Search results for: the priorities of public administration

Authors: Sofia F. Franco, Jacob Macdonald

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This paper estimates the value of urban public street trees and their complementary and substitution value with other broader urban amenities and dis-amenities via the residential housing market. We estimate a lower bound value on a city’s tree amenities under instrumental variable and geographic regression discontinuity approaches with an application to Lisbon, Portugal. For completeness, we also explore how urban trees and in particular public street trees impact house prices across the city. Finally, we jointly analyze the planting and maintenance costs and benefits of urban street trees. The estimated value of all public trees in Lisbon is €8.84M. When considering specifically trees planted alongside roads and in public squares, the value is €6.06M or €126.64 per tree. This value is conditional on the distribution of trees in terms of their broader density, with higher effects coming from the overall greening of larger areas of the city compared to the greening of the direct neighborhood. Detrimental impacts are found when the number of trees is higher near street canyons, where they may exacerbate the stagnation of air pollution from traffic. Urban street trees also have important spillover benefits due to pollution mitigation around €6.21 million, or an additional €129.93 per tree. There are added benefits of €26.32 and €28.58 per tree in terms of flooding and heat mitigation, respectively. With significant resources and policies aimed at urban greening, the value obtained is shown to be important for discussions on the benefits of urban trees as compared to mitigation and abatement costs undertaken by a municipality.

Keywords: urban public goods, urban street trees, spatial boundary discontinuities, geospatial and remote sensing methods

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Authors: Mosabbir Pasha, Ijaj Mahmud Chowdhury, M. A. Afrahim Bhuiyann

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With the increasing population and intensive land use, huge traffic demand is generating worldwide both in developing and developed countries. As a developing country, Bangladesh is also facing the same problem in recent years by producing huge numbers of daily trips. As a matter of fact, extensive traffic demand is increasing day by day. Also, transport system in Dhaka is heterogeneous, reflecting the heterogeneity in the socio-economic and land use patterns. As a matter of fact, trips produced here are for different purposes such as work, business, educational etc. Due to the significant concentration of educational institutions a large share of the trips are generated by educational purpose. And one of the major percentages of educational trips is produced by university going students and most of them are travelled by car, bus, train, taxi, rickshaw etc. The aim of the study was to find out the university students’ perception on public transit ridership. A survey was conducted among 330 students from eight different universities. It was found out that 26% of the trips produced by university going students are travelled by public bus service and only 5% are by train. Percentage of car share is 16% and 12% of the trips are travelled by private taxi. From the study, it has been found that more than 42 percent student’s family resides outside of Dhaka, eventually they prefer bus instead of other options. Again those who chose to walk most of the time, of them, over 40 percent students’ family reside outside of Dhaka and of them over 85 percent students have a tendency to live in a mess. They generally choose a neighboring location to their respective university so that they can reach their destination by walk. On the other hand, those who travel by car 80 percent of their family reside inside Dhaka. The study also revealed that the most important reason that restricts students not to use public transit is poor service. Negative attitudes such as discomfort, uneasiness in using public transit also reduces the usage of public transit. The poor waiting area is another major cause of not using public transit. Insufficient security also plays a significant role in not using public transit. On the contrary, the fare is not a problem for students those who use public transit as a mode of transportation. Students also think stations are not far away from their home or institution and they do not need to wait long for the buses or trains. It was also found accessibility to public transit is moderate.

Keywords: traffic demand, fare, poor service, public transit ridership

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Authors: Rodrigo Coelho

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As several authors have pointed out (such as Jordi Borja, or Oriol Bohigas), the necessity to “make center” presents itself not only as a imperative response to deal with the processes of dissolution of peripheral urbanization, as it should be assumed, from the point of view its symbolic and functional meaning, as a key concept to think and act on the enlarged city. The notion of re-centralization (successfully applied in urban periphery recompositions, such as in Barcelona or Lyon), understood from the redefinition of mobility, the strengthening of core functions, and from the creation or consolidation of urban fabrics (always articulated with policies of creation and redevelopment of public spaces), seems to become one of the key strategies over the challenge of making the city on the “city periphery”. The question we want to address in this paper concerns, essentially, the importance of public space in the (re) construction of the contemporary "shapeless city” sectors (which, in general, we associate to urban peripheries). We will seek demonstrate, from the analysis of a Portuguese case study–The Cacém Central Area requalification, integrated in Polis Program (National Program for Urban Rehabilitation and Environmental Improvement of Cities, released in 1999 by the Portuguese government), the conditions under which the public space project can act, subsequently, in the urban areas of recent formation, where, in many situations, the public space did not have a structuring role in its urbanization, seeing its presence reduced to a residual character. More specifically, we intend to demonstrate with this example the methodological and urban design aspects that led to the regeneration of a disqualified and degraded urban area, by intervening consistently and profoundly in public space (with well defined objectives and criteria, and framed in a more comprehensive strategy, attentive to the various scales of urban design).

