What Happened to Participation? Urban Development and Authoritarian Upgrading in Cairo's Informal Neighbourhoods

Participation appeared in development discourses for the first time in the 1970s, as a generic call for the involvement of the poor in development initiatives. Over the last three decades, the initial perspectives on participation intended as a project method for poverty reduction have evolved into a coherent and articulated theoretical elaboration, in which participation figures among the paraphernalia of good governance promotion: participation has acquired the status of “new orthodoxy”. Nevertheless, the experience of the implementation of participatory approaches in development projects seemed to be in the majority of cases rather disappointing, since the transformative potential of ‘participation in development’ depends on a series of factors in which every project can actually differ from others: the ultimate aim of the approach promoted, its forms and contents and, last but not least, the socio-political context in which the participatory initiative is embedded. In Egypt, the signature of a project agreement between the Arab Republic of Egypt and the Federal Republic of Germany, in 1998, inaugurated a Participatory Urban Management Programme (PUMP) to be implemented in Greater Cairo by the German Technical Cooperation (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit, GTZ) and the Ministry of Planning (now Ministry of Local Development) and the Governorates of Giza and Cairo as the main counterparts. Now, ten years after the beginning of the PUMP/PDP and close to its end (December 2010), it is possible to draw some conclusions about the scope, the significance and the effects of the participatory approach adopted by GTZ and appropriated by the Egyptian counterparts in dealing with the issue of informal areas and, more generally, of urban development. Our analysis follows three sets of questions: the first set regards the way ‘participation’ has been interpreted and concretised by PUMP and PDP. The second is about the emancipating potential of the ‘participatory approach’ and its ability to ‘empower’ the ‘marginalised’. The third focuses on one hand on the efficacy of GTZ strategy to lead to an improvement of the delivery service in informal areas (especially in terms of planning and policies), and on the other hand on the potential of GTZ development intervention to trigger an incremental process of ‘democratisation’ from below.

Valutazione delle politiche di sviluppo locale: una comparazione internazionale

Lo sviluppo locale rappresenta, non solo per gli economisti, un tema di analisi sempre più rilevante sia al livello istituzionale che al livello scientifico. La complessità degli aspetti inerenti lo sviluppo locale richiede il coinvolgimento di diverse discipline, in ambito economico, politico, sociale e ambientale e di tutti i livelli istituzionali. Parallelamente è cresciuta l’esigenza di processi valutativi coerenti e sistematici, basati su di un numero sempre maggiore di strumenti e metodologie di valutazione. Dall’orientamento della Commissione Europea emerge del resto con sempre maggiore evidenza il binomio fra politica di sviluppo locale e valutazione, che coinvolge i diversi livelli di governo. Il presente lavoro realizza un quadro delle politiche di sviluppo locale, partendo dal livello europeo fino ad arrivare al livello locale, ed una successiva analisi di metodologie e strumenti di valutazione consolidati e di frontiera. La considerazione della valutazione come strumento strategico per le politiche di sviluppo locale trova applicazione nella realizzazione di una analisi comparativa di due aree di montagna. Tali aree, identificate nell’Appennino Bolognese e nell’area montana della Contea di Brasov in Romania, pur collocate in paesi a diverso livello di sviluppo, risultano confrontabili, in termini di similitudini e criticità, al fine di trarre considerazioni di policy inerenti il disegno di adeguate politiche di riqualificazione, mettendo in luce l’importanza del processo valutativo e la necessità di contribuire a diffondere una vera e propria cultura della valutazione.

Rimesse e sviluppo locale nel sistema migratorio del Golfo Persico

The thesis concerns, from an economic and institutional point of view, the migration process in connection with development issues, focusing on the Middle East and North Africa region. Adopting a south-south perspective of migration flows, which is focusing on migration from the Maghreb and Mashreq towards the GCC, the research focuses on the linkage between migration and local development (LED), considering the economic implication that temporary migration flows (trough physical and human capital accumulation) have for the labour exporting countries of the region. Since south-south migration flows are both temporary and skilled, the research points out that return migrants from the GCC can have a significant impact for the growth of recipient countries, as they transfer capital through remittances on regular basis and, once back, they can use human capital acquired abroad to promote economic initiatives. Starting from the descriptive analysis on international migration flows (from an historical to a systemic point of view), and focusing on the patterns of people movements in the Gulf Migration System and on the role remittances have in the region as a strategy for both household survival and local development, the research considers the economics of migrant remittances from a micro and macro perspective and the main direct and indirect effects that remittances have on the local communities. The review of the economic literature on international remittances and on local development shows how migration is an alternative strategy of financing local economic development (LED) especially for low-middle income countries (among them the Maghreb countries). The linkage between return migration, remittances, human capital formation and the promotion of local development in the Egyptian case is the focus of the empirical investigation.

