Does expenditure in public governance guarantee less corruption? Non-linearities and complementarities of the rule of law

Corruption is an endemic societal problem with profound implications in the development of nations. In combating this issue, cross-national evidence supporting the effectiveness of the rule of law seems at odds with poorly realized outcomes from reforms inspired in the academic literature. This paper provides an explanation for such contradiction. By building a computational approach, we develop three methodological novelties into the empirical study of corruption: (1) modeling government expenditure as a more adequate intervention variable than traditional indicators, (2) generating large within-country variation by means of bottom-up simulations (instead of cross-national data pooling), and (2) accounting for all possible interactions between covariates through a spillover network. Our estimates suggest that, the least developed a country is, the more difficult it is to find the right combination of policies that lead to reductions in corruption. We characterize this difficulty through a rugged landscape that governments navigate when changing the total budget size and the relative expenditure towards the rule of law. Importantly our method helps identifying the—country-specific—policy issues that complement the rule of law in the fight against corruption

Policy priority inference: A computational framework to analyze the allocation of resources for the sustainable development goals

We build a computational framework to support the planning of development and the evaluation of budgetary strategies toward the 2030 Agenda. The methodology takes into account some of the complexities of the political economy underpinning the policymaking process: the multidimensionality of development, the interlinkages between these dimensions, and the inefficiencies of policy interventions, as well as institutional factors that promote or discourage these inefficiencies. The framework is scalable and usable even with limited publicly available information: development-indicator data. However, it can be further refined as more data becomes available, for example, on public expenditure. We demonstrate its usage through an application for the Mexican federal government. For this, we infer historical policy priorities, that is, the non-observable allocations of transformative resources that generated past changes in development indicators. We also show how to use the tool to assess the feasibility of development goals, to measure policy coherence, and to identify accelerators. Overall, the framework and its computational tools allow policymakers and other stakeholders to embrace a complexity (and a quantitative) view to tackle the challenges of the Sustainable Development Goals

Estimating networks of sustainable development goals

An increasing number of researchers and practitioners advocate for a systemic understanding of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) through interdependency networks. Ironically, the burgeoning network-estimation literature seems neglected by this community. We provide an introduction to the most suitable estimation methods for SDG networks. Building a dataset with 87 development indicators in four countries over 20 years, we perform a comparative study of these methods. We find important differences in the estimated network structures as well as in synergies and trade-offs between SDGs. Finally, we provide some guidelines on the potentials and limitations of estimating SDG networks for policy advice

The Resilience of Public Policies in Economic Development

This paper studies the resilience of public policies that governments design for catalyzing economic development. This property depends on the extent to which behavioral heuristics and spillover effects allow policymakers to attain their original goals when a particular policy cannot be funded as originally planned. This scenario takes place, for example, when unanticipated events such as natural disasters or political turmoil obstruct the use of resources to advance certain policy issues, e.g., infrastructure or labor reforms. Here, we analyze how the adaptive capacity of the policy-making process generates resilience in the face of disruptions. In order to estimate the allocation of resources across policies, we employ a computational model that accounts for diverse social mechanisms, for example, coevolutionary learning and network interdependencies. In our simulations, we use a data set of 117 countries on 79 development indicators over an 11-year period. Then, we calculate a resilience score corresponding to each development indicator via counter-factual analysis of policy disruptions. Next, we assess whether some development strategies produce resilient/fragile policy profiles. Finally, by studying the relationship between policy resilience and policy priority, we determine which issues are bottlenecks to economic development

Subnational sustainable development: The role of vertical intergovernmental transfers in reaching multidimensional goals

Achieving sustainable development hinges on two critical factors: the subnational implementation of public policies and the efficient allocation of resources across regions through vertical intergovernmental transfers. We introduce a framework that links these two mechanisms for analyzing the impact of reallocating federal transfers in the presence of regional heterogeneity from development indicators, budget sizes, expenditure returns, and long-term structural factors. Our study focuses on the case of Mexico and its 32 states. Using an agent-based computational model, we estimate the development gaps that will remain by the year 2030, and characterize their sensitivity to changes in the states’ budget sizes. Then, we estimate the optimal distribution of federal transfers to minimize these gaps. Crucially, these distributions depend on the specific development objectives set by the national government, and by various interdependencies between the heterogeneous qualities of the states. This work sheds new light on the complex problem of budgeting for the Sustainable Development Goals at the subnational level, and it is especially relevant for the study of fiscal decentralization from the expenditure point of view