Keywords: public space, urban design, urban regeneration, urban and regional studies

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Authors: O. V. Jurieva, O. U. Jurieva, R. H. Yagudin, P. B. Chursin

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In the recent scientific researches on the problems of public service the idea of the use of innovative technologies of management of personnel processes is accurately formulated. Authors made an attempt to analyze the changes in the public service organizations and to understand how the studied situation is interpreted by the government employees themselves. For this purpose the strategy of sociological research was carried out on the basis of application of questionnaire developed by M. Rokich and focus group research. For the research purposes it was necessary to get to microlevel in order to include daily activities of employees of an organization, their life experience and values in the focus of the analysis. Based on P. Bourdieu's methodology, authors investigated the established patterns of consciousness and behavior of officials (doxa) and also analyzed the tendencies of re-thinking (change) of the settled content of values (heterodoxy) by them. The distinctive feature of the conducted research is that the public servants who have different length of service in the public service took part in the research procedure. The obtained data helped to answer the following question: what are the specifics of doxs of the public servants who work in the public civil service more than 7-10 years and what perception of values of civil service have junior experts whose work experience doesn't exceed 3 years. Respondents were presented by two groups: (1) public servants of the level of main positions in the public civil service of the Republic of Tatarstan. (2) Public servants of the level of lower positions in the ministries and departments of the Republic of Tatarstan. For the study of doxa or of the existing values of public servants, the research with use of the questionnaire based on M. Rokich's system is conducted. Two types of values are emphasised: terminal and instrumental, which are united by us in the collective concept doxa. Doxa: the instrument of research of the established patterns of consciousness and behavior which can either resist to changes in the organization or, on the contrary, support their implementation. In the following stage an attempt to deepen our understanding of the essence and specifics of doxa of officials by means of the applied sociological research which is carried out by focus group method is made. Information obtained by authors during the research convinces that for the success of policy of changes in the organizations of public service it is necessary to develop special technologies of informing employees about the essence and inevitability of the developed innovations, to involve them in the process of changes, to train and to develop the younger generation of civil servants, seriously to perceive additional training and retraining of officials.

Keywords: innovative technologies, public service organizations, public servants

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Authors: Sayed Abdul Rahman Sadaat, Nsenda Lukumwena

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Traffic congestion is a worldwide issue, especially in developing countries. This is also the case of Afghanistan, especially in Kabul-the capital city, whose rapid population growth makes it the fifth fastest growing city in the world. Traffic congestion affects not only the mobility of people and goods but also the air quality that leads to numerous deaths (3000 people) every year. There are many factors that contribute to traffic congestion. The insufficiency and inefficiency of public transportation system along with the increase of private vehicles can be considered among the most important contributing factors. This paper addresses the traffic congestion and attempts to suggest possible solutions that can help improve the current public transportation system in Kabul. To this end, the methodology used in this paper includes field work conducted in Kabul city and literature review. The outcome suggests that improving the public transportation system is likely to contribute to the reduction of traffic congestion and the improvement of air quality, thereby reducing the number of death related to air quality.

Keywords: air quality, Kabul, Afghanistan, public transportation system, improvements, traffic congestion

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Authors: Sibel Kurt

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In this study, with the use of Goffee and Jones’s corporate culture classification and the scale of this classification, there aimed to analyze a company’s corporate culture which does not have a public relations or communication department. First of all, the type of corporate culture in the company had been determined. Then it questioned if there are subcultures which formed according to demographics or the department of work. In the survey questionnaire, there are 53 questions total. 6 of these questions are about demographics, and 47 of them are about corporate culture. 152 personnel of the company had answered the survey, and the data have been evaluated according to frequency, descriptive, and compare means tests. The type of corporate culture of the company was determined as the 'communal' from the typology of Goffee and Jones in the positive form. There are no subcultures in the company which bases on the demographics, but only one subculture has determined according to the department of work. As a result, the absence of public relations department, personnel’s low level of awareness about corporate culture, and the lack of information between management and employees has been revealed.

Keywords: corporate culture, subculture, public relations, organizational communication

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Authors: Yolanda Ramírez, Ángel Tejada, Agustín Baidez

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The purpose of this paper is to examine the quality of voluntary intellectual capital disclosure by public Spanish universities on their websites. To this end, a content analysis was used to analyze the websites of 50 public Spanish universities i 2016. The results of this study show that human capital was the most disclosed category with relational capital being the least frequently disclosed in Spain. However, the quality of structural capital disclosures was higher than relational and human capital. Finally, most IC disclosures were narrative in nature.

Keywords: intellectual capital, quality disclosure, websites, universities, Spain

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Authors: Lucas Oliveira Gomes Ferreira, André Luiz Marques Serrano

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The fiscal decentralization driven by the 1988 Constitution was responsible for granting greater autonomy to Brazilian subnational entities, as states and municipalities were entrusted with greater responsibilities to provide local public goods and services. However, the revenues necessary to implement the new attributions are largely received through intergovernmental transfers and not by local tax collection. The literature points out that public spending increases more by receiving unconditional and nonmatching (lump sum) intergovernmental grants than by an increase in taxpayers' income. This effect, called the flypaper effect, happens because the funds received could be used to reduce local taxes, meaning an increase in the citizen's private income. However, they are applied in the public sector in the form of expenses. The present work investigates the existence of the flypaper effect in Brazilian municipalities during the first two decades of the 21st century. The research uses the Municipal Participation Fund (FPM) as a grant proxy from 2000 to 2019 through econometrics of cross-section and panel data for all 5,568 municipalities. The results indicate the flypaper effect in Brazilian municipalities, as well as the proportional relationship between the receipt of constitutional transfers and the increase in public expenditure.