Il Progetto Good Water Neighbors nella pratica quotidiana: il people to people approach alla prova delle comunità israeliane, palestinesi e giordane. L'acqua quale strumento di pace e di empowerment sociale nel quadro del conflitto arabo-israeliano

Il Medio Oriente è una regione in cui le scarse risorse idriche giocano un ruolo fondamentale nei rapporti e nelle relazioni tra gli Stati. Soprattutto nell'area di Israele, Palestina e Giordania la natura transfrontaliera delle fonti idriche condivise è considerata da qualche ricercatore come un catalizzatore del più ampio conflitto arabo-israeliano. Altri studiosi, tuttavia, vedono nella cooperazione regionale sulle risorse idriche un potenziale cammino verso una pace duratura veicolata dalla natura interdipendente delle fonti idriche comuni a più territori. Dato che l'acqua è l'elemento che per molti aspetti contribuisce allo sviluppo sociale ed economico e dato che le fonti idriche sotterranee e di superficie non conoscono confini e si muovono liberamente nel territorio, la cooperazione tra gli Stati rivieraschi delle risorse idriche dovrebbe arrivare a prevalere sul conflitto. Unica nel suo genere, l'ong trilaterale israelo-palestinese giordana Friends of the Earth Middle East, FoEME, ha fatto proprio tale auspicio e dal 1994 punta a sviluppare progetti di cooperazione per la salvaguardia del patrimonio naturale dell'area del bacino del fiume Giordano e del Mar Morto. Attraverso l'esperienza del Progetto Good Water Neighbors, GWN, avviato nel 2002, sta lavorando ad una serie di iniziative nel campo dell'environmental awareness e del social empowerment a favore di comunità  israeliane, palestinesi e giordane transfrontaliere che condividono risorse idriche sotterranee o di superficie. Operando inizialmente a livello locale per identificare i problemi idrico-ambientali di ogni comunità  selezionata e lavorare con i cittadini (ragazzi, famiglie e amministratori municipali) per migliorare la conoscenza idrica locale attraverso attività  di educazione ambientale, di water awareness e piani di sviluppo urbano eco-compatibile, il Progetto GWN ha facilitato a livello transfrontaliero i rapporti tra le comunità  confinanti abbattendo la barriera di sfiducia e sospetto che normalmente impedisce relazioni pacifiche, ha coadiuvato l'analisi dei problemi idrici comuni cercando di risolverli attraverso uno sforzo programmatico condiviso e sostenibile, per giungere infine a livello regionale ad incoraggiare la gestione idrica comune attraverso lo scambio di informazioni, il dialogo e lo sforzo/impegno cooperativo congiunto tra gli attori parte del GWN al fine di incentivare la pace attraverso l'interesse comune della tutela delle fonti idriche condivise. Gli approcci di local development e participation, le azioni di confidence building e il peacebuilding attraverso la tutela ambientale applicati con il metodo di bottom up all'interno di un contesto non pacificato come quello del conflitto arabo-israeliano, fanno del Progetto GWN un esperimento innovativo e originale. Le comunità  israeliane, palestinesi e giordane selezionate hanno imparato a migliorare le proprie condizioni idrico-ambiennali cooperando assieme e sfruttando l'interdipendenza dalle fonti idriche condivise, avviando nel contempo rapporti pacifici con società  sempre considerate nemiche. La sfida è stata quella di far comprendere le potenzialità  di una cooperazione locale, in vista di un coordinamento regionale e di uno sforzo comune in grado di generare un beneficio collettivo. La lezione appresa finora durante questi primi sette anni di Progetto è stata quella di capire che non è necessario attendere la fine del conflitto per poter essere di aiuto alle proprie comunità  o per un benessere personale, ma si può agire subito, anche nel pieno dell'Intifada al-Aqsa e con i coprifuoco.

