Integrated bio-economic models as tools to support land-use decision making: a review of potential and limitations

Bio-economic modelling has become a useful tool for anticipating the outcomes of policies and technologies before their implementation. Advances in mathematical programming have made it possible to build more comprehensive models. In an overview of recent studies about bio-economic models applied to land-use problems in agriculture and forestry, we evaluated how aspects such as uncertainty, multiple objective functions, system dynamics and time have been incorporated into models. We found that single objective models were more frequently applied at the farm level, while multiple objective modelling has been applied to meet concerns at the landscape level. Among the objectives, social aspects are seldom represented in all models, when being compared to economic and environmental aspects. The integration of uncertainty is occasionally a topic, while stochastic approaches are more frequently applied than non-stochastic robust methods. Most multiple-objective models do not integrate uncertainty or sequential decision making. Static approaches continue to be more recurrent than truly dynamic models. Even though integrating multiple aspects may enhance our understanding of a system; it involves a tradeoff between complexity and robustness of the results obtained. Land-use models have to address this balance between complexity and robustness in order to evolve towards robust multiple-objective spatial optimization as a prerequisite to achieve sustainability goals.     

Searle's Monadological Construction of Social Reality

A BSTRACT . One aim of this paper is to make visible the connection between Searle's views on social reality and his general ontology, and at the same time to show that some peculiar features of his analysis of social reality are a natural outcome of his general ontology. The paper contains five sections. In the first Searle's naturalism is philosophically situated and its differentia specifica explained. Then, Searle's view that intentional states exist only in brains is presented. One might say that, according to Searle, each mind is, although caused by a material brain, a Leibnizian monad. This view is related to an important, but neglected, distinction that Searle himself has made between requirement conditions of satisfaction and required conditions of satisfaction. In the third section, it is pointed out that, necessarily, sometimes there has to exist some kind of relation of satisfaction between the two kinds of conditions of satisfaction. Searle, however, has never really discussed what this satisfaction relation may look like. The upshot of all the remarks is that, fourth, Searle's general ontology automatically implies an ontology of social reality according to which a social fact can only exist as a scattered aggregate whose items exist in the brains of the people who constitute it. Finally and fifth, I try to think with Searle against Searle. His monadological view of social reality cannot, Searle notwithstanding, be regarded as being close to the direct realism of common sense. Searle's realism is an indirect realism. However, if Searle's view that intentional states exist only in brains is rejected, then the rest of his ontology has features that may take us closer to a direct realism. Such a move, which in one respect takes us closer to common sense, takes us in another respect away from common sense. The title of the last section is "Social Reality and the Impossibility of Common Sense."     

An alternative interpretation of multiple bounded WTP data—Certainty dependent payment card intervals

This paper analyzes the multiple bounded format, in which uncertainty is directly incorporated into the WTP question. A new approach for analyzing multiple bounded uncertainty data is presented. The intuition underlying the approach is that uncertain individuals would like to state their WTP as intervals rather than precise values and that the width of the intervals is determined by the degree of uncertainty. The approach is compared to the one applied in Welsh and Poe [Welsh, M., Poe, G.L., 1998. Elicitation effects in contingent valuation: comparisons to a multiple bounded discrete choice approach. Journal of Environmental Economics and Management 36, 170–185] which treats uncertainty by conditioning responses on specific verbal probability statements. We argue that the conditioning approach overestimates mean and median WTP and that conditioning WTP estimates on probability statements like “probably” and “unsure” make them “fuzzy”. To empirically compare the two approaches we use data from 2004 concerning implementation of a predator protection policy in Sweden. Our analysis show that the suggested approach: (1) is more intuitive; (2) better fits the data; (3) estimates mean and median WTP with better precision; (4) is less sensitive to distributional assumptions; and (5) it is better suited for policy analysis.     

Independent Movement or Government Subcontractor? – Strategic Responses of Voluntary Organizations to Institutional Processes

The purpose of this paper is to identify factors that can explain differing responses of voluntary organizations to the pressure of homogenization that follows from interaction with public authorities. The paper is theoretically based on institutional organization theory and resource dependence theory, and empirically on research on voluntary organizations in the social sector. It is asserted that the following factors may explain voluntary organizations' ability to maintain autonomous in relation to public organizations: the characteristics of the organizational field, the focal organization's relations to the dominating organization in the field, organization characteristics and intra–organizational processes and strategies.     