Keywords: flypaper effect, intergovernmental transfers, municipal participation fund, fiscal federalism

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Authors: Sara Najiazarpour, Mahsa Najiazarpour

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There are many problems in contracting projects and their performance. At each project stage and due to different reasons, these problems affect cost, time and overall project quality. Hence, in order to increase the efficiency and performance in all levels of the chain and with supply chain management approach, there will be a coordination from the beginning of a project (contractor selection) to the end of project (handover of project). Contractor selection is the foremost part of construction projects which in this multi-criteria decision-making, the best contractor is determined by expert judgment, different variables and their priorities. In this paper for selecting the best contractor, numerous criteria were collected by asking from adept experts and then among them, 16 criteria with highest frequency were considered for questionnaire. This questionnaire was distributed between experts. Cronbach's alpha coefficient was obtained as 72%. Then based on Borda's function 12 important criteria was selected which was categorized in four main criteria and related sub-criteria as follow: Environmental factors and physical equipment: procurement and materials (supplier), company's machines, contractor’s proposed cost estimate - financial capacity: bank turnover and company's assets, the income of tax declaration in last year, Ability to compensate for losses or delays - past performance- records and technical expertise: experts and key personnel, the past technical backgrounds and experiences, employer satisfaction of previous contracts, the number of similar projects was done - standards: rank and field of expertise which company is qualified for and its validity, availability and number of permitted projects done. Then with PROMTHEE method, the criteria were normalized and monitored, finally the best alternative was selected. In this research, qualitative criteria of each company is became a quantitative criteria. Finally, information of some companies was evaluated and the best contractor was selected based on all criteria and their priorities.

Keywords: contractor evaluation and selection, project development, supply chain management, PROMTHEE method

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Authors: Ramya P, Lino Abraham Varghese, S. Bose

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By cloud storage services, the data can be stored in the cloud, and can be shared across multiple users. Due to the unexpected hardware/software failures and human errors, which make the data stored in the cloud be lost or corrupted easily it affected the integrity of data in cloud. Some mechanisms have been designed to allow both data owners and public verifiers to efficiently audit cloud data integrity without retrieving the entire data from the cloud server. But public auditing on the integrity of shared data with the existing mechanisms will unavoidably reveal confidential information such as identity of the person, to public verifiers. Here a privacy-preserving mechanism is proposed to support public auditing on shared data stored in the cloud. It uses group signatures to compute verification metadata needed to audit the correctness of shared data. The identity of the signer on each block in shared data is kept confidential from public verifiers, who are easily verifying shared data integrity without retrieving the entire file. But on demand, the signer of the each block is reveal to the owner alone. Group private key is generated once by the owner in the static group, where as in the dynamic group, the group private key is change when the users revoke from the group. When the users leave from the group the already signed blocks are resigned by cloud service provider instead of owner is efficiently handled by efficient proxy re-signature scheme.

Keywords: data integrity, dynamic group, group signature, public auditing

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Authors: Rewadee Waiyawassana

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The objectives of the research on Thai tourists’ satisfaction of visiting Southern of Thailand are i) to study the Thai tourists’ satisfaction who select southern of Thailand as their destinations ii) to study their tourist’s decision making process in Southern of Thailand. The samples of the study are 619 Thai visitors at Southern of Thailand by accidental sampling technic and focus group interview for 12 key informant by purposive sampling. The data analysis includes Percentage, Frequency and One-way ANOVA. The findings from the research are the satisfaction of Thai visitors on southern of Thailand ranks from the resources of the destination, transportation, convenience, security, and promotion and public relations; with the high level of satisfaction on all the factors the government or responsible agencies should also modernize the marketing and public relation with increasing public relations, the potential visitors shall be updated with new information and alternative tourist destination also.

Keywords: public relations, Southern of Thailand, Thai Tourists’ satisfaction, Tourist’s decision making process

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Authors: Zarema Urustamova, Chunsheng Shi, Ghulam Mujtaba Kayani 

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This research paper helps to understand the comparative analysis of recruitment problems which majorly faced by HRD of Public/Semi-Govt. and private sectors of Russia. The natures of different recruitment problems faced by HRD are different in both sector of Russia. Recruitment is one of very critical and important decision taken by HR department and some recruitment problems are highly faced by HR department of public/semi Govt. sector but are not major problems for private sector. Moreover, some problems are majorly influence in private sector but are not major problems in public/semi-govt. sector of Russia in recruitment. It is also identified that some recruitment problems are majorly affect in recruitment in both sectors. This paper helps to understand the recruitment problems faced by HR department while recruiting the new employee in both sectors. This paper also identified that “environment” and “prejudice” in public sector have higher affect and considered as a major problems in employee recruitment and “reference”, “selection standards” are considered as a least affecting problems of recruitment in public sector. Further, in private sector, “prejudice” and “culture” are major issues and “selection standards” and “reference” is considered as least affecting recruitment problems in private sector of Russia. So, HR department will be able to hire right person on right time, and it is possible when different HR departments focus to overcome these recruitment problems more efficiently and effectively.

