Politics and preferences

The overall aim of this thesis is to better understand how politics and preferences influence policy outcomes. The thesis consists of two papers that examine two different policy outcomes in Swedish municipalities. Paper I analyzes the effect of income and education on the environmental policy performance of Swedish local governments. In estimating the effects of income and education we will also examine how they interact with political participation. To examine this I use panel data based on an environmental ranking of Swedish municipalities made every year between 1993 and 2001. The empirical results show that there is a positive relationship between income and the environmental policy performance. This relationship is however captured by controlling for the education level, which has a positive relationship with the environmental policy performance. Controlling for municipal fixed effects and relevant control variables does not change this result. Furthermore we find that political participation has significant interaction effects with both income and education. Paper II develops a regression discontinuity (RD) design to estimate the causal effect of political party power on the placement of refugee immigrants in Swedish municipalities. That Swedish municipalities have a proportional election system puts forward specific challenges for using a RD design, which this paper will provide solutions to. The identification strategy is based on the idea that a specific party getting one more seat or not in the municipal council can be considered as good as random if the party is close to a seat change. Even though this paper only looks at Swedish data the method could be applied to other countries with proportional election systems. The results of the paper show that the political party power has a large effect on the placement of refugee immigrants in Swedish municipalities

A deseeded Avena test method for small amounts of auxin and auxin precursors

In 1927 Went isolated the growth promoting hormone, auxin, from the tip of the Arena coleoptile, and worked out the now well known Arena test method for its quantitative determination. By the use of this method the chemistry and many phases of the physiological action of auxin have been studied. In physiological work, however, the amounts of hormone involved are frequently so small that quantitative or even qualitative work has often been very difficult or impossible. In this article is presented a supplementary procedure with deseeded Arena seedlings whereby smaller concentrations of the hormone not detectable by the standard method can be quantitatively determined. By the use of this method it has also been possible to demonstrate directly the existence of substances capable of being converted into auxin by the plant. Some data relative to the presence of a precursor of auxin in Arena and synthetic precursors of hereto-auxin are included

On Analysing Changes in Urban Form ? Some Theoretical and Methodological Issues

The urban structure is a result of human actions and affects its users in a cyclic relationship. The political systems on different levels put attention to the urban structure and its relationship to the ecological and sociological and economical systems. This attention is expressed on the European level, for instance, in the European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP) where a spatial structure according to the polycentric urban system principle is recommended. The first aim of this study is to discuss spatial location factors for the temporal and geographical development of urban residential structures. The second aim of the study is to investigate the relative importance of the discussed location factors using a segment of a Swedish county as a test case. The basic question is whether the location of new residential areas is determined through market forces or political decisions. Thus, the paper addresses the fundamental question of the efficiency of land-use planning decisions. By geo-coding existing geographical real estate tax databases and combining the information with existing digital maps and satellite images the spatial development over time will be analysed in a geographic information system. By non-parametric statistical tests and multiple regression analyses the importance of individual factors relative to one another will be determined. The analysis is performed at as low a geographical level as possible. If the urban development exhibits some regularity, and hence is not totally random with the regards to the explanatory factors in question, then is it possible to investigate the development as a system of spatial causalities. The study is based on earlier investigations by, among others, Rietveld & Wagtendonk (2000), Filion, Bunting & Warriner (1999) and de la Barra (1989). However, the current investigation will use disaggregated geographical data on micro level with a high spatial resolution. The case study is performed in an area affected by high speed commuting train from the middle of the analysis period 1980-2000, which calls for also a detailed representation of the transport system. References: Rietveld P & Wagtendonk AJ (2000), The location of new residential areas in the Netherlands: A statistical analysis for the period between 1980 and 1995, Paper presented to the 40th congress of the European Regional Science Association (2000), Barcelona, Spain. Filion P., Bunting T. och Warriner K. (1999). The entrenchment of urban dispersion: Residental preferences and location patterns in the dispersed city. Urban Studies, 36, (8), 1317-1347. de la Barra T. (1989). Integrated land use and transport modelling: decision chains and hierarchies. New York. Cambridge university press.