Il ruolo della grande distribuzione nello sviluppo locale. Un'indagine sul contesto italiano

Supermarkets and hypermarkets still represent a relatively new retailing format in Italy and in its Southern area in particular, where they were introduced decades later than in other Western countries, such as France and the UK in Europe, and the US in America. Nowadays, these retailers have become large organisations potentially capable of influencing local development from an economic, social and urban perspective. The literature concerned with their effects on the local economy, in particular, has focused on labour markets, price dynamics, inter-type competition, instead the impact on macroeconomic factors such as GDP, value added and investments in specific sectors, as agriculture, industry and services. This study tries to fill this gap by empirically investigating associations between key characteristics of these retailers and specific macroeconomic factors.

L’esperienza turistica tra pratica di consumo e fattore di sviluppo locale sostenibile

La società dei consumi ha reso ogni ambito vitale suscettibile di mercificazione. Il capitalismo ha da tempo svestito la prassi produttiva dei suoi elementi più pesanti per vestire i panni della dimensione simbolica e culturale. Il consumo fattosi segno, dimensione immateriale delle nostre vite materiali, ha finito per colonizzare l'ambito dell'esperienza e, quindi, della vita stessa. Il consumo diventa, innanzitutto, esperienza di vita. Una esperienza continuamente cangiante che ci permette di vivere numerose vite, ognuna diversa. Ciò che è stabile è il paradigma consumistico che investe la nostra stessa identità, l'identità dei luoghi, l'identità del mondo. Il nomadismo è la dimensione più tipica del consumo, così come la perenne mobilità della vita è la dimensione propria dell'epoca globale. Tuttavia, le nuove forme di consumerismo politico, etico e responsabile, conseguenti al montare dei rischi globali, investendo proprio l’ambito dell’esperienza e del consumo, contribuiscono a modificare i comportamenti in senso “riflessivo” e “glocale”. L’ambito turistico, rappresentando al contempo il paradigma esperienziale e quello della mobilità globale, può diventare allora l’osservatorio privilegiato per indagare queste stesse forme riflessive di consumo, le quali forniscono un significato del tutto nuovo tanto all’esperienza quanto al consumo stesso. Il lavoro di tesi vuole allora approfondire, attraverso lo studio di caso, il modo in cui nuove forme emergenti di turismo responsabile possano rappresentare una chiave d’accesso a nuove forme di sviluppo sostenibile dei territori locali in contesti di prima modernizzazione.

Innovazione sociale, sviluppo e turismo: quale legame? Uno studio teorico ed empirico nella citta di Bologna.

La ricerca è nata dalla volontà di indagare il legame tra innovazione sociale, sviluppo e turismo. La domanda di ricerca che ha guidato questo lavoro ha assunto una duplice natura. Il primo obiettivo, di natura teorica, è stato quello di concettualizzare l’IS attraverso uno studio comparativo della letteratura internazionale, definendone le dimensioni e i processi di diffusione. Dal punto di vista empirico, è stata effettuata una ricerca-azione di tipo qualitativo nella città di Bologna. Partendo da un approfondimento storico che ha analizzato alcune peculiarità territoriali – il movimento cooperativo, i distretti industriali, etc. – l’indagine ha fornito una prima panoramica del fenomeno attraverso una mappatura delle realtà bolognesi. I risultati emersi hanno dimostrato che i legami tra IS, sviluppo e turismo sono complessi. L’IS comporta delle conseguenze per il territorio, andando ad intervenire all’interno dei processi di sviluppo. Nel rispondere a bisogni emergenti, essa promuove agency ed empowerment, creatività e capitale sociale abilitante. In un’ottica di sviluppo territoriale integrato, l’IS agisce sul processo di capacitazione, sia attraverso la valorizzazione del capitale sociale e la creazione di reti, sia attraverso processi di negoziazione e conflitto. L’indagine ha mostrato che tra turismo e IS esiste una triplice relazione. Innanzitutto, il turismo può essere considerato come uno strumento di analisi per osservare l’IS, ma la relazione avviene soprattutto a livello di pratiche sociali. Esistono, infatti, a Bologna diversi casi di iniziative di IS che diventano esperienze turistiche e viceversa. Citando Lefebvre, quando IS e turismo trovano spazi di intersezione emerge un duplice diritto alla città. Un diritto che si manifesta nella (ri)appropriazione di spazi fisici e simbolici dove si collocano le relazioni sociali e dove si elaborano progettualità condivise e dove la comunità può partecipare, supportando la capacità di aspirare dei soggetti locali