Keywords: Govt. /Semi-Govt. vs. private sector, HR department, recruitment problems, Russia

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Authors: Mike Yaw Osei-Atweneboana, John Asiedu Larbi, Edward Jenner Tettevi

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Background: The lymphatic filariasis (LF) control programme has been on-going in Ghana since 2000. This community-wide approach involves the use of ivermectin (IVM) and albendazole (ALB). Soil-transmitted helminth (STH) infections control is augmented within this programme; however, in areas where LF is not prevalent, albendazole alone is administered to school children. The purpose of this study was therefore, to determine the efficacy of albendazole against soils transmitted helminths and the impact of mass drug administration of albendazole and ivermectin on the health status of children of school going age and pregnant women. Material/Methods: This was a twelve months longitudinal study. A total of 412 subjects including school children (between the ages of 2-17 years) and pregnant women were randomly selected from four endemic communities in Kpandai district of the Northern region. Coprological assessment for parasites was based on the Kato–Katz technique in both dry and rainy seasons at baseline, 21 days and 3 months post-treatment. Single-dose albendazole treatment was administered to all patients at baseline. Preserved samples are currently under molecular studies to identify possible single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) within the beta tubulin gene which is associated with benzimidazole resistance. Results: Of all the parasites found (hookworm, Trichuris trichiura, Hymenolepis nana, and Taenia sp.); hookworm was the most prevalent. In the dry season, the overall STHs prevalence at pre-treatment was 29%, while 9% and 13% prevalence was recorded at 21 days, and three months after treatment respectively. However, in the rainy season, the overall STHs prevalence was 8%, while 4% and 12% was recorded at 21 days and three months respectively after ALB treatment. In general, ALB treatment resulted in an overall hookworm egg count reduction rate of 89% in the dry season and 93% in the rainy season, while the T. trichiura egg count reduction rate was 100% in both seasons. Conclusions: STH infections still remains a significant public health burden in Ghana. Hookworm infection seems to respond poorly or sub-optimally to ALB, raising concerns of possible emergence of resistance which may lead to a major setback for the control and elimination of STH infections, especially hookworm infections.

Keywords: hookworm, sub-optimal response, albendazole, trichuriasis, soil-transmitted helminths

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Authors: A. M. Gadanya, B. A. Ahmad, U. Maigatari

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Effect of oral administration of Gadagi tea on superoxide dismutase activity was assessed on twenty (20) male subjects (aged 21-40years). Ten (10) male non Gadagi tea consumers (aged 20-26 years), were used as control. Blood samples were collected from the subjects and analysed for serum superoxide dismutase activity using R&D Enzyme Linked Immunosorbent Assay method (ELISA). The subjects were grouped into four based on age i.e group I (21-25 years), group II (26-30 years), and also based on duration of the tea consumption, i.e group A (5-9 years) , group B (10-14 years), group C (15-19 years) and group D (20-24 years). The subjects in group I (0.12 U mg-l +0.05), group II (0.11 U mg-l +0.01), group III (0.14 U mg-l +0.08) and group IV (0.17 U mg-l +0.11) showed increased activity of serum superoxide dismutase when compared with the control subjects (0.88 U mg-l +0.02) (P<0.05). There was no statistical significant difference in superoxide dismutase activity within the case groups (P<0.05), based on age and duration of consumption of the tea. Thus, Gadagi tea consumption could increase serum superoxide dismutase activity in humans.

Keywords: “Gadagi” tea, Serum, Superoxide dismutase, Humans.

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Authors: William Xiu Shun Wong, Myungsu Lim, Yoonjin Hyun, Chen Liu, Seongi Choi, Dasom Kim, Kee-Young Kwahk, Namgyu Kim

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Recently, many users have begun to frequently share their opinions on diverse issues using various social media. Therefore, numerous governments have attempted to establish or improve national policies according to the public opinions captured from various social media. In this paper, we indicate several limitations of the traditional approaches to analyze public opinion on science and technology and provide an alternative methodology to overcome these limitations. First, we distinguish between the science and technology analysis phase and the social issue analysis phase to reflect the fact that public opinion can be formed only when a certain science and technology is applied to a specific social issue. Next, we successively apply a start list and a stop list to acquire clarified and interesting results. Finally, to identify the most appropriate documents that fit with a given subject, we develop a new logical filter concept that consists of not only mere keywords but also a logical relationship among the keywords. This study then analyzes the possibilities for the practical use of the proposed methodology thorough its application to discover core issues and public opinions from 1,700,886 documents comprising SNS, blogs, news, and discussions.

Keywords: big data, social network analysis, text mining, topic modeling

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Authors: Sulyman Abdulhakeem Olarewaju, S. O. Malomo, M. T. Yakubu, J. O. Akolade

