560 research outputs found
Private law in Vojvodina between two world wars: Heritage for European future
No full textThis article represents an overview of different legal cultures. Author compares pluralistic legal systems, concomitant to Eastern societies, with monistic legal systems typical for Western civilizations. This article demonstrates the convergence of different legal traditions as the result of regional and global integration processes. Special attention has been given to Western legal culture. In this respect, the author analyzes fundamental features of European continental law, created by legislature, and of Anglo-American law primarily formed by judiciary. European Union has been in search for a medium solution. The aim is creating a combined legal system which would include both models of law. Such combined legal systems have existed in Scotland (United Kingdom), Quebec (Canada), Louisiana (The United States of America), and South Africa. However, it has not been well known that a similar combined legal system existed in Vojvodina between two world wars. This legal heritage, in the opinion of the author, could serve as a model for creating a new ius comunae europaeum. This model represents the evidence of a successful fusion of legisla?tive (parliamentary) law and common law. In 2005 Matica Srpska launched the research project 'Private Law in Vojvodina between Two World Wars' in order to present this legal heritage nationally and inter?nationally. This Collection of Papers displays preliminary results of this research.</jats:p
Developing a Generic Agent-Based Model to Explore Servicising Policy
No full textContinuous economic growth, ignoring the incidental recession, is currently still coupled with increases in the use of resources and generation of wastes. The European Commission (EC) is looking for ways to achieve absolute decoupling between economic growth and environmental impacts. A shift from product-based to function-based production and consumption, known as `servicising' of the economy, has the potential to contribute to absolute decoupling. The EC is therefore looking for policy measures on all political levels that may stimulate a servicising shift and thereby contribute to absolute decoupling. In this thesis, I propose a generic agent-based model to inform policy towards absolute decoupling, with a focus on the role of servicising. The model captures interactions between selling and buying `agents' and can be parametrised for many different specific markets. It integrates rational and non-rational considerations, decision making on multiple levels of both producers and consumers, and resulting material flows and impacts, all in a generic way. Also, the model features sophisticated market research as a novel basis for the decision making of agents in an artificial market. The model was developed following the methodology for developing an agent-based model proposed by Van Dam, Nikolic and Lukszo \citep{Dam2012}. A substantial part of this thesis is reserved for a reflection on the methodology. The main conclusion from that part is that although the methodology provides valuable structure to help new modellers through model development, the recommended techniques and practices are mostly suitable for relatively small, domain-specific models. Additional practices are recommended in order to successfully build large and generic models. The proposed model is suitable for the three planned case studies in the pan-European SPREE project, of which the generic model development constituted a central part. The concluding sections of this thesis provide suggestions for future extensions of the model, including the inclusion of social networks, spatial explicitness and chain-level interactions.SEPAMESSTechnology, Policy and Managemen
The Incorporation of International Law in the Swiss Legal System
No full textThe paper examines the incorporation of international law into Swiss legal system. Under a realistic approach, founding its roots in the Italian School of International Law, the problematic and uniqueness of Swiss legal system is explained under an alternative dimension. The intention of the author is that of (re)conceptualizing the methodology of interpretation of relationship between international law and internal law through a realistic analyze of the phenomenon, based on the social origin and nature of international law. The principal accent is given to the necessary distinction between relationship and mechanisms of adaptation. Bringing the scientific debate on social binaries might help scholars and commentators to better identify the real object and purpose of the realistic approach
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Calibration Techniques for Time-Interleaved SAR A/D Converters
No full textBenefits of technology scaling and the flexibility of digital circuits favor the digital signal processing in many applications, placing additional burden to the analog-to-digital con- verters (ADCs). This has created a need for energy-efficient ADCs in the GHz sampling frequency and moderate effective resolution range. A dominantly digital nature of successive approximation register (SAR) ADCs makes them a good candidate for an energy-efficient and scalable design, but its sequential operation limits its applicability in the GHz sampling range. Time-interleaving can be used to extend the efficiency of the SAR ADCs to the higher frequencies if the mismatches between the interleaved ADC channels can be handled in an efficient manner.New calibration techniques are proposed for time-interleaved SAR ADCs capable of cor- recting the gain, offset and timing mismatches, as well as the static nonlinearities of individ- ual ADC channels stemming from the capacitor mismatches. The techniques are based on introducing two additional calibration channels that are identical to all other time-interleaved channels and the use of the least mean square algorithm (LMS). The calibration of the chan- nel offset and gain mismatches, as well as the capacitor mismatches, is performed in the background using digital post-processing. The timing mismatches between channels are cor- rected using a mixed-signal feedback, where all calculations are performed in the digital do- main, but the actual timing correction is done in the analog domain by fine-tuning the edges of the sampling clocks. These calibration techniques enable a design of time-interleaved con- verters that use minimum-sized capacitors and operate in the thermal-noise-limited regime for maximum energy and area efficiency.The techniques are demonstrated on a time-interleaved converter that interleaves 24 channels designed in a 65nm CMOS technology. The ADC uses the smallest capacitor value of only 50aF, achieves 50.9dB SNDR at fs = 2.8GHz with the effective-resolution bandwidth higher than the Nyquist frequency, while consuming only 44.6 mW of power
Elements of judge-made law in Serbia and European Union