Regional development expectations in the Öresund region - travel patterns and cross border mobility

The opening of the Oresund bridge is the ultimate break through in cutting travel time between, East-Denmark and Scania, Sweden. The final implementing of the TEN project makes it finally possible to commute on a daily basis in the region between the two countries. The new link either has enlarged the Copenhagen region as a northern hub or created a new Scandinavian hub with Copenhagen and Malmö as core centres. This new common Oresund region provides an optimal location for central European and international firms that try to penetrate the Nordic markets from a location close to the European centre but close to the majority of customers due to its economy of scale. One of the questions for the future development of the region is if travel patterns at the two sides of the strait can adapt to the new circumstances. In relation to that it can be asked if the abilities already exist today to cope with the demands of the changed regions structure for work commuting. Going one step further increased regional identity will foster a change of moving patterns. An overview over the living and housing situation in the region try to analyse if it is today favourable reconsidering permanently the place of residence to come closer to the economical centre of the region, to reduce unproductive commuting or increase quality of life. The paper tries to give answers to these and other questions related to willingness and ability to commute in the region, using the results of a household survey that has been performed in the Oresund region. The survey bases on a random sample Danes and Swedes living in the new region that have been asked about their relation to the region and future expectation and willingness to commute. Starting from the assumption that individual total average travel time does not increase but accessible area this paper tries to summarize the preferences of different peergroups and their adapting ability for fostering a common region.

Enriching Discourse on Public Domains

Studying microvascular responses to iontophoresis of vasoconstricting drugs contributes to a better understanding of the regulatory mechanisms of cutaneous vessels, but measuring these responses with laser-Doppler flowmetry at basal blood flow conditions is technically challenging. This study aimed to investigate whether the measurement of cutaneous vasoconstrictor responses to noradrenaline (NA) and phenylephrine (PE), delivered by iontophoresis, is facilitated by predilatation of the microvascular bed using local heating. We used different drug delivery rates (100 s x 0.12 mA, 200 s x 0.06 mA, 300 s x 0.04 mA) to investigate whether predilatation affects the local drug dynamics by an increased removal of drugs from the skin. In a predilatated vascular bed, iontophoresis of NA and PE resulted in a significant decrease in perfusion from the thermal plateau (p andlt; 0.001). The decrease was 25-33%, depending on drug delivery rate. In unheated skin, a significant vasoconstriction was observed (p andlt; 0.001), with 17% and 14% decrease from baseline for NA and PE, respectively. These results indicate that predilatating the cutaneous vascular bed by local heating facilitates measurement of vasoconstriction with laser-Doppler flowmetry and does not seem to significantly affect the result by an increased removal of drugs from the skin.Original Publication: Joakim Henricson, Yashma Baiat and Folke Sjöberg, Local Heating as a Predilatation Method for Measurement of Vasoconstrictor Responses with Laser-Doppler Flowmetry, 2011, MICROCIRCULATION, (18), 3, 214-220. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1549-8719.2010.00079.x Copyright: Wiley http://eu.wiley.com/WileyCDA/Brand/id-35.html</p

Mechanical and Psychological Effects of Electoral Reform

Duverger (1954) noted that changes in electoral systems will have two types of effects: mechanical effects, and reactions of political agents in anticipation of these, which he referred to as psychological effects. It is complicated to empirically separate the two effects since these occur simultaneously. In this paper we use a large set of counterfactual election outcomes to address this issue. Our application is based on a nationwide municipal electoral reform in Norway, which changed the seat allocation method from d’Hondt to modified Sainte-Lagüe. Even though this electoral reform is of a relatively small magnitude, we document substantial psychological effects.

Psychological approaches to the study of saving / 7

Bibliography: p. 95-114

Resilience: Accounting for the Noncomputable

Plans to solve complex environmental problems should always consider the role of surprise. Nevertheless, there is a tendency to emphasize known computable aspects of a problem while neglecting aspects that are unknown and failing to ask questions about them. The tendency to ignore the noncomputable can be countered by considering a wide range of perspectives, encouraging transparency with regard to conflicting viewpoints, stimulating a diversity of models, and managing for the emergence of new syntheses that reorganize fragmentary knowledg