188,222 research outputs found
Monetary and Fiscal Policies in Bulgaria: Lessons from the Historical Record
No full textThere are two aspects through which an economic policy can influence the economic situation – monetary and fiscal. Monetary and fiscal policies have different and sometimes controversial goals to achieve by means of specific instruments. While the mission of central banks is generally price stability, governments usually set their goals in the realm of economic growth and employment. Fiscal institutions , however, often use inflation in order to derive revenues (seigniorage) and finance budget deficits. Hence, inflation is viewed as a public finance phenomenon (Barro, 1979; Mankiw, 1987; Grilli, 1989). The purpose of this paper is to present a historical perspective on the behaviour of the monetary and fiscal policies pursued in Bulgaria from 1879, when the Bulgarian National Bank was established (soon after the liberation from the Ottoman Empire). Furthermore, historical time series of monetary and fiscal indicators give us the chance to study the link between government budget problems, fluctuations of monetary variables and inflation dynamics in different monetary episodes.monetary and fiscal policy, inflation, exchange rate
Multiple Social Identities in Relation to Self-Esteem of Adolescents in Post-communist Albania, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Kosovo, and Romania
No full textWe test a model linking ethnic, familial, and religious identity to self-esteem among youth in Albania, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Kosovo, and Romania. All countries are post-communist nations in Europe, offering novel and underexplored settings to study identity. Participants were 880 adolescents (mean age, 15.93 years; SD, 1.40) with Albanian (n = 209), Bulgarian (n = 146), Czech (n = 306), Kosovan (n = 116), and Romanian (n = 103) background who filled in an Ethnic Identity Scale (Dimitrova et al., 2016), familial and religious identity scales adapted from the Utrecht Management of Identity Commitment Scales [U-MICS; Crocetti et al. Child and Youth Care Forum, 40, 7–23 (2011); Crocetti et al. Assessment, 1, 2–16 (2015)], and the Rosenberg’s Self-Esteem Scale [Rosenberg, Conceiving the self. Basic Books, New York (1979)]. A multigroup path model showed that ethnic, familial, and religious identities were significantly positively related to a single underlying construct of social identities. In all countries, youth with a stronger multiple identities reported higher self-esteem. These results are particularly valuable in addressing the scope of the proposed book by providing new knowledge on multiple social identities among under investigated samples from post-communist countries in Europe faced with dynamic societal changes. They also mirror increasing attention on multiple, inclusive, and intersectional identities as psychological assets for young generations
Citrilolepis Dimitrova & Georgiev & Mariaux & Vasileva 2019, n. g.
No full text<i>Citrilolepis</i> n. g. <i>Diagnosis</i> <p>Cyclophyllidea, Hymenolepididae. Body mediumsized. Scolex oval, covered by distinct microtriches. Rostellar apparatus musculo-glandular. Suckers round, muscular. Rostellum retractile, ovoid. Rostellar sheath oval, thick-walled, not reaching level of posterior margin of suckers. Rostellar hooks diorchoid, more than 10 in number, in single row. Neck long. Strobila with gradual maturation. Proglottides craspedote, much wider than long. Inner longitudinal muscle bundles numerous. Ventral osmoregulatory canals often with distinct irregular transverse anastomoses. Genital pores unilateral, sinistral. Genital ducts dorsal to osmoregulatory canals. Testes oval, usually three, rarely four or five per proglottis, arranged in transverse line, rarely in triangle; situated usually in two groups separated by female glands. Cirrus-sac elongate, thin-walled, situated near anterior proglottis margin, not reaching midline of proglottis. Cirrus cylindrical, armed. Female glands median. Ovary multilobate, median. Vitellarium median, with irregular shape, consisting of 3–4 compact, oval lobes, posterior to ovary. Seminal receptacle voluminous, convoluted. Vagina with thick-walled copulatory part, surrounded by thick cellular sleeve; ventral or posteroventral to cirrus-sac; lumen of copulatory part covered by hair-like microtriches. Young uterus narrow, tubular, transversely-elongated; with further development becoming labyrinthine, with numerous sacculations. Fully-developed uterus sacciform, thick-walled, occupying entire median field, not crossing lateral osmoregulatory canals. Eggs oval or elliptical, with thick embryophore. In Fringillidae (Passeriformes). <i>Type-species</i>: <i>Citrilolepis citrili</i> n. g., n. sp.</p> <p> <i>Etymology:</i> The name of the new genus is derived from the common English name (‘‘citril’’) of the typehost; ‘‘ <i>lepis</i> ’’ (Latin) - scale, a frequently used ending for names of cyclophyllidean cestode genera.</p>Published as part of <i>Dimitrova, Yana D., Georgiev, Boyko B., Mariaux, Jean & Vasileva, Gergana P., 2019, Two new cestode species of the family Hymenolepididae Perrier, 1897 (Cyclophyllidea) from passerine birds in Ethiopia, with the erection of Citrilolepis n. g., pp. 279-297 in Syst Parasitol 96</i> on page 286, DOI: 10.1007/s11230-019-09846-y, <a href="http://zenodo.org/record/2669972">http://zenodo.org/record/2669972</a>
Towards automated knowledge-based mapping between individual conceptualisations to empower personalisation of Geospatial Semantic Web