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The ameliorative effect of Celosia argentea var. cristata leaf extract against cadmium (Cd) induced oxidative stress and toxicity in selected tissues of rats was investigated. Toxicity coupled with oxidative stress was induced in rats by oral administration of Cd (8 mg/kg b. wt). Preliminary quantitative phytochemical and in vitro antioxidant analyses showed that the methanolic extract of C. argentea leaves was constituted by polyphenols (5.72%), saponins (3.20%), tannins (0.65%) and cadenolides (0.006%). IC50 of 9800, 7406, and 45.04 μg/ml were recorded for inhibition of linoleic acid oxidation, 2, 2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl and hydrogen peroxide radicals respectively. Simultaneous administration of C. argentea leaf extract with Cd significantly attenuated Cd-induced elevation of serum enzyme markers such as aspartate and alanine transaminase, alkaline and acid phosphatase as well as γ-glutaryltransferase in a dose-dependent fashion, while their reduced level in the liver were significantly increased. Higher levels of enzymatic antioxidants; superoxide dismutase and catalase activities were observed in the liver, brain, kidney and testes of the Cd-induced rats treated with C. argentea extract, while lipid peroxidation expressed in malondialdehyde concentrations were lower when compared to values in rats administered Cd only. Other Cd-induced toxicity and stress markers in the serum viz. reduced uric acid and albumin levels as well as elevated total and unconjugated bilirubin were attenuated by the extract and their values compared favorably with those animals co-administered cadmium with ascorbic acid. Data from the study showed that oral administration of extract from the leaf C. argentea may ameliorate Cd-induced oxidative stress and toxicity in rats.

Keywords: toxicity, cadmium, celosia, antioxidants, oxidative stress

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Authors: Marcos Centurion-Vicencio

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This study discusses the idea of ‘dominance’ in economic policy and its practical influence over monetary decisions. The discretionary use of repurchase agreements in Brazil over the period 2006-2016 and its effects on the overall price level are the specific issues we will be focusing on. The set of in-depth interviews carried out with public servants at the Brazilian central bank and national treasury, alongside data collected from the National Institution of Statistics (IBGE), suggest that monetary and fiscal dominance do not differ in nature once the assumption of depoliticized central bankers is relaxed. In both regimes, the pursuit of private gains via public institutions affects price stability. While short-sighted politicians in the latter are at the origin of poor monetary decisions, the action of short-sighted financial interest groups is likely to generate a similar outcome in the former. This study then contributes to rethinking monetary policy theory as well as the nature of public borrowing.

Keywords: fiscal and monetary interactions, interest groups, monetary capture, public borrowing

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Authors: Kyungae Jo, Eun Young Kim, Byungsoo Shin, Kwang Soon Shin, Hyung Joo Suh

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Gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) and 5-hydroxytryptophan (5-HTP) are amino acids of digested nutrients or food ingredients and these can possibly be utilized as non-pharmacologic treatment for sleep disorder. We previously investigated the GABA/5-HTP mixture is the principal concept of sleep-promoting and activity-repressing management in nervous system of D. melanogaster. Two experiments in this study were designed to evaluate sleep-promoting effect of GABA/5-HTP mixture, to clarify the possible ratio of sleep-promoting action in the Drosophila invertebrate model system. Behavioral assays were applied to investigate distance traveled, velocity, movement, mobility, turn angle, angular velocity and meander of two amino acids and GABA/5-HTP mixture with caffeine treated flies. In addition, differentially expressed gene (DEG) analyses from next generation sequencing (NGS) were applied to investigate the signaling pathway and functional interaction network of GABA/5-HTP mixture administration. GABA/5-HTP mixture resulted in significant differences between groups related to behavior (p < 0.01) and significantly induced locomotor activity in the awake model (p < 0.05). As a result of the sequencing, the molecular function of various genes has relationship with motor activity and biological regulation. These results showed that GABA/5-HTP mixture administration significantly involved the inhibition of motor behavior. In this regard, we successfully demonstrated that using a GABA/5-HTP mixture modulates locomotor activity to a greater extent than single administration of each amino acid, and that this modulation occurs via the neuronal system, neurotransmitter release cycle and transmission across chemical synapses.

Keywords: sleep, γ-aminobutyric acid, 5-hydroxytryptophan, Drosophila melanogaster

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Authors: Suphaphon Udomluck, Pannathorn Chachvarat

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Information Communication Technology (ICT) using management is essential for effective decision making in organization. The Concerns Based Adoption Model (CBAM) was employed as the conceptual framework. The purposes of the study were to assess the situation of Information Communication Technology (ICT) using management in College of Nursing under the Praboromarajchanok Institute. The samples were multi – stage sampling of 10 colleges of nursing that participated include directors, vice directors, head of learning groups, teachers, system administrator and responsible for ICT. The total participants were 280; the instrument used were questionnaires that include 4 parts, general information, Information Communication Technology (ICT) using management, the Stage of concern Questionnaires (SoC), and the Levels of Use (LoU) ICT Questionnaires respectively. Reliability coefficients were tested; alpha coefficients were 0.967for Information Communication Technology (ICT) using management, 0.884 for SoC and 0.945 for LoU. The data were analyzed by frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation, Pearson Product Moment Correlation and Multiple Regression. They were founded as follows: The high level overall score of Information Communication Technology (ICT) using management and issue were administration, hardware, software, and people. The overall score of the Stage of concern (SoC)ICTis at high level and the overall score of the Levels of Use (LoU) ICTis at moderate. The Information Communication Technology (ICT) using management had the positive relationship with the Stage of concern (SoC)ICTand the Levels of Use (LoU) ICT(p < .01). The results of Multiple Regression revealed that administration hardwear, software and people ware could predict SoC of ICT (18.5%) and LoU of ICT (20.8%).The factors that were significantly influenced by SoCs were people ware. The factors that were significantly influenced by LoU of ICT were administration hardware and people ware.

