent us from pinpointing a unique trigger of the star formation, even within the same galaxy. Gas impacts, mergers, and in-spiraling gas clumps are all possible star formation igniters for our targets

The end of the art connoisseur? Experts and knowledge production in the visual arts in the digital age

In this digital age, declarations surface on the death of the expert and the democratization of information. Crowd wisdom is seen as the new guide in constructing and evaluating knowledge. In the context of the art world, this tension between the amateurs and the experts becomes particularly pronounced as popular meets high culture. Questions arise such as wh