L'interpretazione del contratto internazionale

La ricerca ha ad oggetto l’analisi di clausole, contenute nei contratti del commercio internazionale, che sembrano finalizzate a fornire in anticipo una metodologia dell’interpretazione del contratto. L’elaborato pertanto analizza i profili di validità ed efficacia di singole e specifiche clausole, come le “clausole d’intero accordo”, le “clausole di non modificazione orale”, le clausole contenenti definizioni, e simili, alla luce delle regole giudiriche di derivazione eteronoma applicabili al contratto, siano esse rappresentate da una legge nazionale, da una convenzione internazionale di diritto materiale uniforme, o da fonti ulteriori c.d. di soft law, come i Principi Unidroit sui contratti del commercio internazionale. La ricerca ha pertanto rivelato che, diversamente da quanto possa apparire a prima vista, svariate tipologie di clausole analizzate non coinvolgono profili legati all'’nterpretazione del contratto, quanto piuttosto di documentazione e forma dello stesso. L’elaborato contiene infine alcune considerazioni di teoria generale del diritto.

"Water users must be efficient producers". Women's access to and use of land in Chókwè irrigation scheme, Mozambique

The irrigation scheme Eduardo Mondlane, situated in Chókwè District - in the Southern part of the Gaza province and within the Limpopo River Basin - is the largest in the country, covering approximately 30,000 hectares of land. Built by the Portuguese colonial administration in the 1950s to exploit the agricultural potential of the area through cash-cropping, after Independence it became one of Frelimo’s flagship projects aiming at the “socialization of the countryside” and at agricultural economic development through the creation of a state farm and of several cooperatives. The failure of Frelimo’s economic reforms, several infrastructural constraints and local farmers resistance to collective forms of production led to scheme to a state of severe degradation aggravated by the floods of the year 2000. A project of technical rehabilitation initiated after the floods is currently accompanied by a strong “efficiency” discourse from the managing institution that strongly opposes the use of irrigated land for subsistence agriculture, historically a major livelihood strategy for smallfarmers, particularly for women. In fact, the area has been characterized, since the end of the XIX century, by a stable pattern of male migration towards South African mines, that has resulted in an a steady increase of women-headed households (both de jure and de facto). The relationship between land reform, agricultural development, poverty alleviation and gender equality in Southern Africa is long debated in academic literature. Within this debate, the role of agricultural activities in irrigation schemes is particularly interesting considering that, in a drought-prone area, having access to water for irrigation means increased possibilities of improving food and livelihood security, and income levels. In the case of Chókwè, local governments institutions are endorsing the development of commercial agriculture through initiatives such as partnerships with international cooperation agencies or joint-ventures with private investors. While these business models can sometimes lead to positive outcomes in terms of poverty alleviation, it is important to recognize that decentralization and neoliberal reforms occur in the context of financial and political crisis of the State that lacks the resources to efficiently manage infrastructures such as irrigation systems. This kind of institutional and economic reforms risk accelerating processes of social and economic marginalisation, including landlessness, in particular for poor rural women that mainly use irrigated land for subsistence production. The study combines an analysis of the historical and geographical context with the study of relevant literature and original fieldwork. Fieldwork was conducted between February and June 2007 (where I mainly collected secondary data, maps and statistics and conducted preliminary visit to Chókwè) and from October 2007 to March 2008. Fieldwork methodology was qualitative and used semi-structured interviews with central and local Government officials, technical experts of the irrigation scheme, civil society organisations, international NGOs, rural extensionists, and water users from the irrigation scheme, in particular those women smallfarmers members of local farmers’ associations. Thanks to the collaboration with the Union of Farmers’ Associations of Chókwè, she has been able to participate to members’ meeting, to education and training activities addressed to women farmers members of the Union and to organize a group discussion. In Chókwè irrigation scheme, women account for the 32% of water users of the familiar sector (comprising plot-holders with less than 5 hectares of land) and for just 5% of the private sector. If one considers farmers’ associations of the familiar sector (a legacy of Frelimo’s cooperatives), women are 84% of total members. However, the security given to them by the land title that they have acquired through occupation is severely endangered by the use that they make of land, that is considered as “non efficient” by the irrigation scheme authority. Due to a reduced access to marketing possibilities and to inputs, training, information and credit women, in actual fact, risk to see their right to access land and water revoked because they are not able to sustain the increasing cost of the water fee. The myth of the “efficient producer” does not take into consideration the characteristics of inequality and gender discrimination of the neo-liberal market. Expecting small-farmers, and in particular women, to be able to compete in the globalized agricultural market seems unrealistic, and can perpetuate unequal gendered access to resources such as land and water.

Le strategie di internazionalizzazione delle imprese distrettuali: un'analisi comparata di tre diversi sistemi locali di produzione in Emilia Romagna

Since the Nineties, the process of globalization has caused a sharp increase in the real and financial integration of the worldwide economy, reducing the obstacles to international trade and minimizing the cost of transaction. The entrance of foreign firms in the domestic market has deeply modified the competitive situation of Italian enterprises, which have been forced to change their strategies in order to cope with those of the new competitors. In this scenario, internationalization is no longer one of the different strategic options available for the firm, but it becomes a forced choice to maintain or acquire a competitive advantage sustainable over time. Internationalization strategies of SMEs, however, are hindered by the shortage of financial resources and entrepreneurial skills, therefore this kind of firms tends toward light forms of foreign expansion, like export and subcontracting. Despite this, many studies have demonstrated that the district localisation increases the firms’ productivity and innovative capacity, so their competiveness both at a domestic and international level. The majority of these empirical contributions has focused mainly on the analysis of commercial flows, confirming that district enterprises reach a superior international performance compared to their external competitors. On the contrary, only few works have tried to evaluate the existence of a district effect on the firms’ ability to invest abroad, but the obtained results are not straightforward. One of the reason of these conclusions is that the phenomena has been analysed without taking into account the differences existing between districts in terms of enterprises’ dimension, diffusion of industrial groups and, above all, the sector of productive specialization, because the technological content of production could improve the innovativeness of district firms, allowing them to adopt advanced forms of internationalisation as foreign direct investments (FDI). The aim of the thesis is to further investigate the district effect on internationalisation, trough an econometric analysis of the international strategies carried out by firms localised in three different local system of production characterised by different technological specialization.