Keywords: information communication technology (ICT), management, the concerns-based adoption model (CBAM), stage of concern(SoC), the levels of use(LoU)

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Authors: Sahar B. Ahmed, M. Mostafa Said, Mona I. Mohamed

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Streptozotocin (STZ) caused a significant increase in blood glucose and malondialdehyde (MDA) levels in serum accompanied by a significant decrease in blood reduced glutathione (GSH) and superoxide dismutase (SOD) activities. Also, ALT, AST, albumin and urea were markedly affected by STZ injection. The oral administration of Mango leaves extract (MLE) one hour before STZ injection was significantly improved the blood glucose level, ALT, AST activities, albumin and urea that associated with the regulation of MDA, GSH and SOD levels. The antimicrobial activity of MLE showed a significant inhibitory activity against multidrug resistant gram positive and gram negative bacteria isolated from patients in Egyptian hospitals especially Salmonella typhi and typhimurium. In conclusion, results revealed the antioxidant, hypoglycemic effect and antimicrobial potentials of MLE under investigation. Further studies will be needed to investigate the prolonged period of MLE administration and its possible side effects.

Keywords: aqueous extract of mango leaves, STZ, antioxidant, hypoglycemic effect, antimicrobial potentials.

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Authors: Taner Cindik, Ferya Tas Ciftci

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Mobbing in the public sector and specific issues (i.e., the demand for non-pecuniary damages) regarding mobbing have become very important in the light of the precedents constituted by the Turkish Council of State in 2010. The legal scope of mobbing is not able to be determined since the concept of mobbing is not defined in Turkish law system. This study aims to reveal three major problems caused by the lack of laws related to mobbing in the Turkish legal system. First, the absence of an arrangement for disciplinary penalties leads that general provisions in the disciplinary law are implemented. This situation, therefore, causes difficulties in practice. Second, not being drawn of the lines in the topic concerning mobbing in public sector leads confusions in being direction of hostility. Third, the fact that there is a legal gap on seeking non-pecuniary compensation when employees in public sector are exposed to mobbing might make it difficult to obtain non-pecuniary compensation. Within the context of these major problems, civil servants in Turkey do not have enough protection mechanism. However, some possible legal arrangements will help civil servants to protect against mobbing. This study may be considered important because of the fact that mobbing in the public sector is at a significant level and has not been evaluated in this context before. This research is mainly a study of Turkish legal system and evaluates critically law case to determine legal problems. As a result of this study, three main problems might be identified because there is legal gap regarding mobbing in the public sector. In conclusion, the introduction of the major problems related to mobbing in this study might shed light on making the proper regulations of this subject in Turkish law system. In this respect, the plaintiff will be provided convenience in the point of non-pecuniary damages and this study will guide the assessment of legal liability of those who implement mobbing.

Keywords: human rights violations, mobbing, public sector, direction of hostility, non-pecuniary compensation, disciplinary law

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Authors: Ankit Nagar, Dinesh Kumar Nauriyal, Sukhpal Singh

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This paper examines the key determinants of farmers’ access to agricultural extension services, sources of agricultural extension services preferred and accessed by the farmers. An ordered logistic regression model was used to analyse the data of the 360 sample households based on a primary survey conducted in western Uttar Pradesh, India. The study finds that farmers' decision to engage in the agricultural extension programme is significantly influenced by factors such as education level, gender, farming experience, social group, group membership, farm size, credit access, awareness about the extension scheme, farmers' perception, and distance from extension sources. The most intriguing finding of this study is that the progressive farmers, which have long been regarded as a major source of knowledge diffusion, are the most distrusted sources of information as they are suspected of withholding vital information from potential beneficiaries. The positive relationship between farm size and ‘Access’ underlines that the extension services should revisit their strategies for targeting more marginal and small farmers constituting over 85 percent of the agricultural households by incorporating their priorities in their outreach programs. The study suggests that marginal and small farmers' productive potential could still be greatly augmented by the appropriate technology, advisory services, guidance, and improved market access. Also, the perception of poor quality of the public extension services can be corrected by initiatives aimed at building up extension workers' capacity.

Keywords: agriculture, access, extension services, ordered logistic regression

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Authors: Gizachew Assefa Tessema, Mohammad Afzal Mahmood, Judith Streak Gomersall, Caroline O. Laurence

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Introduction: Improving access to quality family planning services is the key to improving health of women and children. However, there is currently little evidence on the quality and scope of family planning services provided by private facilities, and this compares to the services provided in public facilities in Ethiopia. This is important, particularly in determining whether the government should further expand the roles of the private sector in the delivery of family planning facility. Methods: This study used the 2014 Ethiopian Services Provision Assessment Plus (ESPA+) survey dataset for comparing the structural aspects of quality of care in family planning services. The present analysis used a weighted sample of 1093 primary health care facilities (955 public and 138 private). This study employed logistic regression analysis to compare key structural variables between public and private facilities. While taking the structural variables as an outcome for comparison, the facility type (public vs private) were used as the key exposure of interest. Results: When comparing availability of basic amenities (infrastructure), public facilities were less likely to have functional cell phones (AOR=0.12; 95% CI: 0.07-0.21), and water supply (AOR=0.29; 95% CI: 0.15-0.58) than private facilities. However, public facilities were more likely to have staff available 24 hours in the facility (AOR=0.12; 95% CI: 0.07-0.21), providers having family planning related training in the past 24 months (AOR=4.4; 95% CI: 2.51, 7.64) and possessing guidelines/protocols (AOR= 3.1 95% CI: 1.87, 5.24) than private facilities. Moreover, comparing the availability of equipment, public facilities had higher odds of having pelvic model for IUD demonstration (AOR=2.60; 95% CI: 1.35, 5.01) and penile model for condom demonstration (AOR=2.51; 95% CI: 1.32, 4.78) than private facilities. Conclusion: The present study suggests that Ethiopian government needs to provide emphasis towards the private sector in terms of providing family planning guidelines and training on family planning services for their staff. It is also worthwhile for the public health facilities to allocate funding for improving the availability of basic amenities. Implications for policy and/ or practice: This study calls policy makers to design appropriate strategies in providing opportunities for training a health care providers working in private health facility.