No full textSerbia has developed a legal system of state regulations of the European continental type. The majority of legally relevant relations are governed by norms in the form of laws and other general legal acts adopted by bodies of the legislative and executive branches of government. In accordance with the principle of division of power proclaimed by the constitution, courts are obliged to consistently apply general rules. Judges should apply the law, not create it. In other words, jurisprudence is not considered to be a formal source of law. However, in reality, courts have always played a much more significant role in the process of shaping the legal system. This role has ranged from a very broad interpretation of statutory rules to the creation of individual rules in order to fill legal lacunae, and even creating general legal rules. Evidence of this are the numerous examples from the history of Serbian law, which is briefly outlined in the following pages. The historical overview presents the role of courts in mediaeval Serbia, during the period of uprisings against the Turkish occupation (1804-1830), during the time of the creation of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (Yugoslavia), and in the post-revolutionary period in socialist Yugoslavia. Particular emphasis is placed on the mixed legal system with elements of judge-made law developed on the territory of the Province of Vojvodina between the two World Wars. In the second part of the paper, the role of courts in the modern law of Serbia is discussed. In that context, mention is given to constitutional approaches, current trends and the informal influence of courts in the process of shaping the legal system. A few pages have been dedicated to the problems facing courts in Eastern European in the period of transition. This primarily relates to the implementation of the community acquis which is developing at an alarming speed with far-reaching consequences for legal, economic and social stability in many countries, as well as the European Union itself. The acceptance of high and often objective unachievable legal standards widens the gap between the normative and the actual. Legal insecurity rises, and with it, mistrust in state institutions, including the courts, which carry particular responsibility for the creation of a new legal environment. The concluding segment of the paper is devoted to the role of courts in a future European law. In that context, current trends in the European Union are presented. Special consideration is given to the broad competencies of the Court of Justice of the European Communities, which delve as far as creating legal rules. Changes taking place in Europe point to the need to reconsider traditional teachings on the division of power and redefine the position of courts.</jats:p
Perception of Lexical Pitch Accents by Serbian and French Speakers
No full textThe study explored the perception of the Serbian lexical pitch accent by Serbian (native) and French (non-native) listeners. The motivation for the study came from the previous research on the processing of word-level prosodic categories in perception. With this study, I attempted to shed light on the ways the lexical pitch accent is perceptually processed by both native and non-native listeners in view of contributing to methodological and theoretical paradigms for studying the perception of word-level prosodic categories. The study included three experiments, all of which were carried out online. The first experiment included an AX discrimination task and an identification task in which only Serbian listeners participated. The results of the AX discrimination task revealed that the listeners were more sensitive to length than to pitch movement as the two main perceptual correlates of lexical pitch accent. The listeners were less accurate on the short-falling and short-rising contrasts, which suggested that the listeners were conflating the pitch movement on short lexical pitch accents. On the identification task, the lexical pitch accent types could not be reliably identified, which implied the lack of metalinguistic knowledge of lexical pitch accents by Serbian listeners. The second experiment was a Sequence Recall Task which investigated Serbian and French listeners' contrast and recall of lexical pitch accent types. The speakers of a language with no word-level prosodic category in their first language were expected to be perceptually insensitive to a non-native word-level prosodic category. The French and Serbian listeners were not significantly different from each other, which suggested that there was no perceptual insensitivity to lexical pitch accents by French (non-native) listeners.
The third experiment was an online version of a free classification task, which was used to explore Serbian and French listeners' perception of Serbian lexical pitch accent types based on their similarity. The results were submitted to multi-dimensional scaling and clustering analyses. The analyses showed that the perceptual space between the short-falling and short-rising lexical pitch accents by the Serbian listeners was extremely reduced, while the French listeners displayed the confusion of the long-falling lexical pitch accents with the rest of lexical pitch accent types. Overall, the findings indicated that the listeners of a language with no word-level prosodic category were not insensitive to lexical pitch accents. In addition, native listeners processed lexical pitch accent through the filter of the prosodic structure of their first language, Non-native listeners were able to hear distinctions between lexical pitch accents which native listeners could not. Moreover, non-native listeners heard the contrasts that did not exist in their native language. Lastly, the results indicated both the phonetic and phonological encoding of lexical pitch accent in perception
Two centuries of the Austrian Civil code (1811-2011)
No full textAustrian civil code (Allgemeines b?rgerliches Gesetzbuch - ABGB, ACC) succeeded in resisting the challenges of time for two centuries. A number of factors influenced it's longevity. First of all, prior to adoption of the law, a long lasting and well designed work, which has been described in greater detail in this article, was done. The Code was written gradually, with lots of recalculations, checks and public debates. In legal literature, it is often written about a unique lawmaking experiment, which Austrian authorities made by implementing the Code in one part of the state territory. The Code was written for feudal order, but according to principles of natural law. This second thing has, in addition to widely formulated and flexible legal norms, left enough space for extensive interpretation of outdated rules, and filling in the legal lacunas, whose number was increasing as the time passed. Courts often used this opportunity in a creative manner, contributing to survival of the Code. Many additions and changes were made to the Code, but there were few of those who thought that it should be changed by a new one Code. Austrians are preparing a more detailed revision of the ACC, which will allow modernization of the national law and it's synchronization with trends in current European law, but on the other hand, to preserve the two century old legal heritage. The second part of this article is dedicated to the influence of the Austrian Civil Code on the development of civil law in the former Yugoslavia and Serbia. ACC served as model for adoption of the Serbian Civil Code of 1844. It was applied as a positive law in the first half of XX century, in one part of the territory of today's Autonomous Province of Vojvodina. Formally, legal rules of the Austrian Civil Code can even be applied today, according to the Law on Nullity of Legal Regulations Enacted Prior to 6th of April 1941, and During the Enemy Occupation. However, that possibility is more theoretical than practical, and is limited only to a narrow field inside the property law, because in other fields, Serbia has an equally proper, and in domain of obligation law, even a more modern legal regulative, which was mentioned by some Austrian authors.</jats:p
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