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The politics of ECB’s economic ideas and its implications for European economic governance : embedding a resilient EMU from the top-down?
Get PDFBy focusing on ECB’s economic policy thinking and its internal politics of ideas, this research aims to provide two contributions to knowledge. Firstly, it seeks to enhance scholarly understanding of ideational change inside international organisations (IOs). To do so, it asks (a) how ECB’s economic policy thinking has evolved since the outbreak of the euro crisis, and (b) what drives change in ECB’s ideas on the best way to deepen Europe’s Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) in its fiscal and economic realms. To answer these questions, fiscal policy, structural reforms and convergence towards resilient economic structures are used as case studies. The article argues that the interplay between changes in ECB’s leadership and internal policy discussions promoted by ideational entrepreneurs played a pivotal role in enabling new ideas to emerge inside the Bank. Secondly, by interrogating ECB’s ideas on the way to complete EMU, this research reflects on the future of the euro. It shares the view that the construction of cognitive authority within IOs is an ongoing political struggle over the ideas underpinning the everyday practice of global governance. By looking at the politics of ideas within the ECB, this article aims to contribute to the international political economy of EMU deepening
Academic self- concept, self-esteem and school attitudes in pre and mid adolescents : gender, SES and parenting
No full textChildren undergo significant changes as they enter secondary school, a time during which their social and academic self-concept is fluid and the pressures to adjust and show positive attitudes and behaviours are intense. Utilising data from the Millennium Cohort Study (Waves 4 and 5) the purpose of this study was two-fold: to examine longitudinal changes in academic self-concept, self-esteem and school attitudes in pre and mid adolescents through the lenses of gender and SES; and to trace the unique and cumulative effects of SES, gender and parenting on academic self-concept, self-esteem and school attitudes in 14- year-olds. The findings showed that academic self-concept, self-esteem and positive school attitudes decreased considerably between the ages of 11 and 14, and that girls rated themselves lower in self-esteem and school attitudes than did boys. The observed drop in academic self-concept was sharper in 14-year-olds from economically less well-off families. Parent behaviour and practices and the home learning environment contributed significantly to 14-year-olds’ school attitudes, self-esteem and self-concept. These findings have implications for developing school policies that support self-esteem especially during the first years of secondary education
Examining heterogeneity of education intervention effects using quantile mixed models : a re-analysis of a cluster-randomized controlled trial of a fluency-based mathematics intervention
Get PDFTraditionally, cluster randomized controlled trials are analyzed with the average intervention effect of interest. However, in populations that contain higher degrees of heterogeneity or variation may differ across different values of a covariate, which may not be optimal. Within education and social science contexts, exploring the variation in magnitude of treatment effect at different points in the population can indicate where the intervention is most effective rather than assuming an average effect.
Data from [Owen, K.L., et al., 2021. Implementation support improves outcomes of a fluency-based mathematics strategy: A cluster-randomized controlled trial. Journal of research on educational effectiveness, 14 (3), 523–542.] were reanalyzed using three modeling approaches: conditional mean-modeling reporting the average treatment effect using linear mixed models, and two quantile regression-based methods. Quantile regressions report the quantile treatment effects at different percentiles: 10th, 25th, 50th, 75th and 90th. For the Quantile approaches, a significant intervention effect in the median to upper quantiles was found and linear quantile mixed model showed improved fit over the other approaches.
