Legal evolution of the concept of ‘home base’ for the purpose of determining labour and social security law applicable to European aircrew members

This paper has a dual aim: (1) to outline the legal evolution of the ‘home base’ concept and (2) to map the role of this concept in determining the law applicable (both employment law and social security law) to employment contracts of European aircrew members. An in-depth analysis of the relevant portions of (1) Reg. (EEC) No 3922/91, (2) Reg. (EU) No 465/2012, (3) Reg. (EU) No 83/2014, (4) EASA's 2014 Certification Specifications, and (5) the European Court of Justice's preliminary ruling on joined cases C-168/16 and C-169/16 is conducted.What emerges is that (1) the ‘home base’ definition, due to its subjectivity, has traditionally been susceptible to multiple interpretations and (2) due to regulatory ambiguity, the use of ‘home base’ to identify the labour laws applicable to airline workers has for a long time been inconsistent, ranging from one extreme (being considered a key element for this purpose) to the other (being assigned a secondary role). It was only in the last few years that some improvements were made, with Reg. (EU) No 465/2012 first and the European Court of Justice's 2017 preliminary ruling then, clarifying that the ‘home base’ concept must be assigned a central role in the determination of the law (both social security law and employment law) applicable to employment contracts in the aviation industry.     

The 2012 Olympic Ambassadors and sustainable tourism legacy

This paper examines the capacity of the London (2012) Olympic Ambassador volunteer programmes to create a sustainable tourism legacy. It contributes to the literature on event legacies, particularly the role of volunteers promoting tourism in their home destination. Using an exploratory inductive approach, semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted, in 2012 and 2013, with managers of all 11 Ambassador volunteer programmes associated with London and the 10 other regional venues that hosted London Olympic and Paralympic Games events. These show that volunteer Ambassadors enhanced tourist experiences during the Games through the Ambassadors’ pride in their home city, enthusiasm and local knowledge. However, although the Ambassador programmes had aspirations to create a sustainable legacy, in the form of a pool of experienced volunteers to support future events and further tourist visits, this was severely constrained by cuts in local government budgets. The Government Olympic Executive provided a coordinating role leading up to the Games, but neither they nor the London Organising Committee for the Olympic Games provided practical assistance for legacy development. This was a missed opportunity to channel the enthusiasm of mega-event volunteers into further volunteering to promote tourism.     

Evaluating the London 2012 Games’ impact on sport participation in a non-hosting region: a practical application of realist evaluation

In the literature on Olympic legacies and impacts, there is a dearth of materials that specifically address the issue of Olympic impact for non-hosting regions. The literature tends to deal with impacts at a national level, or at a hosting-city region level, neglecting in large part the degree to which benefits can be leveraged by non-hosting regions. A further limitation identified in the literature is a failure to engage in detailed formal evaluation of policy implementation where assertions of potential policy impact are based on untested assumptions. This study is intended to address both of these concerns. It presents an empirical, ‘bottom-up’ application of a Realist Evaluation framework to assess the impact of a policy initiative – Workplace Challenge – aimed at leveraging enhanced sports participation in a non-hosting region – Leicestershire – in the period leading up to the 2012 Games. In doing so, it seeks to identify which causal mechanisms worked within this particular context to produce the observed outcomes. The evaluation results demonstrate that the programme represented a positive approach to fostering regular engagement with sport and physical activities for some groups in some types of organisations, and that awareness and motivational factors associated with the London 2012 Games are, in this case, linked (albeit weakly) to an increase in sport and physical activity participation for specific groups taking part in the programme in particular organisational contexts.     

