Città Metropolitane e Smart Governance Iniziative di successo e nodi critici verso la Smart City

The volume contains the results of the research project "Governance Analysis Project (GAP) for the Smart Energy City. The actualization of Smart Cities in the Metropolitan Areas of Europe and Italy” conducted within the PON “Smart Energy Master for the energy management of the territory” at the University Federico II of Naples (TeMA Lab of the Department of Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering). Smart Cities have gained increasing relevance in the scientific debate and in the national and international operational practice, emerging as one of the opportunities to rethink cities and, more generally, the life of urban communities. First reflections, researches and projects on the issue seem to converge towards the idea that a “smart” urban development should not only be a result of the yet necessary and unavoidable infrastructural endowment (physical capital) and of its continuing innovation, but also of the quality of human, social and environmental capital, conceived as strategic factors for development. A “smart” city is, primarily, a city able to effectively satisfy the needs of its citizens respecting the rules imposed by the environmental context. It is in such a debate that the project GAP fits with the aim to address Smart Cities in light of the administrative reorganization of Italian large cities as a consequence of the Law 56/2014. With a scientific approach, the volume provides a comprehensive and updated framework of how Italian and European Metropolitan cities are declining the Smart City issue and this thanks to the collection of a wide-ranging screening represented by more than 1.000 initiatives including researches, projects, interventions, technologies, etc. Furthermore, one original element of this research is that after an analysis conducted through indirect sources, a phase of dialogue with “stakeholders” was carried out (and of this there is a wide picture in the volume in which, by the way, are reported long excerpts of the interviews). This has enabled to give a clearer framework of what is now experimenting in Italian and European cities, avoiding being totally naïve for interventions and projects labelled as “smart”, but often lacking of innovative methods and contents.

From Passive to Active Community Conservation: A Study of Forest Governance in a Region of the Sierra Norte of Oaxaca, Mexico

This thesis investigates how seven communities in a subregion of the Sierra Norte of Oaxaca are conserving high forest cover in the absence of national protected areas. To conduct this study I relied on archival research and the review of community documents, focus group interviews and land use transects to explore historical and current land use. I found that communities have conserved 88.34% of the subregion as forest cover, or 58,596 hectares out of a total territory of 66,264 hectares. Analysis suggests that the communities have undergone a historical transition from more passive conservation to more active, conscious conservation particularly in the last decade. This thesis further contends that communities deserve additional financial compensation for this active conservation of globally important forests for biodiversity conservation and that exercises in systematic conservation planning ignore the reality that existing biodiversity conservation in the subregion is associated with community ownership.

Using modeling tools for implementing feasible land use and nature conservation governance systems in small islands e The Pico Island (Azores) case-study

The present study deals with the development of systematic conservation planning as management instrument in small oceanic islands, ensuring open systems of governance, and able to integrate an informed and involved participation of the stakeholders. Marxan software was used to define management areas according a set of alternative land use scenarios considering different conservation and management paradigms. Modeled conservation zones were interpreted and compared with the existing protected areas allowing more fused information for future trade-outs and stakeholder's involvement. The results, allowing the identification of Target Management Units (TMU) based on the consideration of different development scenarios proved to be consistent with a feasible development of evaluation approaches able to support sound governance systems. Moreover, the detailed geographic identification of TMU seems to be able to support participated policies towards a more sustainable management of the entire island

In Situ Observation of the Thermal Decomposition of Weddelite by Heating Stage Environmental Scanning Electron Microscopy

The morphological and chemical changes occurring during the thermal decomposition of weddelite, CaC2O4·2H2O, have been followed in real time in a heating stage attached to an Environmental Scanning Electron Microscope operating at a pressure of 2 Torr, with a heating rate of 10 °C/min and an equilibration time of approximately 10 min. The dehydration step around 120 °C and the loss of CO around 425 °C do not involve changes in morphology, but changes in the composition were observed. The final reaction of CaCO3 to CaO while evolving CO2 around 600 °C involved the formation of chains of very small oxide particles pseudomorphic to the original oxalate crystals. The change in chemical composition could only be observed after cooling the sample to 350 °C because of the effects of thermal radiation.

Nonprofit Boards in Australia: A Distinctive Governance Appoach

This article reports the findings into patterns of governance on nonprofit boards in Australia. The research surveys 118 boards, upon which serve a total of 1405 directors. The findings indicate that nonprofit boards can mimic some aspects of a shareholder approach to governance. But nonprofit boards, in the main, indicate priorities and activities of a stakeholder approach to governance. The features of `isomorphism' that arise largely stem from legislative requirements in corporate governance. Generally, nonprofit directors are influenced by agenda and motivations that can be differentiated from the influences upon director activity in the corporate sector. The study indicates that nonprofit boards prize knowledge and loyalty to the sector when considering board composition. The survey suggests nonprofits ``compensate'' for the demands placed upon them about fiduciary duty and due diligence responsibilities with the diverse intellectual expertise of non-executive directors. Nonprofit boards possess greater diversity than boards in the corporate sector; they include more women as directors than corporate boards and they include a greater proportion of directors from minority groups. While strategic issues feature significantly as a task of the nonprofit board, they distinguish themselves from their corporate counterparts by engaging in operational management. The findings indicate that, in the main, directors on nonprofit boards deliberate and operate in ways distinctive from their corporate counterparts. Such findings offer a contribution to the reform of Corporations Law in other countries and the likely consequence on boards outside the corporate sector.