An improved picture of intervention effects may be apparent using quantile regression methods when analyzing cluster randomized trials that have heterogeneous error variance. In particular, the linear quantile mixed model shows improved model fit allowing a multilevel framework to include random effects. There is considerable scope to extend this framework to incorporate more complex RCT designs
A closed bipolar electrochemical cell for the interrogation of BDD single particles : electrochemical advanced oxidation
Get PDFA closed bipolar electrochemical cell containing two conductive boron-doped diamond (BDD) particles of size ∼ 250 – 350 μm, produced by high-pressure high-temperature (HPHT) synthesis, has been used to demonstrate the applicability of single BDD particles for electrochemical oxidative degradation of the dye, methylene blue (MB). The cell is fabricated using stereolithography 3D printing and the BDD particles are located at either end of a solution excluded central channel. Platinum wire electrodes placed in each of the two outer solution compartments are used to drive electrochemical reactions at the two BDD particles, which, under bipolar conditions do not require direct electrical connection to a potential source. Experiments using ultra high-performance liquid chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (UHPLC-MS) show that the anodic pole BDD particle is able to electrochemically remove > 99 % of the dye (originally present at 1 × 10−4 M) to undetectable UHPLC-MS products in 600 s. Monitoring of the time dependant change in MB peak area, from the UHPLC chromatograms, enables a pseudo first order rate constant of 0.54 min−1 to be determined for MB removal. Given the large scale at which such particles can be produced (tonnes), such data bodes well for scale up opportunities using HPHT-grown BDD particles, where the particles can be assembled into high surface area electrode formats
Theorizing the process of financialization through the paradox of profit : the credit-debt reproduction mechanism
Get PDFFinancialization occurs where, over time, capitalist economies undergo a transformation, with profit-making via investment in production declining, to be replaced by profit-making via investment in financial markets. In the present research, we offer a novel theoretical explanation for this process, that we call the credit-debt reproduction mechanism. We derive this inductively, starting with Marx’s analysis of the paradox of monetary profit and its practical manifestation in the capitalist economy, the shortage of money in circulation. This shortage results in capital becoming increasingly expensive, making long-term investment decisions less certain, less profitable and less justifiable. Investment in financial markets grows, but this leads to an ever-expanding cycle of credit and debt, which puts capitalist economies on a one-way road from productive investments to predominantly unproductive investments. We include in this analysis important reflections on the distinction between “financialization” and “financial development.” We also revive and revisit the notion of the shortage of money as a key driver in this process. Another contribution made in this research is to draw a distinction between practical and theoretical solutions to the paradox of monetary profit. Crucially, our research confirms the absence of a theoretical solution to the paradox, there existing only practical solutions
Local version of Vizing's theorem for multi-graphs
No full textExtending a result of Christiansen, we prove that every mutli-graph G = (V, E) admits a proper edge colouring φ : E → {1, 2, . . . } which is local, that is, φ(e) 6 max{d(x) + π(x), d(y) + π(y)} for every edge e with end-points x, y ∈ V , where d(z) (resp. π(z)) denotes the degree of a vertex z (resp. the maximum edge multiplicity at z). This is derived from a
local version of the Fan Equatio
Dataset to support : Thermal analysis of novel Nitrate-Chloride salt mixtures for CSP applications
No full textNitrate salts have better thermal stability, low vapour pressure and non-toxic nature compared to synthetic heat transfer oil like Therminol VP-1®. Solar salt, a mixture of 60%NaNO3 -40%KNO3 by weight, is finding increased application as a Heat Transfer Fluid (HTF) and Thermal Energy Storage (TES) material in Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) plant. In this research work, two novel salt mixtures are prepared and tested for their melting point, short and long duration thermal stability. The formulation 1 is a ternary salt comprising of 44%KNO3- 32%Ca(NO3)2- 24%NaNO3, referred to as Base Salt. Formulation 2 is a quinary mixture of 90%Base salt + 5%NaCl + 5%KCl, referred to as Base-Chloride. Solar salt is also tested and compared alongside the novel mixtures. The experiments conclude that the melting point of Solar salt is 223°C, Base salt is 135.8°C and Base-Chloride is 142.2°C. Considering Short duration thermal stability, decomposition point of Solar salt is 631°C, Base salt is 585°C and Base-Chloride is 589°C. Considering long duration stability, all the three mixtures remain stable till 400°C, when heated at constant temperature for 24 hours. The novel mixtures have significantly lower melting points, thus providing wider operating temperature range compared to Solar salt
Recovering lost light : discovery of supernova remnants with integral field spectroscopy
Get PDFWe present results from a systematic search for broad (≥ 400 km s−1) Hα emission in integral field spectroscopy data cubes of ∼1200 nearby galaxies obtained with PMAS and MUSE. We found 19 unique regions that pass our quality cuts, four of which match the locations of previously discovered supernovae (SNe): one Type IIP and three Type IIn, including the well-known SN 2005ip. We suggest that these objects are young Supernova remnants (SNRs), with bright and broad Hα emission powered by the interaction between the SN ejecta and dense circumstellar material. The stellar ages measured at the locations of these SNR candidates are systematically lower by about 0.5 dex than those measured at the locations of core-collapse (CC) SNe, implying that their progenitors might be shorter lived and therefore more massive than a typical CCSN progenitor. The methods laid out in this work open a new window into the study of nearby SNe with integral field spectroscopy
Effects of lithological layering and fluid diffusivity on the nucleation of coal dynamic failure
No full textLarge compound lotteries
No full textExtending preferences over simple lotteries to compound (two-stage) lotteries can be done using two different methods: (1) using the Reduction of compound lotteries axiom, under which probabilities of the two stages are multiplied; (2) using the compound independence axiom, under which each second stage lottery is replaced by its certainty equivalent. Except for expected utility preferences, the rankings induced by the two methods are always in disagreement and deciding on which method to use is not straightforward. Moreover, sometimes each of the two methods may seem to violate some kind of monotonicity. In this paper we demonstrate that, under some conditions, the disagreement disappears in the limit and that for (almost) any pair of compound lotteries, the two methods agree if the second stage lotteries are replicated sufficiently many times