The effects of debt versus equity inflows on savings and growth in developing economies

Zusammenfassung Die Wirkung von ausl?ndischer Kapitalbeteiligung und Kreditfinanzierung auf Ersparnisbildung und Wachstum in Entwicklungsl?ndern. — Zur Bew?ltigung der internationalen Schuldenprobleme von Entwicklungsl?ndern wird h?ufig vorgeschlagen, die Struktur des Kapitalimports zugunsten von Forderungsarten zu verschieben, bei denen sich die Gl?ubiger am wirtschaftlichen Risiko beteiligen, wie dies etwa bei Direktinvestitionen der Fall ist. Die Wahl zwischen Kapitalbeteiligung und Kreditfinanzierung mag jedoch Risiko-Ertrag-Konflikte zwischen Einkommensstabilit?t und erwartetem wirtschaftlichem Wachstum involvieren. Diese Hypothese wird aus einem entscheidungstheoretischen Modell auf der Basis eines Benutzer-Eigentümer Verh?ltnisses abgeleitet und mittels einer L?nderquerschnittsuntersuchung regressionsanalytisch getestet. Es zeigt sich, da\ bei nichtkooperativen Beziehungen zwischen Schuldnern und Gl?ubigern kreditfinanzierte Kapitalimporte einen vergleichsweise starken positiven Einflu\ auf die Ersparnisbildung und das Wirtschaftswachtum im Schuldnerland ausüben. Kapitalbeteiligungen k?nnen deshalb nicht ohne weiteres als vorteilhaft angesehen werden und auch nicht allen L?ndern empfohlen werden, ohne zu bedenken, wie sich soziale Gruppen gegenüber dem Risiko verhalten.

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Résumé Les effets de l’influx de la dette et du capital propre sur l’épargne et la croissance en économies développantes. — L’élément commun des beaucoup de propositions données pour faciliter les problèmes de la dette extérieure des pays développants est l’intention de changer la structure des importations de capital vers l’augmentation du rapport des créances qui basent sur quelque forme de partager les risques, p.e. la participation en capital propre. Cependant, le choix entre le capital propre ou des influx des capitaux financés par des dettes peut induire un conflit de ?rendement-risque? entre la stabilité de revenu et la croissance attendue. Cette hypothèse est dérivée d’un modèle choix-théorique basé sur l’approche agent-principal et testée empiriquement en appliquant l’analyse de régression trans-pays. Les auteurs démontrent que, dans un cadre non-coopératif des relations débiteurcréditeur, des transferts financés par des dettes ont une influence plus positive sur l’épargne et la croissance économique. La participation en capital propre ne peut pas être évaluée supérieure sans ambigu?té et c’est pourquoi elle ne peut pas être recommendée pour tous les pays, indépendant des attitudes sociales envers le risque.

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Resumen El efecto del endeudamiento sobre el ahorro y el crecimiento eneconomías en desarrollo comparado con el de las inversiones directas. — En varias propuestas para aliviar el problema de la deuda externa de los países en desarrollo se sugiere alterar la composición de las importaciones de capital en el sentido de aumentar la proportión de derechos con participación en el riesgo económico, es decir, la participación de la inversión directa. La elección entre inversión directa y deuda considera la relación inversa riesgo-beneficio que existe entre la estabilidad del ingreso y el crecimiento esperado. Esta tesis se dériva de un modelo teórico de elección basado en el enfoque agente-principal, que es sometido a un test empírico de regresión sobre una muestra de países. Se muestra que en el marco de relaciones deudor-acreedor de tipo no cooperativas las transferencias de financiamiento por deuda ejercen una influencia positiva relativamente superior sobre el ahorro y el crecimiento económico. La participación directa en el capital no resulta superior en todos casos y por ello no puede ser recomendada para todos los países, independientemente de las actitudes frente al riesgo que prevalezcan.

     

The division of labour and market structure

Most firms produce most of the time under conditions of substantial economies of scale. The division of labour, according to Adam Smith the mainspring of wealth, is intrinsically an economies of scale phenomenon. Market structure in most industries in characterized by a small number of suppliers and a larger number of customers. I explain this law of small numbers as the equilibrium of two forces: the deconcentration effect of imitation and the market spliting effect of further refinements in the division of labour by innovation. A deconcentrated market creates larger incentives for market splitting (product differentiation) by innovation than a concentrated market. But market splitting raises concentration in the market and it raises the number of different markets in the economy. Before the economies of scale of old products are fully exploited, new products are being offered which again are produced under conditions of economies of scale.     

Some economics of content protection

We are grateful to a perceptive referee for many constructive comments on an earlier version of this paper entitled The Economics of Content Protection: A Dual Approach. The usual disclaimer applies.