No full textGeospatial domain is characterised by vagueness, especially in the semantic disambiguation of the concepts in the domain, which makes defining universally accepted geo- ontology an onerous task. This is compounded by the lack of appropriate methods and techniques where the individual semantic conceptualisations can be captured and compared to each other. With multiple user conceptualisations, efforts towards a reliable Geospatial Semantic Web, therefore, require personalisation where user diversity can be incorporated. The work presented in this paper is part of our ongoing research on applying commonsense reasoning to elicit and maintain models that represent users' conceptualisations. Such user models will enable taking into account the users' perspective of the real world and will empower personalisation algorithms for the Semantic Web. Intelligent information processing over the Semantic Web can be achieved if different conceptualisations can be integrated in a semantic environment and mismatches between different conceptualisations can be outlined. In this paper, a formal approach for detecting mismatches between a user's and an expert's conceptual model is outlined. The formalisation is used as the basis to develop algorithms to compare models defined in OWL. The algorithms are illustrated in a geographical domain using concepts from the SPACE ontology developed as part of the SWEET suite of ontologies for the Semantic Web by NASA, and are evaluated by comparing test cases of possible user misconceptions
Habitat preferences of Sombre Tit (Poecile lugubris) in a karst environment
No full textSombre Tit (Poecile lugubris) is one of the least studied passerine bird species in Europe, and the least known among Paridae species on the continent. The aim of the study is to identify its habitat preferences in a karst environment. The study took place in 2016-2017 within the "Rayanovtsi" Special Protection Area in Western Bulgaria- a limestone terrain with a mosaic of open areas, shrubs and scattered woodland, featured by sinkholes, rocks and caves. Territory and control plots were identified by means of point counts and territory mapping. To quantitatively describe the habitat structure and the fine-scale land-cover, 17 habitat variables were measured at both territory and control plots (the latter located at unoccupied sites), within a radius (180 m) approximating the territory size of the species. We used generalized additive models (GAMs) to identify the main predictors of species occurrence. Six habitat variables drove Sombre Tit occurrence according to the model: tree cover (quadratic effect), shrub cover (positive/quadratic effects), number of trees along the woodland edge and elevation (negative effects), solar radiation and woodland edge length (positive effects); tree and shrub cover were the most important predictors of species occurrence. Sombre Tits occurred at an average density of 0.36 pairs / 10 ha in the karst-dominated study area. Our results highlight the ecotonal habits of the species, provide a first quantitative description of its habitat preferences, and may be used to integrate the species' requirements into management plans of mosaic landscapes in Natura 2000 sites and other protected areas
Institutionalization of Imported Rules in the European Union's New Member States: Bringing Politics Back in the Research Agenda
No full textThis paper sets out to explore the puzzle of possible institutionalization or reversal of rules 'imported' by new member states from Central and Eastern Europe during their preparation for accession to the EU. It argues that the institutionalization of formal rules adopted as part of enlargement requirements is not automatic post accession. New formal rules can be reversed, supported by secondary rules and institutionalized or ignored and not implemented. The paper proposes a politics framework that suggests that these different outcomes will be influenced by the environment of weak post communist states and will depend on the area specific configuration of formal and informal veto players and on the EU's ability to impose sanctions. In the case of non acquis imported rules, reversal of formal rules would be possible without sanctions whereas in the case of acquis rules, the likely outcomes are institutionalization or 'empty shells'. Another outcome, 'capture' of the new rules is likely in areas with distributive implications.enlargement; East-Central Europe; acquis communautaire; institutionalisation; administrative adaptation
Social Media in Political Campaigning Around the World: Theoretical and Methodological Challenges
No full textThis is a manuscript of an article published as Dimitrova, Daniela V., and Jörg Matthes. "Social Media in Political Campaigning Around the World: Theoretical and Methodological Challenges." Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly 95, no. 2 (2018): 333-342. DOI: 10.1177/1077699018770437. Posted with permission.</p
Author-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.
No full textAuthor-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.</p
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
No full textThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
The establishment of the gold standard in Southeast Europe: convergence to a new system or divergence from an old one
No full textThe establishment of the Bulgarian monetary system, as that of other newborn Southeast European states, occurred at a time in which the very meaning of money was being redefined at an international level, with the establishment of the gold standard. The homologation of the Balkan “periphery” to the West European “center” occurred thus at a time in which the relations between center and periphery were undergoing a radical change. In fact, the relations between different economic spaces, between center and periphery, between domestic and foreign trade, depend crucially on the peculiar form taken by the monetary regime: different monetary regimes design different relations between internal and external money, and hence between domestic economy and foreign trade.
Should the diffusion of the gold standard be read univocally as the establishment of an age of gold out of an age of darkness? Or is it better understood as the transition from a secular age of gold and silver to a precarious age of gold? The purpose of this paper is to reinterpret this story in the light of the system that preceded it, namely the bimetallic system that had characterized European economies over the previous five centuries. In a historical and comparative perspective, the monetary history of Bulgaria, as that of other neighboring countries, appears not as a necessary, however troubled, convergence towards the ultimate and universal gold standard, but rather as an undecided, and therefore troubled, option between two historically alternative monetary standards, bimetallic and monometallic, each with its own advantages and drawbacks
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