Keywords: quality of care, family planning, public-private, Ethiopia

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Authors: Lonna Mabandla, Godfrey Musvoto

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Transportation is a catalytic feature in cities. Transport and land use activity are interdependent and have a feedback loop between how land is developed and how transportation systems are designed and used. This recursive relationship between land use and transportation is reflected in how public transportation routes internal to the inner-city enhance accessibility, therefore creating spaces that are conducive to business activity, while the business activity also informs public transportation routes. It is for this reason that the focus of this research is on public transportation within inner-city areas where the dynamic is evident. Durban is the chosen case study where the dominating form of public transportation within the central business district (CBD) is minibus taxis. The paradox here is that minibus taxis still form part of the informal economy even though they are the leading form of public transportation in South Africa. There have been many attempts to formalise this industry to follow more regulatory practices, but minibus taxis are privately owned, therefore complicating any proposed intervention. The argument of this study is that the application of collaborative planning through a sustainable partnership between the public and private sectors will improve the social and environmental sustainability of public transportation. One of the major challenges that exist within such collaborative endeavors is power dynamics. As a result, a key focus of the study is on power relations. Practically, power relations should be observed over an extended period, specifically when the different stakeholders engage with each other, to reflect valid data. However, a lengthy data collection process was not possible to observe during the data collection phase of this research. Instead, interviews were conducted focusing on existing procedural planning practices between the inner-city minibus taxi association (South and North Beach Taxi Association), the eThekwini Transport Authority (ETA), and the eThekwini Town Planning Department. Conclusions and recommendations were then generated based on these data.

Keywords: collaborative planning, sustainability, public transport, minibus taxis

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Authors: Burak Dik, Oguzhan Avci, Irmak Dik, Emre Bahcivan

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The objective of this study was to evaluate the effects of alone and combined administration of Peste des petits ruminants (PPR) vaccine with Corynebacterium cutis lysate (CCL) on the hematology and biochemistry parameters levels in sheep. CCL and PPR vaccine changes cell and organ activity. In this study, 12 ewes were divided into equal groups; first group; PPR vaccine was applied only one time 1 mL subcutan of armpit on 6 sheep, and the second group; CCL (1 mL) and PPR vaccine (1 mL) combination were applied only one time subcutan of armpit on 6 sheep. Blood samples were collected before treatment (0. hour, control) and after treatment (1, 3, 7, 14, 21 and 28 days) from the sheep. Plasma and serum samples were evaluated for hematology and biochemistry parameters and there were statistically significant in sheep. In conclusion, combined usage of PPR vaccine with CCL may not influence cells and organs. Repeated CCL treatment with vaccine can create hepatotoxic, renal and bone marrow effects in sheep.

Keywords: Corynebacterium cutis lysate, hematology, peste des petits ruminants, vaccine

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Authors: Christian T. Lystbaek

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Background: The importance of innovation management has traditionally been ascribed to private production companies, however, there is an increasing interest in public services innovation management. One of the major theoretical challenges arising from this situation is to understand public values justifying public services innovation management. However, there is not single and stable definition of public value in the literature. The research question guiding this paper is: What is the supposed added value operating in the public sphere? Methodology: The study takes an action research strategy. This is highly contextualized methodology, which is enacted within a particular set of social relations into which on expects to integrate the results. As such, this research strategy is particularly well suited for its potential to generate results that can be applied by managers. The aim of action research is to produce proposals with a creative dimension capable of compelling actors to act in a new and pertinent way in relation to the situations they encounter. The context of the study is a workshop on public services innovation within elderly care. The workshop brought together different actors, such as managers, personnel and two groups of users-citizens (elderly clients and their relatives). The process was designed as an extension of the co-construction methods inherent in action research. Scenario methods and focus groups were applied to generate dialogue. The main strength of these techniques is to gather and exploit as much data as possible by exposing the discourse of justification used by the actors to explain or justify their points of view when interacting with others on a given subject. The approach does not directly interrogate the actors on their values, but allows their values to emerge through debate and dialogue. Findings: The public values related to public services innovation management in elderly care were identified in two steps. In the first step, identification of values, values were identified in the discussions. Through continuous analysis of the data, a network of interrelated values was developed. In the second step, tracking group consensus, we then ascertained the degree to which the meaning attributed to the value was common to the participants, classifying the degree of consensus as high, intermediate or low. High consensus corresponds to strong convergence in meaning, intermediate to generally shared meanings between participants, and low to divergences regarding the meaning between participants. Only values with high or intermediate degree of consensus were retained in the analysis. Conclusion: The study shows that the fundamental criterion for justifying public services innovation management is the capacity for actors to enact public values in their work. In the workshop, we identified two categories of public values, intrinsic value and behavioural values, and a list of more specific values.

