https://thesis.eur.nl/col/4318/ List of Publications en https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/9146/ Fri, 01 May 1981 00:00:01 GMT <div>Artemis, Theodore G.</div> The period 1967~72 constitutes the second period of rapid economic development of postwar Greece. The first being that of 1960-66. The whole period 1960-72 is characterized not only by the high rates of growth of GDP of the economy but further of monetary stability. Most structural changes had occurred during this period and the public sector's participation had played a key role in the development process. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/9260/ Sun, 01 Dec 1991 00:00:01 GMT <div>Reano, German</div> Antimonopoly, antitrust or competition legislation is one of the most important business regulatory policies in developed countries whose main objectives are preventing formation of monopolistic structures and, regulating individual or collective business behaviour which may restrict actual or potential competition. Before the second world war antitrust legislation existed only in the United States and Canada basically to control mergers and cartels. In contrast, European governments often promoted mergers and cartelization of firms in a number of industries in order to avoid bankruptcies of industrial firms as result of the economic depression of the thirties. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/9745/ Wed, 01 Dec 2004 00:00:01 GMT <div>Eckhorst, S. Karel</div> The majority of the available literature describing the vast financial flows into many developing countries, which inflows originates from natural resource export receipts, foreign direct investments (FDI), and Official Development Aid (ODA) have not yet illustrated the possibility of a case where both phenomena simultaneously could cause growth or morespecifically exports to deteriorate. First, it is important to state that ODA in this study refersonly to Dutch development assistance, which is by far the largest of all ODA flows to Suriname. These failures (growth and exports) are the core of the Resource Curse Thesis(Auty, 1993) and Dutch Disease! theory (Neary and Van Wijnbergen, 1986). https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/9700/ Fri, 01 Dec 2006 00:00:01 GMT <div>Habasonda, Calvin l.</div> The past decade has arguably witnessed the emergency of inflation targeting as the key monetary policy innovation. Accordingly, there has been an important debate on the desirability of this new regime. In the last 15 years or so, an increasing number of central banks have adopted inflation targeting as their preferred framework for the conduct of monetary policy. Although it was initially confined to industrialised countries, many developing countries are also increasingly adopting the inflation targeting regime. This paper seeks to evaluate the feasibility and applicability of this framework for monetary policy in Zambia. Using evidence from South Africa, this paper argues that although the presence of certain preconditions could not be confirmed in Zambia, inflation targeting still constitutes a feasible and advisable framework. The paper casts some doubt on the presence of these prerequisite conditions in Zambia although in practice the country can be characterised as already pursuing an implicit inflation targeting framework. The study finds that monetary authorities are currently pre-occupied with achieving single digit inflation and as such it can be argued that it is only a matter of time before adopting a fully fledged inflation targeting regime. In the meantime, the paper suggests financial system deepening, reduction of fiscal dominance and central bank independence. The paper concludes that these aspects are not only crucial in determining the speed and efficacy of transmission mechanisms of monetary policy under an inflation targeting framework but also have an impact on the transparency and credibility of monetary policy which are relevant for anchoring economic agents' future inflation expectations. Consequently, swift progress' on improving these conditions is essential for reaping full bonuses associated with inflation targeting. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/7120/ Tue, 01 Jan 2008 00:00:01 GMT <div>Laha, Somjita</div> This is an exploratory paper which deals with the process of informalisation in the context of global capitalism. By revealing the interconnections and dependency between the formal and the informal economy, it argues that the latter is an outcome of the propensity of the former to escape regulations. To this end, the formal capitalist economy encourages the emergence of the informal economy and feeds its creation to materialise its profit objectives. Through informalisation, the burden of environmentally unsustainable activities is often passed on to the informal economy. This raises crucial questions regarding the ability of environmental policies (predominantly the paradigm of Sustainable Development) to suitably address the environmental implications of global capitalism. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/7117/ Tue, 01 Jan 2008 00:00:01 GMT <div>Hiromi Inagaki</div> The growing volumes of obsolete electronic product, or e-waste, have posed serious concerns on landfill spaces and the urgent need to recycling hazardous components in both developed and developing countries. The illegal shipment of e-waste from developed countries to developing countries has been often reported. In India, the growing stream of e-waste imported and domestically disposed, particularly computer waste has aggregated the environmental health problems at the bottom part of the informal recycling chain, while generating economic benefit and clean environment for the particular group of people. Hence the major focus of my study is to understand the structure of this disproportionate distribution of economic benefits and environmental health costs in the computer recycling chain in India. This paper initially characterizes the generation of and the flow of computer waste in and between developed and developing countries and examines specifically the flow into the formal and informal recycling chains in India. Then the paper analyzes the distribution of economic benefits and environmental health costs in the informal recycling chain in Delhi with a focus on power relations among socially and economically differentiated actors. Finally the paper attempts to investigate policy implementation on the uneven distribution of benefits and costs. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/7121/ Tue, 01 Jan 2008 00:00:01 GMT <div>Yazid, Yazlina M.</div> In this paper I argue that Islamic-based environmentalism has a positive role to play in promoting the protection and conservation of the natural environment. Based on conducting a case study of two (2) Islamic-based environmental organisations established in the United Kingdom, this paper considers the role that they play by exploring their relevant critical drivers, including their belief, vision, activities, and religious resources. This paper seeks to help increase the appreciation of how such organisations could affect the landscape for environmental activism. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/7118/ Tue, 01 Jan 2008 00:00:01 GMT <div>Pinelo, María Teresa Colque</div> The way in which indigenous peoples conceive nature is shaped by -and shapestheir culture. Environmental change thus has a direct impact on it. This paper analyzes the relation between development projects, environmental change and indigenous peoples. Its objective is to identify the main socio-cultural aspects affected by environmental change and show that they are not being properly taken into account by the main impact assessment instruments; and why it is important to incorporate them. An analytical review of the main literature on the topic has been carried on in order to define the main concepts concerning this complex topic; including the description and identification of gaps in EIA and SIA as the main environmental assessment instruments. Once defined, they have been applied in the analysis of three development projects: the Inter-oceanic highway in Peru, the Chad- Cameroon pipeline and the Nam Theun 2 dam in Laos. This research found out that cultural factors are actually poorly or not properly included in the EIA/SIA approved for each of the cases; and following the bibliography analyzed, this can be said for mostly all kind of projects concerning indigenous communities. For this, a list of the cultural aspects shared among indigenous populations regarding their relation with the environment is included. This list does not pretend to be exhaustive as it only includes the shared aspects found in the cases; and of course each of its components needs to be adapted to every specific indigenous culture. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/7119/ Tue, 01 Jan 2008 00:00:01 GMT <div>Kim, Namsil</div> This paper examines the condition under which distributed generation (DG) technology make a genuine contribution to electrify the remote village. To study the circumstance for DG technology and village electrification, three indicators – affordability, institutional capacity and replicability - are drawn with ‘appropriate technology’. With the role of energy and electricity to make progress for human, the urgency and justification for village electrification with DG technology is highlighted. In the off-grid remote villages, electrification with distributed generation (DG) with renewable energy technology would be viable option. To examine the appropriateness of DG technology in the village context, three village electrification cases are chosen from Nepal, India and Sri Lanka. In each cases, DG with the solar PV, biomass gasifier and hybrid solar & wind technology are studied to find answer those technologies are appropriate in the village context with three indicators. This paper concludes that the appropriate technology in the circumstances is determined by the ability to afford the technology, the work of institution and resources to replicate the technology system, or integrated effect of three indicators. To make DG technology for village electrification more appropriate, the constant monitoring and evaluation is necessary in the flexible circumstances. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/6611/ Thu, 01 Jan 2009 00:00:01 GMT <div>Ikeda, Eri</div> The primary focus of this research is the environmental consequences of higher oil prices. Environmental consequences are taken to be the impact on the level of greenhouse gas emissions. The premises of the study are that an understanding of these consequences requires a prior understanding of the causes of the rise in oil prices, and both (the causes and consequences) in turn require an understanding of the nature of the rise in prices i.e., whether the rise has been nominal or real – whether they rose relative to other prices. The major finding of the study is that high oil price per se have thus far not had much of a positive impact on the environment (although it is as yet perhaps too early to have any decisive conclusions regarding these). On the one hand, it was found that higher oil prices have not had much of a dampening impact on the demand for oil, and correspondingly not much of an impact in terms of shifts in demand towards alternative energies. On the other hand, it was found that higher oil prices may have had some consequences in terms of a shift in supply, but the shift has thus far been towards non-friendly alternatives, mostly coal. If there are signs of a shift towards more friendly alternatives, it is in terms of investments. However, as the literature also suggests, it would seem that what has been most important in terms of these developments is government support. With regards to trends, the study found that there has been a long upward movement in oil prices in absolute and relative terms, which could be broken down into five distinct sub-periods of rising, falling and stable price trends, and culminating in a period of rapidly rising prices beginning from 1999. It was noted that there is no single explanation for the long-upward movement in oil prices, but that the recent (post-1998) increase is mostly explained by institutional factors, particularly changes which allowed the oil majors, producers and speculators to exert a continuous upward pressure on prices. It was argued that possible strategic (promotion of alternative energy sources which were located in more stable and controllable parts of the world for energy security) and environmental considerations (particularly for global climate change by increasing supply and demand from environmentally friendly sources) led to governments of advanced countries acquiescing to these increases. The widespread belief that higher oil prices were due to demand pressure by emerging economies was shown to have had little or no empirical support, and doubt was also cast on the cost-push thesis, whether emanating from peak-oil or other sources. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/6615/ Thu, 01 Jan 2009 00:00:01 GMT <div>Hsu, Woan-Ling</div> The serious global environmental problems have drawn much attention on conservation paradigms under the name of ‘sustainable development’. Among various conservation paradigms, indigenous community-based conservation (ICBC) is discussed in this research paper, due to its assumed justifications and dilemmas. In this specific case in Sazasa village in Taiwan, the ICBC experiment presents indigenous ways of using resources, which suggests an alternative and more environmentally friendly resource use regime. However, this case is also analyzed as being controversial, due to the transformation of indigenous institutions since 100 years ago and its tight connection with the market economy and the modern society. The controversy of this case provide an example of the ‘process’ of conservation learning—to modify social and political institutions which influence resource use regimes and to develop local institutions for conservation objective. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/6607/ Thu, 01 Jan 2009 00:00:01 GMT <div>Barguil Gallardo, Daniela</div> This research paper studies an initiative of community-conservation in an artisanal fishery on the Pacific of Costa Rica. The case-study is linked with the wider history and situation of conservation and development in Costa Rica in order to understand the context in which it is embedded. The case of the Community-based Marine Area of Responsible Artisanal Fishing of Tárcoles (MARAFT), in the light of its context, conceptualization elements and process of recognition, is analysed focusing on the issues of the politics of conservation, natural resource management and development that an initiative of community conservation entails and pretends to transform. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/6609/ Thu, 01 Jan 2009 00:00:01 GMT <div>Khatri, Dil Bahadur</div> This study has examined how the scheme of Payments for Environmental Services (PES) has been implemented in collaboration with existing local resource management institutions, particularly community forestry, to try to achieve both environmental and developmental goals. Through a case study approach, this study has analyzed the institutional dynamics of hydroelectricity revenue sharing mechanisms in Kulekhani watershed of Nepal. Results indicate that payments to upstream communities are made in the form of conservation and development projects, most of which are spent on rural electrification and road construction, putting less emphasis on the environment itself. The analysis has