Understanding Risk: Contributions from the Journal of Risk and Governance

During recent years, news headlines have been rife with criticisms of the risk management practices of public and private sector entities. These criticisms have often been accompanied by calls for greater transparency in the way government entities manage risks and communicate dangers to the public. Similarly, in the private sector, the internationalisation of economic activity has heightened concerns over the potential adverse implications of mismanagement and financial scandals, and has led to calls for greater regulation and supervision. While the responses of public sector agencies and private sector actors to these challenges have differed, they share a common acknowledgement that effective governance relies on the pro-active identification, assessment, and management of risks as well as appropriate regulatory frameworks.

This edited book covers a number of divergent topics illustrating the emergence of several novel themes in the area of economic and social risks. As a communality, these novel themes relate to the complexity in which human activity in this late stage of capitalist development is embedded. This risk-generating complexity, in turn, can be observed at several levels, including workplace hazards, governance problems within the private sector or the intersection between public and private, and in relation to the economic risks faced by larger entities such as national governments.

Understanding Risk: Recent Contributions from the Journal of Risk and Governance

Following on from the format of the previous Book Understanding Risk: Contributions from the Journal of Risk and Governance, this collection of recent contributions (including work by the editor) this book is divided in three sections .  The first section examines issues relating to corporate governance in the private sector, with emphasis being placed on issues of 'Board Decision Making,' Earnings Management and Audit Committee Effectiveness'  and ' Corporate Governance Failures.'  These contributions are complemented by the second sections which looks at governance and risk issues affecting the public sector, with a focus being places on 'Public Private Partnerships' and regulation of activities in the Life Sciences.'  Section three focuses on societal risk management in relation to health, safety and the environment.  In this context, contributions are presented in relation to major debates surrounding 'Rising Trends in Cancer Cases,' dilemmas surrounding 'Medical Self Help,' 'Mental Health Policy' and the use of 'Information Technology in Health Care.'

Risk and the Politics of Public Health:A Critical Review

Twentieth century public health initiatives have been crucially informed by perceptions and constructions of risk. Notions of risk identification, assessment and mitigation have guided political and institutional actions even before these concepts became an explicit part of the language of public administration and policy making. Past analyses investigating the link between risk perceptions and public health are relatively rare, and where researchers have investigated this nexus, it has typically been assumed that the collective identification of health risks has led to progressive improvements in public health activities.
Risk and the Politics of Public Health addresses this gap by presenting a detailed critical historical analysis of the evolution of risk thinking within medical and health related discourses. Grouped around the four core themes of 'immigration', 'race', 'armed conflict' and 'detention and prevention' this book highlights the innovative capacity of risk related concepts as well as their vulnerability to the dysfunctional effects of dominant social ideologies. Risk and the Politics of Public Health is an essential reference for those who seek to understand the interplay of concepts of risk and public health throughout history as well as those who wish to gain a critical understanding of the social dynamics which have underpinned, and continue to underpin, this complex interaction.

Wnt signaling in age-related macular degeneration: human macular tissue and mouse model

BACKGROUND: The wingless-type MMTV integration site (Wnt) signaling is a group of signal transduction pathways. In canonical Wnt pathway, Wnt ligands bind to low-density lipoprotein receptor-related protein 5 or 6 (LRP5 or LRP6), resulting in phosphorylation and activation of the receptor. We hypothesize that canonical Wnt pathway plays a role in the retinal lesion of age-related macular degeneration (AMD), a leading cause of irreversible central visual loss in elderly.

METHODS: We examined LRP6 phosphorylation and Wnt signaling cascade in human retinal sections and plasma kallistatin, an endogenous inhibitor of the Wnt pathway in AMD patients and non-AMD subjects. We also used the Ccl2 (-/-) /Cx3cr1 (-/-) /rd8 and Ccl2 (-/-) /Cx3cr1 (gfp/gfp) mouse models with AMD-like retinal degeneration to further explore the involvement of Wnt signaling activation in the retinal lesions in those models and to preclinically evaluate the role of Wnt signaling suppression as a potential therapeutic option for AMD.

RESULTS: We found higher levels of LRP6 (a key Wnt signaling receptor) protein phosphorylation and transcripts of the Wnt pathway-targeted genes, as well as higher beta-catenin protein in AMD macula compared to controls. Kallistatin was decreased in the plasma of AMD patients. Retinal non-phosphorylated-β-catenin and phosphorylated-LRP6 were higher in Ccl2 (-/-) /Cx3cr1 (-/-) /rd8 mice than that in wild type. Intravitreal administration of an anti-LRP6 antibody slowed the progression of retinal lesions in Ccl2 (-/-) /Cx3cr1 (-/-) /rd8 and Ccl2 (-/-) /Cx3cr1 (gfp/gfp) mice. Electroretinography of treated eyes exhibited larger amplitudes compared to controls in both mouse models. A2E, a retinoid byproduct associated with AMD was lower in the treated eyes of Ccl2 (-/-) /Cx3cr1 (-/-) /rd8 mice. Anti-LRP6 also suppressed the expression of Tnf-α and Icam-1 in Ccl2 (-/-) /Cx3cr1 (-/-) /rd8 retinas.

