Project acronym EVOCLIM
Project Behavioral-evolutionary analysis of climate policy: Bounded rationality, markets and social interactions
Researcher (PI) Jeroen VAN DEN BERGH
Host Institution (HI) UNIVERSITAT AUTONOMA DE BARCELONA
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), SH2, ERC-2016-ADG
Summary Distinct climate policies are studied with incomparable approaches involving unique criteria and impacts. I propose to unite core features of such approaches within a behavioral-evolutionary framework, offering three advantages: evaluate the effectiveness of very different climate policy instruments in a consistent and comparative way; examine policy mixes by considering interaction between instruments from a behavioral as well as systemic perspective; and simultaneously assessing policy impacts mediated by markets and social interactions.
The key novelty is linking climate policies to populations of heterogeneous consumer and producers characterized by bounded rationality and social interactions. The resulting models will be used to assess the performance of policy instruments – such as various carbon pricing and information provision instruments – in terms of employment, equity and CO2 emissions. The approach is guided by 5 goals: (1) test robustness of insights on carbon pricing from benchmark approaches that assume representative, rational agents; (2) test contested views on joint employment-climate effects of shifting taxes from labor to carbon; (3) examine various instruments of information provision under distinct assumptions about social preferences and interactions; (4) study regulation of commercial advertising as a climate policy option in the context of status-seeking and high-carbon consumption; and (5) explore behavioral roots of energy/carbon rebound.
The research has a general, conceptual-theoretical rather than a particular country focus. Given the complexity of the developed models, it involves numerical analyses with parameter values in realistic ranges, partly supported by insights from questionnaire-based surveys among consumers and firms. One survey examines information provision instruments and social interaction channels, while another assesses behavioral foundations of rebound. The project will culminate in improved advice on climate policy.
Summary
Distinct climate policies are studied with incomparable approaches involving unique criteria and impacts. I propose to unite core features of such approaches within a behavioral-evolutionary framework, offering three advantages: evaluate the effectiveness of very different climate policy instruments in a consistent and comparative way; examine policy mixes by considering interaction between instruments from a behavioral as well as systemic perspective; and simultaneously assessing policy impacts mediated by markets and social interactions.
The key novelty is linking climate policies to populations of heterogeneous consumer and producers characterized by bounded rationality and social interactions. The resulting models will be used to assess the performance of policy instruments – such as various carbon pricing and information provision instruments – in terms of employment, equity and CO2 emissions. The approach is guided by 5 goals: (1) test robustness of insights on carbon pricing from benchmark approaches that assume representative, rational agents; (2) test contested views on joint employment-climate effects of shifting taxes from labor to carbon; (3) examine various instruments of information provision under distinct assumptions about social preferences and interactions; (4) study regulation of commercial advertising as a climate policy option in the context of status-seeking and high-carbon consumption; and (5) explore behavioral roots of energy/carbon rebound.
The research has a general, conceptual-theoretical rather than a particular country focus. Given the complexity of the developed models, it involves numerical analyses with parameter values in realistic ranges, partly supported by insights from questionnaire-based surveys among consumers and firms. One survey examines information provision instruments and social interaction channels, while another assesses behavioral foundations of rebound. The project will culminate in improved advice on climate policy.
Max ERC Funding
1 943 924 €
Duration
Start date: 2018-01-01, End date: 2022-12-31
Project acronym TRANSGANG
Project Transnational Gangs as Agents of Mediation: Experiences of Conflict Resolution in Street Youth Organizations in Southern Europe, North Africa and the Americas
Researcher (PI) Carles FEIXA PAMPOLS
Host Institution (HI) UNIVERSIDAD POMPEU FABRA
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), SH3, ERC-2016-ADG
Summary TRANSGANG aims to develop a renewed model for the analysis of transnational youth gangs in the global age, in dialogue with two classics of urban ethnography, published nearly a century ago: The Gang, by F.M. Thrasher (1926) and The Polish Peasant in Europe and America, by W. I. Thomas and F. Znaniecki (1918-1920). To do this, the project will start by a systematic review of the historical literature on youth gangs, which will try to overcome the north-american-centrism, dominant in contemporary criminology. The central phase of the research will focus on a multisited and multilevel ethnography that will explore experiences in which gangs have acted as agents of mediation, as well as the barriers that have blocked these attempts. The project will compare street youth organizations from two transnational communities -Latinos and Arabs-, both in their homelands and in their new European neigbourhoods. Starting with three case studies of “good practices” in Barcelona, Medellin and Casablanca, which will be studied in depth, contrasts with other cases in which other policies have been implemented will be established: Madrid, Marseille and Milan in southern Europe; Oran Tunis and Cairo in north Africa; Chicago, Santiago de Cuba and San Salvador in the Americas. Using an experimental approach based on the “extended case method”, it will have as its theme the making of a film that collects the experience of members or former members of gangs who have participated in mediation experiences. The ultimate goal is to develop a renewed transnational, inter-generational, intergeneric and transmedia approach to Twenty-First-century gangs, very different from the local, coeval, male and face-to-face model used for understanding gangs in the Twentieth century. Although the focus of the project is theoretical, its purpose is applied: to deduce more effective ways of intervention to prevent the hegemony of the criminal gang model that appears as dominant in the neoliberal era.
Summary
TRANSGANG aims to develop a renewed model for the analysis of transnational youth gangs in the global age, in dialogue with two classics of urban ethnography, published nearly a century ago: The Gang, by F.M. Thrasher (1926) and The Polish Peasant in Europe and America, by W. I. Thomas and F. Znaniecki (1918-1920). To do this, the project will start by a systematic review of the historical literature on youth gangs, which will try to overcome the north-american-centrism, dominant in contemporary criminology. The central phase of the research will focus on a multisited and multilevel ethnography that will explore experiences in which gangs have acted as agents of mediation, as well as the barriers that have blocked these attempts. The project will compare street youth organizations from two transnational communities -Latinos and Arabs-, both in their homelands and in their new European neigbourhoods. Starting with three case studies of “good practices” in Barcelona, Medellin and Casablanca, which will be studied in depth, contrasts with other cases in which other policies have been implemented will be established: Madrid, Marseille and Milan in southern Europe; Oran Tunis and Cairo in north Africa; Chicago, Santiago de Cuba and San Salvador in the Americas. Using an experimental approach based on the “extended case method”, it will have as its theme the making of a film that collects the experience of members or former members of gangs who have participated in mediation experiences. The ultimate goal is to develop a renewed transnational, inter-generational, intergeneric and transmedia approach to Twenty-First-century gangs, very different from the local, coeval, male and face-to-face model used for understanding gangs in the Twentieth century. Although the focus of the project is theoretical, its purpose is applied: to deduce more effective ways of intervention to prevent the hegemony of the criminal gang model that appears as dominant in the neoliberal era.
Max ERC Funding
2 343 249 €
Duration
Start date: 2018-01-01, End date: 2022-12-31