found three fundamental design problems of PES institutions. First, construction of road, which is often done using bulldozer, has accelerated soil erosion posing a threat to the environmental services. Second, since the mechanism has excluded the local resource management institutions like Community Forest User Groups (CFUGs), it has failed to provide incentives to resource managers. Finally, the mechanisms have undermined the role of principal beneficiary of environmental services, Nepal Electricity Authority, which has affected the monitoring and compliance of the rules. Analysis of the institutional dynamics of the PES has revealed that such disappointing results are due to three main institutional factors. First, the design process has been heavily influenced by the Makawanpur District Development Committee (DDC), while marginalizing the role of other important actors, particularly CFUGs and the Nepal Electricity Authority. Second, due to lack of a separate policy for PES in Nepal, the rules have drawn heavily from the Local Self Governance Act (1999), which has reinforced the role of the DDC and marginalized that of other resource management institutions. Finally, because of weak monitoring mechanisms, the procedural rules have not been put into practice effectively. Based on this analysis, I argue that, although the PES in Kulekhani has provided a mechanism for transferring hydroelectricity revenue to the local communities to support rural development, it has not transformed existing resource management structures and institutions to demonstrate the effectiveness of enhancing environmental outcomes. The lessons of this research are that politics are driving the design of PES mechanisms, and that its interplay with local institutions can hinder the performance. Moreover, this research suggests that PES schemes do not necessarily result in cooperation among local institutions or the achievement of both ecological and social outcomes. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/6616/ Thu, 01 Jan 2009 00:00:01 GMT <div>Jenks, Jessica J.</div> This paper addresses the neoliberal assumptions for private property rights to incentivise water and water markets. Chile´s 1981 Water Code is used to display the juxtaposition of efficiency and social equity of water markets in providing water access for different groups within a liberalised agricultural sector. The fruit industry is a specific example for the incentive to allocate water to high-value production for national and transnational fruit companies. New Institutional Economics provides a realistic perspective to the socio-economic power dynamics in the competition for scarce water resources within water markets. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/6595/ Thu, 01 Jan 2009 00:00:01 GMT <div>Connor, Jonathan</div> Prior to the 1980s, indigenous activism in Brazil was primarily a local affair, as indigenous communities sought to defend their traditional lands from the encroachment of cattle ranchers, land speculators and large-scale development projects. However, over the course of the 1980s these local land-use conflicts came to take on major international significance. As concern for the state of the global environment gained momentum in international policy discussions, many indigenous rights activists strategically recast their claims in environmentalist terms. What was previously seen as a conflict over land use or human rights violations was suddenly perceived as a pressing environmental issue—that of deforestation and the subsequent loss of biodiversity. In this way, Indian struggles for self-determination, land rights and cultural survival very rapidly came to be seen by northern audiences as intimately tied to the fate of the rainforest. As a result, a complex network of ‘partnerships,’ ‘alliances’ and information exchange emerged between local Amazonian communities and international environmentalists, which began to challenge the developmentalist policies of international lending institutions and the Brazilian state. These transnational alliances have been instrumental in directing international attention to the plight of indigenous peoples. However, they may ultimately misrepresent the priorities of Amazonian communities. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/6610/ Thu, 01 Jan 2009 00:00:01 GMT <div>Strydom, Elrich Morne</div> With this paper I aim to conduct a critical discourse analysis of the South African Biofuel Industrial Strategy which was passed in 2007. South Africa has produced biofuels prior to the passing of the BIS, dating back to as early as the 1920s. I examine the history of biofuel production in the country and outline the historical discourse around biofuel production. The BIS renewed South Africa’s commitment to biofuel production and outline the country’s biofuel goals post 2007. The BIS was set up to coincide with other several other goals of other governmental. Land reform and land use restrictions were tied into the BIS, hoping biofuel production would assist emerging farmers on newly redistributed land; I examine the discourse around the BIS and look at its impacts on agriculture, land affairs, and biofuel production. Similarly, food security was made paramount in the BIS, leading to extensive biofuel production regulations, in effect preventing bio-ethanol producers from participating in the biofuel industry because of the food security concerns. This led to the examination of the biofuel industry where the paper compared the discourse of the BIS with the impacts of the strategy on the biofuel industry. I conclude by analysing the BIS and assessing its efficacy. The analysis will show that the strategy is too broad, too ambitious, and unfortunately therefore unworkable. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/6614/ Thu, 01 Jan 2009 00:00:01 GMT <div>Kantengwa, Speciose</div> Water resources in their natural state represent almost the only source of water used for all household purposes, especially for rural communities from Developing countries. Hence, these natural resources constitute a very important asset for the livelihoods of these communities. Changing the property regime of water resources might affect significantly the livelihoods assets of local population, principally those living on the peripheries of the natural water resources. The present research paper aims to analyse the impact of the national environmental policy on water resources through property regimes on livelihoods assets of rural communities, living specifically in the periphery of Lake Muhazi in the Eastern province of Rwanda. The main concepts applicable to this study are environmental property regimes, environmental policy instruments, and livelihoods assets. The study captured their mutual influence on the property rights of local population living in the surroundings of that lake. Findings from field research have revealed that the policy is implemented, and its outcomes on property rights are evident. By losing their property rights, the local population in general and the poor in particular have lost their endowments in relation to the use of Lake Muhazi. It was realized that the poor were excluded by the new livelihood strategies in place for the conservation of the lake. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/6612/ Thu, 01 Jan 2009 00:00:01 GMT <div>Cheng, Kai-Fang</div> This paper uses political ecology to analyze the dynamic relation between the Moso minority, their surrounding natural resources and environmental degradation in four periods. It shows that the ecological changes in the Lugu Lake region was intimately linked to the development path of China after the establishment of the People’s Republic in 1949. The paper argues that the mainstream statement which saw underdevelopment and traditional living practices of local poor people, especially the minorities, were the main cause of environmental degradation in western China as reductionist and problematic. In addition, it points out that the purely technical-oriented sustainable development policies in minority areas which ignore the power relation between the majority and minorities and lack a comprehensive concern for cultural difference could bring unintended social, economic and cultural impacts and inequalities. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/8593/ Fri, 01 Oct 2010 00:00:01 GMT <div>Lignule, E.</div> An increasing number of irrigation dam interventions are user-managed, presuming that this approach delivers better project outcomes. Using an institutional approach, this paper explores how the IFAD-funded, user-managed, irrigation dam interventions in Ghana’s Upper West Region impacted on farmers‟ capacity to cope with drought. Water users associations were formed to address problems of malfeasance among members and ensure collective action for efficient irrigation management to empower participants and reduce poverty and vulnerability to drought. The study concludes that perverse incentives at all levels, particularly at design led to the framing of the intervention on the neo-liberal tenet of full cost recovery, and at implementation to poorly constructed irrigation canals, while lack of collective action during the operational phase contributed to lack of maintenance. As a result, the intervention contributed to a low increase in the capacity of respondents to cope with drought. -- Relevance to Development Studies -- Access to and management of irrigation facilities is vital for the livelihoods of poor and vulnerable farmers living in drought-stricken areas. By exploring how this donor-funded, user-managed irrigation dam intervention worked and impacted on the capacity of farmers to cope with drought, this paper makes a theoretical contribution to literature on irrigation, climate change and rural livelihoods. https://thesis.eur.nl/pub/8628/ Mon, 01 Nov 2010 00:00:01 GMT <div>Rodríguez Valladares, Silvia Cristina</div> One of the most relevant environmental degradation issues reported at the international and regional spheres is deforestation. From the 1980s, the relevant literature is focused on understanding what the drivers of deforestation are because its economic, social, and environmental effects may put at risk human well-being and biodiversity for current and future generations. Even though its definition and quantification is in constant flux and evolution there is a consensus that deforestation has to be controlled and globally its expansion reduced.