Development Aid to Water Management in Mali: The Actors, ‘Global’ Paradigms, and ‘Local’ Translations

Development aid involves a complex network of numerous and extremely heterogeneous actors. Nevertheless, all actors seem to speak the same ‘development jargon’ and to display a congruence that extends from the donor over the professional consultant to the village chief. And although the ideas about what counts as ‘good’ and ‘bad’ aid have constantly changed over time —with new paradigms and policies sprouting every few years— the apparent congruence between actors more or less remains unchanged. How can this be explained? Is it a strategy of all actors to get into the pocket of the donor, or are the social dynamics in development aid more complex? When a new development paradigm appears, where does it come from and how does it gain support? Is this support really homogeneous? To answer the questions, a multi-sited ethnography was conducted in the sector of water-related development aid, with a focus on 3 paradigms that are currently hegemonic in this sector: Integrated Water Resources Management, Capacity Building, and Adaptation to Climate Change. The sites of inquiry were: the headquarters of a multilateral organization, the headquarters of a development NGO, and the Inner Niger Delta in Mali. The research shows that paradigm shifts do not happen overnight but that new paradigms have long lines of descent. Moreover, they require a lot of work from actors in order to become hegemonic; the actors need to create a tight network of support. Each actor, however, interprets the paradigms in a slightly different way, depending on the position in the network. They implant their own interests in their interpretation of the paradigm (the actors ‘translate’ their interests), regardless of whether they constitute the donor, a mediator, or the aid recipient. These translations are necessary to cement and reproduce the network.

Topics in Local Economic Development

This thesis contributes to the current debate in literature about local economic development by considering two different topics: quality of institutions, and the role of clusters in innovation and productivity growth. The research is built upon three papers. The first paper deals with the analysis of the effect of administrative continuity on administrative efficiency. The analysis underlines the importance of different typologies of social capital. Findings reveal a positive impact on administrative efficiency (AE) by administrative continuity (AC) when it is coupled by bridging and linking social capital. On the contrary, bonding social capital influences negatively the effect by AC on AE. The second paper investigates the spatial interaction in levels of quality of government (QoG) among European regions. Notwithstanding the largely recognised role by institutions in the design of regional policies, no study has been conducted about the mechanisms of interaction and diffusion of QoG at regional level. This research wants to overcome this knowledge gap in literature. Findings reveal a heterogeneity in spatial interaction among groups of regions, i.e. ‘leader regions’ (Northern regions) and ‘lagging regions’ (Southern regions), when considering different mechanisms of interaction (learning / imitating competition and pure competition). Moreover, the effect of wealth on the levels of QoG is nonlinear. Finally, the third paper analyses the relation among specialization and productivity within the agricultural sector. In literature, the study of clusters dynamics has long neglected agriculture. The analysis describes the changes in sectorial specialization for eight main crop groups in Italian regions (NUTS 3), assessing the existence of spatial autocorrelations by using an exploratory data analysis. Furthermore, the effect of specialization on productivity is analysed within the main crop groups using a spatial panel data model. Findings reveal a marked tendency to specialization in the Italian agriculture, and a heterogeneous effect by specialization on productivity.

Rural development and communication: a community media project in Uttar Pradesh (India)

Loaded with 16% of the world’s population, India is a challenged country. More than a third of its citizens live below the poverty line - on less than a dollar a day. These people have no proper electricity, no proper drinking water supply, no proper sanitary facilities and well over 40% are illiterates. More than 65% live in rural areas and 60% earn their livelihood from agriculture. Only a meagre 3.63% have access to telephone and less than 1% have access to a computer. Therefore, providing access to timely information on agriculture, weather, social, health care, employment, fishing, is of utmost importance to improve the conditions of rural poor. After some introductive chapters, whose function is to provide a comprehensive framework – both theoretical and practical – of the current rural development policies and of the media situation in India and Uttar Pradesh, my dissertation presents the findings of the pilot project entitled “Enhancing development support to rural masses through community media activity”, launched in 2005 by the Department of Mass Communication and Journalism of the Faculty of Arts of the University of Lucknow (U.P.) and by the local NGO Bharosa. The project scope was to involve rural people and farmers from two villages of the district of Lucknow (namely Kumhrava and Barhi Gaghi) in a three-year participatory community media project, based on the creation, implementation and use of a rural community newspaper and a rural community internet centre. Community media projects like this one have been rarely carried out in India because the country has no proper community media tradition: therefore the development of the project has been a challenge for the all stakeholders involved.