CONCLUSIONS: Wnt signaling may be disturbed in AMD patients, which could contribute to the retinal inflammation and increased A2E levels found in AMD. Aberrant activation of canonical Wnt signaling might also contribute to the focal retinal degenerative lesions of mouse models with Ccl2 and Cx3cr1 deficiency, and intravitreal administration of anti-LRP6 antibody could be beneficial by deactivating the canonical Wnt pathway.

Global Systemic Risk and International Regulatory Coordination: Squaring Sovereignty and Financial Stability

In recent years much attention has been given to systemic risk and maintaining financial stability. Much of the focus, rightly, has been on market failures and the role of regulation in addressing them. This article looks at the role of domestic policies and government actions as sources of global instability. The global financial system is built upon global markets controlled by national financial and macroeconomic policies. In this context, regulatory asymmetries, diverging policy preferences, and government failures add a further dimension to global systemic risk not present at the national level.
Systemic risk is a result of the interplay between two independent variables: an underlying trigger event, in this analysis a domestic policy measure, and a transmission channel. The solution to systemic risk requires tackling one of these variables. In a domestic setting, the centralization of regulatory power into one single authority makes it easier to balance the delicate equilibrium between enhancing efficiency and reducing instability. However, in a global financial system in which national financial policies serve to maximize economic welfare, regulators will be confronted with difficult policy and legal tradeoffs.
We investigate the role that financial regulation plays in addressing domestic policy failures and in controlling the danger of global financial interdependence. To do so we analyse global financial interconnectedness, and explain its role in transmitting instability; we investigate the political economy dynamics at the origin of regulatory asymmetries and government failures; and we discuss the limits of regulation.

Deciphering the molecular role of DJ-1 in the etiology of Parkinson’s and Huntingtons’s disease

Tese de doutoramento, Ciências Biomédicas (Neurociências), Universidade de Lisboa, Faculdade de Medicina, 2014

Copy number variation and Huntington’s disease

Tese de doutoramento, Ciências Biomédicas (Neurociências), Universidade de Lisboa, Faculdade de Medicina, 2014

Kyotorphin derived peptides in the relationship between analgesia and alzheimer’s disease

Tese de doutoramento, Ciências Biomédicas (Bioquímica Médica), Universidade de Lisboa, Faculdade de Medicina, 2014

Cross-Industry Product Diversification and Contagion in Risk and Return: The Case of Bank-Insurance and Insurance-Bank Takeovers

We investigate the impact of domestic/international bancassurance deals on the risk-return profiles of announcing and non-announcing banks and insurers within a GARCH model. Bank-insurance deals produce intra- and inter-industry contagion in both risk and return, with larger deals producing greater contagion. Bidder banks and peers experience positive abnormal returns, with the effects on insurer peers being stronger than those on bank peers. Insurance-bank deals produce insignificant excess returns for bidder and peer insurers and positive valuations for peer banks. Following the deal, the bank bidders’ idiosyncratic (systematic) risk falls (increases), while insurance bidders exhibit a lower systematic risk and maintain their idiosyncratic risk.

Assessment of direct radiological risk and indirect associated toxic risks originated by Coal-Fired Power Plants

Over the past few decades there has been some discussion concerning the increase of the natural background radiation originated by coal-fired power plants, due to the uranium and thorium content present in combustion ashes. The radioactive decay products of uranium and thorium, such as radium, radon, polonium, bismuth and lead, are also released in addition to a significant amount of 40K. Since the measurement of radioactive elements released by the gaseous emissions of coal power plants is not compulsory, there is a gap of information concerning this situation. Consequently, the prediction of dispersion and mobility of these elements in the environment, after their release, is based on limited data and the radiological impact from the exposure to these radioactive elements is unknown. This paper describes the methodology that is being developed to assess the radiological impact due to the raise in the natural background radiation level originated by the release and dispersion of the emitted radionuclides. The current investigation is part of a research project that is undergoing in the vicinity of Sines coal-fired power plant (south of Portugal) until 2013. Data from preliminary stages are already available and possible of interpretation.

The role of pneumococcal carbon metabolism in colonisation and invasive disease

Streptococcus pneumoniae is a common asymptomatic commensal of the human nasopharynx. However, it is better known as a threatening pathogen that causes serious diseases such as pneumonia, meningitis and sepsis, as well as other less severe but more prevalent infections (e.g. otitis media). With the increase of antibiotic resistance and the limited efficacy of vaccines, pneumococcal infections remain a major problem. Therefore, the discovery of new therapeutic targets and preventive drugs are in high demand.(...)