A new economics approach to modelling policies to achieve global 2020 targets for climate stabilisation

This paper explores a Post Keynesian, ‘new economics’ approach to climate policy, assessing the opportunities for investment in accelerated decarbonisation of the global economy to 2020 following the Great Recession of 2008–2009. The risks associated with business-as-usual growth in greenhouse gas (GHG) concentrations in the atmosphere suggest that avoiding dangerous climate change will require that the world’s energy-economy system is transformed through switching to low-carbon technologies and lifestyles. Governments have agreed a target to hold the increase in temperatures above pre-industrial levels to at most 2°C and have offered reductions by 2020 in GHG emissions or the carbon-intensity of GDP. The effects of policies proposed to achieve pathways to 2020 towards this target are assessed using E3MG, an Energy-Environment-Economy (E3) Model at the Global level. E3MG is an annual simulation econometric model, estimated for 20 world regions over 1972–2006 adopting a new economics approach. Additional low-GHG investment of some 0.7% of GDP, with carbon pricing and other policies, is sufficient to achieve a pathway consistent with a medium chance of achieving the long-term target. GDP is above reference levels because decarbonisation reduces world oil prices and increases investment. Employment is some 0.9% above reference levels by 2020 and public finances are almost unaffected.     

Natural resource accounting for Indian states — Illustrating the case of forest resources

Our main objective is to set out and apply a SEEA-based methodology to reflect the true value of forest resources in India's national and state accounts. We establish that a “top-down” approach using available national databases is both feasible and desirable from a policy perspective. In this paper, we address four components of value creation in forests: timber production, carbon storage, fuelwood usage, and the harvesting of non-timber forest products. The results of our analysis suggest that prevailing measures of national income in India underestimate the contribution of forests to income. The income accounts of the Northeastern states in particular are significantly understated by these traditional (GDP/GSDP) measures. We are also able to identify some states which performed poorly in the context of our sustainability framework, reflecting natural capital losses due to degradation and deforestation. Our results highlight the need to integrate natural resource accounting into the national accounting framework in order to generate appropriate signals for sustainable forest management and for the conservation of forest resources which are widely used by the poor in India, as well as being significant stores of national wealth.     

我国绿色国民经济核算体系的框架及其评价

开展绿色国民经济核算是目前国际社会研究的热点问题,我国也启动了相关理论研究与实践探索.结合我国绿色国民经济核算的研究进展及其核算体系框架,分析了核算体系所存在的问题,并重点分析了其与联合国等国际组织SEEA2003的差异,指出了我国绿色国民经济核算体系发展的思路与方向.     

绿色GDP核算的国际实践与启示

由于编制体系的缺陷,传统的GDP指标不能够如实、全面地反映人类社会经济活动对自然资源和环境品质的负面影响。为了弥补传统GDP的缺陷,绿色GDP概念便应运而生。本文首先介绍了绿色GDP核算的SEEA体系和主要方法,然后介绍了日本、韩国、瑞典、菲律宾等先进国家在绿色GDP核算方面所取得的主要进展,并对我国的绿色GDP核算工作提出若干可行性建议。     

2012年澳网李娜vs小克技术统计分析

通过对2012年澳网女子单打李娜对阵克里斯特尔斯的比赛情况分析,从中找出其在比赛中的优势与不足,并提出改进措施,旨在为我国女子网球技术训练和发展提供参考。     

The efficiency of schools in developing countries,analysed through PISA 2012 data

This paper analyses the efficiency of more than 6800 schools in 28 developing countries, by means of a two-stage Data Envelopment Analysis and using data from OECD PISA 2012. The results reveal that the average efficiency of schools is around 70%, meaning that achievement scores can be raised by 30% by employing a more effective use of available resources. Substantial heterogeneity exists both between and within countries; in general, efficiency scores are higher when comparing schools only with those in the same country. Among factors associated with schools' efficiency, the most important are the characteristics of student population (for instance, motivation, truancy, etc.). Therefore, some practices related to accountability, teachers’ involvement and professional development, and extracurricular activities are also positively associated with higher levels of efficiency.     

Development of the SEEA 2003 and its implementation

The preparation of the System of Environmental and Economic Accounts 2003 marks an important milestone in the world of official statistics. Just as the development of the original guidelines for national accounting in the 1950s was the first step toward today's robust, internationally comparable economic statistics, the System of Environmental and Economic Accounts 2003 offers hope to bring order and comparability to environmental statistics. How the system came to be and why it is an important achievement are outlined. This is followed by an overview of its accounting structure. A discussion of the implementation of the SEEA 2003, both in ideal terms and as actually practiced in statistical offices, concludes.