Development of Clinical Decision Support Systems based on Mathematical Models of Physiological Systems

In the last years of research, I focused my studies on different physiological problems. Together with my supervisors, I developed/improved different mathematical models in order to create valid tools useful for a better understanding of important clinical issues. The aim of all this work is to develop tools for learning and understanding cardiac and cerebrovascular physiology as well as pathology, generating research questions and developing clinical decision support systems useful for intensive care unit patients. I. ICP-model Designed for Medical Education We developed a comprehensive cerebral blood flow and intracranial pressure model to simulate and study the complex interactions in cerebrovascular dynamics caused by multiple simultaneous alterations, including normal and abnormal functional states of auto-regulation of the brain. Individual published equations (derived from prior animal and human studies) were implemented into a comprehensive simulation program. Included in the normal physiological modelling was: intracranial pressure, cerebral blood flow, blood pressure, and carbon dioxide (CO2) partial pressure. We also added external and pathological perturbations, such as head up position and intracranial haemorrhage. The model performed clinically realistically given inputs of published traumatized patients, and cases encountered by clinicians. The pulsatile nature of the output graphics was easy for clinicians to interpret. The manoeuvres simulated include changes of basic physiological inputs (e.g. blood pressure, central venous pressure, CO2 tension, head up position, and respiratory effects on vascular pressures) as well as pathological inputs (e.g. acute intracranial bleeding, and obstruction of cerebrospinal outflow). Based on the results, we believe the model would be useful to teach complex relationships of brain haemodynamics and study clinical research questions such as the optimal head-up position, the effects of intracranial haemorrhage on cerebral haemodynamics, as well as the best CO2 concentration to reach the optimal compromise between intracranial pressure and perfusion. We believe this model would be useful for both beginners and advanced learners. It could be used by practicing clinicians to model individual patients (entering the effects of needed clinical manipulations, and then running the model to test for optimal combinations of therapeutic manoeuvres). II. A Heterogeneous Cerebrovascular Mathematical Model Cerebrovascular pathologies are extremely complex, due to the multitude of factors acting simultaneously on cerebral haemodynamics. In this work, the mathematical model of cerebral haemodynamics and intracranial pressure dynamics, described in the point I, is extended to account for heterogeneity in cerebral blood flow. The model includes the Circle of Willis, six regional districts independently regulated by autoregulation and CO2 reactivity, distal cortical anastomoses, venous circulation, the cerebrospinal fluid circulation, and the intracranial pressure-volume relationship. Results agree with data in the literature and highlight the existence of a monotonic relationship between transient hyperemic response and the autoregulation gain. During unilateral internal carotid artery stenosis, local blood flow regulation is progressively lost in the ipsilateral territory with the presence of a steal phenomenon, while the anterior communicating artery plays the major role to redistribute the available blood flow. Conversely, distal collateral circulation plays a major role during unilateral occlusion of the middle cerebral artery. In conclusion, the model is able to reproduce several different pathological conditions characterized by heterogeneity in cerebrovascular haemodynamics and can not only explain generalized results in terms of physiological mechanisms involved, but also, by individualizing parameters, may represent a valuable tool to help with difficult clinical decisions. III. Effect of Cushing Response on Systemic Arterial Pressure. During cerebral hypoxic conditions, the sympathetic system causes an increase in arterial pressure (Cushing response), creating a link between the cerebral and the systemic circulation. This work investigates the complex relationships among cerebrovascular dynamics, intracranial pressure, Cushing response, and short-term systemic regulation, during plateau waves, by means of an original mathematical model. The model incorporates the pulsating heart, the pulmonary circulation and the systemic circulation, with an accurate description of the cerebral circulation and the intracranial pressure dynamics (same model as in the first paragraph). Various regulatory mechanisms are included: cerebral autoregulation, local blood flow control by oxygen (O2) and/or CO2 changes, sympathetic and vagal regulation of cardiovascular parameters by several reflex mechanisms (chemoreceptors, lung-stretch receptors, baroreceptors). The Cushing response has been described assuming a dramatic increase in sympathetic activity to vessels during a fall in brain O2 delivery. With this assumption, the model is able to simulate the cardiovascular effects experimentally observed when intracranial pressure is artificially elevated and maintained at constant level (arterial pressure increase and bradicardia). According to the model, these effects arise from the interaction between the Cushing response and the baroreflex response (secondary to arterial pressure increase). Then, patients with severe head injury have been simulated by reducing intracranial compliance and cerebrospinal fluid reabsorption. With these changes, oscillations with plateau waves developed. In these conditions, model results indicate that the Cushing response may have both positive effects, reducing the duration of the plateau phase via an increase in cerebral perfusion pressure, and negative effects, increasing the intracranial pressure plateau level, with a risk of greater compression of the cerebral vessels. This model may be of value to assist clinicians in finding the balance between clinical benefits of the Cushing response and its shortcomings. IV. Comprehensive Cardiopulmonary Simulation Model for the Analysis of Hypercapnic Respiratory Failure We developed a new comprehensive cardiopulmonary model that takes into account the mutual interactions between the cardiovascular and the respiratory systems along with their short-term regulatory mechanisms. The model includes the heart, systemic and pulmonary circulations, lung mechanics, gas exchange and transport equations, and cardio-ventilatory control. Results show good agreement with published patient data in case of normoxic and hyperoxic hypercapnia simulations. In particular, simulations predict a moderate increase in mean systemic arterial pressure and heart rate, with almost no change in cardiac output, paralleled by a relevant increase in minute ventilation, tidal volume and respiratory rate. The model can represent a valid tool for clinical practice and medical research, providing an alternative way to experience-based clinical decisions. In conclusion, models are not only capable of summarizing current knowledge, but also identifying missing knowledge. In the former case they can serve as training aids for teaching the operation of complex systems, especially if the model can be used to demonstrate the outcome of experiments. In the latter case they generate experiments to be performed to gather the missing data.