Keywords: public services innovation management, public value, co-creation, action research

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Authors: Marie E. Docken

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At some point in the lifecycle of a country, patterns of political and social unrest of varying degrees are observed. Events involving public disorder or civil disobedience may produce effects that range a wide spectrum of varying outcomes, depending on the level of unrest. Many previous studies, primarily theoretical in nature, have attempted to measure public disorder in answering why or how it occurs in society by examining causal factors or underlying issues in the social or political position of a population. The main objective in doing so is to understand how these activities evolve or seek some predictive capability for the events. In contrast, this research involves the fusion of analytics and social studies to provide more knowledge of the public disorder and civil disobedience intensity in populations. With a greater understanding of the magnitude of these events, it is believed that we may learn how they relate to extreme actions such as mass migration or violence. Upon establishing a model for measuring civil unrest based upon empirical data, a case study on various Latin American countries is performed. Interpretations of historical events are combined with analytical results to provide insights regarding the magnitude and effect of social and political activism.

Keywords: public disorder, civil disobedience, Latin America, metrics, data analysis

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Authors: Bouzidi Abdelouahab, Ghadjati Nadhra, Bettihi Sara, Mahdeb Nadia, Daamouche Z. El Youm

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The effects of acute administration of TOTAL alkaloids, the main active principle of Datura stramonium, with toxic properties, were studied in female Albino-Wistar rats. After acute intraperitoneal administration of dose 120 mg kg-1 (≈1/3 DL50) of total alkaloids to the seeds of D. stramonium, there were no remarkable changes in general appearance and no deaths occurred in any experimental group. After 5 days a significant reduction was observed in total alkaloids of seeds. The Red Blood Cells (RBC), Hematocrit (HCT) and Hemoglobin (HGB) show significant changes in the treated groups. There were no statistical differences in Glutamic-pyruvic Transaminase (GPT), Alkaline Phosphatase (ALP), urea, glucose and total protein observed between groups. After 24 h Glutamic-Oxaloacetic Transaminase (GOT) and creatinine were significantly higher in the treated male rats than the control group histological examination of liver showed no histopathological changes.

Keywords: datura stramonium, rat, liver, kidney, alkaloids, toxicity

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Authors: Edward Hwang

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The efficiency of public policies depends on customer's satisfaction, and the change directions of public policies hinge on customer's assessment; i.e., the performance of public policies in governments is decided by the citizen's administrative satisfaction! The governments in all levels must heave their efficiency and effectiveness of public services to meet the people's substantially multiple needs in order to make citizens trust the governmental operation styles. To pursue the societal equality and justice, governments should treat people equally and provide more services for the disadvantages. The recent Dapu protest event involves Miaoli county Magistrate Liu cheng-hung who arbitrarily demolished houses and destroyed farmlands, and it shifts his popularity into disaffection. Liu case tells us that the political events are lethal to politicians; it cut almost 20% satisfaction degree for Magistrate Liu and hurt KMT support levels nationally. In terms of administrative satisfaction levels, political factors do matter, especially for the derogated events.

Keywords: local politics, administrative satisfaction, Taiwan, customer satisfaction

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Authors: Aisyiyah Fauziah Rahmah

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Generally, an urban city has a rapid growth, it has frequent a variety of problems, especially of convenience in public space usage. The density of population in urban areas and the high activity is also indicated as a cause of urban resident lifestyle for the worse in social relationships and allow for the stress. Streets and green space (parks) are the only public space in a residential area which is used as a place to build social activity, to meet and interact with the other housing dweller. The high level of activity and social interaction that occurs will affect the spatial arrangement. It can be effected the space structures in housing more complex. Ease in access to public space is the reason many dweller prefer doing social activities there. Hillier in Carmona et al (2003) explains that the pattern and intensity of movement of individuals is influenced by the configuration of space, even the space structure can be regarded as the single most influential determinant of movements in the space. Whyte in Zhang and Lawson (2009) also suggest some factors such as seats, trees, water and legibility of space encourage people to stay in public outdoor space. Furthermore this activities can attract more activities. Villa Bukit Tidar is a housing in Lowokwaru District which highest number of people in Malang City, so social activity is also high there. It has natural and recreational concept and provided with view of Malang City from heights. This potential is able to attract the people who live there to stay in public outdoor space and doing activities there. From this study we can find whether the ease of access to public space and visual satisfaction of Villa Bukit Tidar housing affect the usage of public space. This study was carried out by observing the streets pattern and plot pattern to know the configuration space of Villa Bukit Tidar housing through values of connectivity and integrity by resulting from space sintax analysis. Distributing questionnaires also carried out to determine the level of satisfaction and importance perception of visual condition in the public space in Villa Bukit Tidar housing through Important Performance Analysis (IPA). Results of this research indicated that the public spaces in Villa Bukit Tidar housing who has high connectivity and integrity is considered to be visually satisfied and it has a higher public space usage than has low connectivity and integrity are considered to be visually dissatisfied.

Keywords: configuration space, visual perception, social activities, public space usage

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