Search for new phenomena in final states with an energetic jet and large missing transverse momentum in pp collisions at √ s = 8 TeV with the ATLAS detector

Results of a search for new phenomena in final states with an energetic jet and large missing transverse momentum are reported. The search uses 20.3 fb−1 of √ s = 8 TeV data collected in 2012 with the ATLAS detector at the LHC. Events are required to have at least one jet with pT > 120 GeV and no leptons. Nine signal regions are considered with increasing missing transverse momentum requirements between Emiss T > 150 GeV and Emiss T > 700 GeV. Good agreement is observed between the number of events in data and Standard Model expectations. The results are translated into exclusion limits on models with either large extra spatial dimensions, pair production of weakly interacting dark matter candidates, or production of very light gravitinos in a gauge-mediated supersymmetric model. In addition, limits on the production of an invisibly decaying Higgs-like boson leading to similar topologies in the final state are presente

Fungal chitinases: diversity, mechanistic properties and biotechnological potential

Chitin derivatives, chitosan and substituted chito-oligosaccharides have a wide spectrum of applications ranging from medicine to cosmetics and dietary supplements. With advancing knowledge about the substrate-binding properties of chitinases, enzyme-based production of these biotechnologically relevant sugars from biological resources is becoming increasingly interesting. Fungi have high numbers of glycoside hydrolase family 18 chitinases with different substrate-binding site architectures. As presented in this review, the large diversity of fungal chitinases is an interesting starting point for protein engineering. In this review, recent data about the architecture of the substrate-binding clefts of fungal chitinases, in connection with their hydrolytic and transglycolytic abilities, and the development of chitinase inhibitors are summarized. Furthermore, the biological functions of chitinases, chitin and chitosan utilization by fungi, and the effects of these aspects on biotechnological applications, including protein overexpression and autolysis during industrial processes, are discussed in this review

The Putative Liquid-Liquid Transition is a Liquid-Solid Transition in Atomistic Models of Water

We use numerical simulation to examine the possibility of a reversible liquid-liquid transition in supercooled water and related systems. In particular, for two atomistic models of water, we have computed free energies as functions of multiple order parameters, where one is density and another distinguishes crystal from liquid. For a range of temperatures and pressures, separate free energy basins for liquid and crystal are found, conditions of phase coexistence between these phases are demonstrated, and time scales for equilibration are determined. We find that at no range of temperatures and pressures is there more than a single liquid basin, even at conditions where amorphous behavior is unstable with respect to the crystal. We find a similar result for a related model of silicon. This result excludes the possibility of the proposed liquid-liquid critical point for the models we have studied. Further, we argue that behaviors others have attributed to a liquid-liquid transition in water and related systems are in fact reflections of transitions between liquid and crystal

Genetic Ancestry, Race, and Severity of Acutely Decompensated Cirrhosis in Latin America

Background & Aims: Genetic ancestry or racial differences in health outcomes exist in diseases associated with systemic inflammation (eg, COVID-19). This study aimed to investigate the association of genetic ancestry and race with acute-on-chronic liver failure (ACLF), which is characterized by acute systemic inflammation, multi-organ failure, and high risk of short-term death. / Methods: This prospective cohort study analyzed a comprehensive set of data, including genetic ancestry and race among several others, in 1274 patients with acutely decompensated cirrhosis who were nonelectively admitted to 44 hospitals from 7 Latin American countries. / Results: Three hundred ninety-five patients (31.0%) had ACLF of any grade at enrollment. Patients with ACLF had a higher median percentage of Native American genetic ancestry and lower median percentage of European ancestry than patients without ACLF (22.6% vs 12.9% and 53.4% vs 59.6%, respectively). The median percentage of African genetic ancestry was low among patients with ACLF and among those without ACLF. In terms of race, a higher percentage of patients with ACLF than patients without ACLF were Native American and a lower percentage of patients with ACLF than patients without ACLF were European American or African American. In multivariable analyses that adjusted for differences in sociodemographic and clinical characteristics, the odds ratio for ACLF at enrollment was 1.08 (95% CI, 1.03–1.13) with Native American genetic ancestry and 2.57 (95% CI, 1.84–3.58) for Native American race vs European American race. / Conclusions: In a large cohort of Latin American patients with acutely decompensated cirrhosis, increasing percentages of Native American ancestry and Native American race were factors independently associated with ACLF at enrollment

A922 Sequential measurement of 1 hour creatinine clearance (1-CRCL) in critically ill patients at risk of acute kidney injury (AKI)

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