Development of a new galaxy classification technique and its application to the zCOSMOS survey

The purpose of this Thesis is to develop a robust and powerful method to classify galaxies from large surveys, in order to establish and confirm the connections between the principal observational parameters of the galaxies (spectral features, colours, morphological indices), and help unveil the evolution of these parameters from $z \sim 1$ to the local Universe. Within the framework of zCOSMOS-bright survey, and making use of its large database of objects ($\sim 10\,000$ galaxies in the redshift range $0 < z \lesssim 1.2$) and its great reliability in redshift and spectral properties determinations, first we adopt and extend the \emph{classification cube method}, as developed by Mignoli et al. (2009), to exploit the bimodal properties of galaxies (spectral, photometric and morphologic) separately, and then combining together these three subclassifications. We use this classification method as a test for a newly devised statistical classification, based on Principal Component Analysis and Unsupervised Fuzzy Partition clustering method (PCA+UFP), which is able to define the galaxy population exploiting their natural global bimodality, considering simultaneously up to 8 different properties. The PCA+UFP analysis is a very powerful and robust tool to probe the nature and the evolution of galaxies in a survey. It allows to define with less uncertainties the classification of galaxies, adding the flexibility to be adapted to different parameters: being a fuzzy classification it avoids the problems due to a hard classification, such as the classification cube presented in the first part of the article. The PCA+UFP method can be easily applied to different datasets: it does not rely on the nature of the data and for this reason it can be successfully employed with others observables (magnitudes, colours) or derived properties (masses, luminosities, SFRs, etc.). The agreement between the two classification cluster definitions is very high. ``Early'' and ``late'' type galaxies are well defined by the spectral, photometric and morphological properties, both considering them in a separate way and then combining the classifications (classification cube) and treating them as a whole (PCA+UFP cluster analysis). Differences arise in the definition of outliers: the classification cube is much more sensitive to single measurement errors or misclassifications in one property than the PCA+UFP cluster analysis, in which errors are ``averaged out'' during the process. This method allowed us to behold the \emph{downsizing} effect taking place in the PC spaces: the migration between the blue cloud towards the red clump happens at higher redshifts for galaxies of larger mass. The determination of $M_{\mathrm{cross}}$ the transition mass is in significant agreement with others values in literature.

