The "racialized" other: intolerance and political equality in Brazil and the United Kingdom

The implementation of Affirmative Action (Political Equality) in various spheres of Brazilian society, including in the university, and mainly implemented through a system of ‘racial’ quotas, have confronted cultural myths such as 'Brazilian cordiality' or 'racial democracy'. Affirmative Action is currently the subject of intense debate in Brazilian society, not only amongst intellectuals, academics and politicians, but amongst many sections of the population, including young students interested in entering the public universities. Conversely, in the United Kingdom, affirmative action or reverse discrimination, i.e. choosing someone solely on the grounds of their gender or racial group and not on their abilities, is illegal under UK antidiscrimination law. This perspective changes not only the legal status of such actions, but implies a change in perspectives towards modes of 'racializing the other'

Rock falls impacting railway tracks. Detection analysis through an artificial intelligence camera prototype

During the last few years, several approaches have been proposed to improve early warning systems for managing geological risk due to landslides, where important infrastructures (such as railways, highways, pipelines, and aqueducts) are exposed elements. In this regard, an Artificial intelligence Camera Prototype (AiCP) for real-time monitoring has been integrated in a multisensor monitoring system devoted to rock fall detection. An abandoned limestone quarry was chosen at Acuto (central Italy) as test-site for verifying the reliability of the integratedmonitoring system. A portion of jointed rockmass, with dimensions suitable for optical monitoring, was instrumented by extensometers. One meter of railway track was used as a target for fallen blocks and a weather station was installed nearby. Main goals of the test were (i) evaluating the reliability of the AiCP and (ii) detecting rock blocks that reach the railway track by the AiCP. At this aim, several experiments were carried out by throwing rock blocks over the railway track. During these experiments, the AiCP detected the blocks and automatically transmitted an alarm signal

Why Do Governments Sell Privatised Companies Abroad?

This paper provides an empirical analysis of Governments' decisions to sell privatised companies on both international and domestic markets in a sample of 392 privatisations in 42 countries. Political theories of privatisation find strong support in our analyses: market oriented Governments favour domestic investors in the allocation of shares. Furthermore, the need to penetrate foreign markets and to warrant better legal protection to shareholders also appear as relevant. Significant differences emerge in OECD and non-OECD countries. In wealthy economies stock market liquidity favours cross-listing, while in emerging countries Governments resort to cross-list in order to "import" liquidity and to develop domestic stock markets. Legal institutions also play a different role. In OECD countries, weak shareholder protection induces Governments to cross-list, in order to borrow the reputation and best practices of established exchanges. On the other hand, creditors' protection is more relevant in non-OECD countries, where weak legal protection of creditors reduces the scope of bank finance, forcing Governments to look for external finance abroad.http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/39677/3/wp293.pd

Why Do Governments Sell Privatised Companies Abroad?

This paper provides an empirical analysis of Governments' decisions to sell privatised companies on both international and domestic markets in a sample of 392 privatisations in 42 countries. Political theories of privatisation find strong support in our analyses: market oriented Governments favour domestic investors in the allocation of shares. Furthermore, the need to penetrate foreign markets and to warrant better legal protection to shareholders also appear as relevant. Significant differences emerge in OECD and non-OECD countries. In wealthy economies stock market liquidity favours cross-listing, while in emerging countries Governments resort to cross-list in order to "import" liquidity and to develop domestic stock markets. Legal institutions also play a different role. In OECD countries, weak shareholder protection induces Governments to cross-list, in order to borrow the reputation and best practices of established exchanges. On the other hand, creditors' protection is more relevant in non-OECD countries, where weak legal protection of creditors reduces the scope of bank finance, forcing Governments to look for external finance abroad.privitisation, cross-listing, international financial markets, political economy, investor protection

Galois descent of semi-affinoid spaces

We study the Galois descent of semi-affinoid non-archimedean analytic spaces. These are the non-archimedean analytic spaces which admit an affine special formal scheme as model over a complete discrete valuation ring, such as for example open or closed polydiscs or polyannuli. Using Weil restrictions and Galois fixed loci for semi-affinoid spaces and their formal models, we describe a formal model of a $K$-analytic space $X$, provided that $X\otimes_KL$ is semi-affinoid for some finite tamely ramified extension $L$ of $K$. As an application, we study the forms of analytic annuli that are trivialized by a wide class of Galois extensions that includes totally tamely ramified extensions. In order to do so, we first establish a Weierstrass preparation result for analytic functions on annuli, and use it to linearize finite order automorphisms of annuli. Finally, we explain how from these results one can deduce a non-archimedean analytic proof of the existence of resolutions of singularities of surfaces in characteristic zero.Comment: Exposition improved and minor modifications. 37 pages. To appear in Math.

La liberalizzazione del mercato dell’energia elettrica e del gas naturale: il caso italiano nel panorama europeo

L'articolo si compone di due parti: nella prima parte si analizza il processo di liberalizzazione del settore dell’energia elettrica e del gas naturale a livello comunitario e si descrive il lungo e complesso percorso verso l’europeizzazione del mercato dell’energia; nella seconda parte si esamina l’esperienza della liberalizzazione del mercato energetico in Italia, evidenziandone la specificità nazionale nel contesto europeo. Il caso italiano di liberalizzazione del settore dell’energia elettrica e del gas naturale mostra le contraddizioni e i paradossi del modello europeo di regolazione del mercato dell’energia, che si contraddistingue per la dialettica tra la costruzione di un mercato unico, fondato sul principio di libera concorrenza, e la disciplina degli Stati membri, avente carattere interventistico, finalizzata a garantire la sicurezza degli approvvigionamenti

La liberalizzazione del trasporto ferroviario. L'esperienza italiana nel contesto europeo

Il lavoro analizza lo stato di avanzamento della liberalizzazione del trasporto ferroviario in Europa e in Italia, allo scopo di evidenziare le peculiarità del caso italiano nel contesto europeo, nonché di valutarne le criticità antitrust e i profili regolatori. Tale disamina viene effettuata sia in un’ottica retrospettiva, ripercorrendo le principali tappe normative del processo di apertura del mercato del trasporto ferroviario, scandite a livello comunitario dalla successione di tre pacchetti e segnate sul piano nazionale dall’istituzione della nuova Autorità di regolazione dei trasporti; sia in un’ottica prospettica, alla luce dell’imminente approvazione del quarto pacchetto ferroviario e del recepimento nell’ordinamento interno della direttiva 2012/34/UE sullo spazio ferroviario europeo unico ad opera del d.lgs. n. 112 del 2015