Bridging innovation, nature and tradition: assessment of strategies for rural tourism development in Maramureş (Romania)

In the frame of EU rural policy, always more oriented towards environmental concerns and green livelihoods, Romania stands out for the predominance of rural areas and high nature value farming. The country has to face the challenge of joining the modernization process of rural farming systems with the valorization of local assets. Tourism has emerged as one of the main drivers of change and contributors for a sustainable exploitation of local resources. Rural tourism (RT) can foster the enhancement of the territorial capital (TC), the preservation of public goods (PGs) and the promotion of a more environmental oriented livelihood. The research focuses on a case study area, two valleys from Maramureş, where environmental approaches as diversification strategies are partially explored. The work investigates the role of tourism initiatives for the promotion of green oriented practices. The first part of the work is based on a literature review and interdisciplinary analysis of secondary data to identify the key issues: from rural development policy, to the concept of TC, of PGs and RT. The Romanian development programmes and related strategies are investigated; afterwards the characteristics of the County and the role of RT as diversification and valorisation policies is considered. The second part is based on the collection of primary data through interviews to different local stakeholders (farmers owners of rural guesthouses, local administrators, networks and artisans). The main frequencies are analyzed, a cluster analysis is computed to evaluate the similarities within the most representative groups and a comparative analysis is carried out between the two Valleys. The frame of the analysis is based on a set of indicators following the dimensions of the TC, to assess the characteristics of the local stakeholders and to outline the perception about the local PGs and on the adopted strategies to manage the territory. Final considerations are elaborated and few scenarios are outlined, giving relevance to the importance of improving awareness and creating embeddedness among public-private local stakeholders and resources as a tool for a socio-economic and environmental development of the area.

Development of parallelizable flood inundation models for large scale analysis

Flood disasters are a major cause of fatalities and economic losses, and several studies indicate that global flood risk is currently increasing. In order to reduce and mitigate the impact of river flood disasters, the current trend is to integrate existing structural defences with non structural measures. This calls for a wider application of advanced hydraulic models for flood hazard and risk mapping, engineering design, and flood forecasting systems. Within this framework, two different hydraulic models for large scale analysis of flood events have been developed. The two models, named CA2D and IFD-GGA, adopt an integrated approach based on the diffusive shallow water equations and a simplified finite volume scheme. The models are also designed for massive code parallelization, which has a key importance in reducing run times in large scale and high-detail applications. The two models were first applied to several numerical cases, to test the reliability and accuracy of different model versions. Then, the most effective versions were applied to different real flood events and flood scenarios. The IFD-GGA model showed serious problems that prevented further applications. On the contrary, the CA2D model proved to be fast and robust, and able to reproduce 1D and 2D flow processes in terms of water depth and velocity. In most applications the accuracy of model results was good and adequate to large scale analysis. Where complex flow processes occurred local errors were observed, due to the model approximations. However, they did not compromise the correct representation of overall flow processes. In conclusion, the CA model can be a valuable tool for the simulation of a wide range of flood event types, including lowland and flash flood events.

Essays on Regional Development and Internationalisation

This collection of essays examines various aspects of regional development and the issues of internationalization. The first essay investigates the implications of the impressive growth of China from a rural-urban perspective and addresses the topic of convergence in China by employing a non-parametrical approach to study the distribution dynamics of per capita income at province, rural and urban levels. To better understand the degree of inequality characterizing China and the long-term predictions of convergence or divergence of its different territorial aggregations, the second essay formulates a composite indicator of Regional Development (RDI) to benchmark development at province and sub-province level. The RDI goes beyond the uni-dimensional concept of development, generally proxied by the GDP per capita, and gives attention to the rural-urban dimension. The third essay “Internationalization and Trade Specialization in Italy. The role of China in the international intra-firm trade of the Italian regions” - deals with another aspect of regional economic development: the progressive de-industrialisation and de-localization of the local production. This essay looks at the trade specialization of selected Italian regions (those regions specialized in manufacturing) and the fragmentation of the local production on a global scale. China represents in this context an important stakeholder and the paper documents the importance of this country in the regional intra-firm trade.