scholarly journals Exploring Future Effects of Prolonged Austerity Policy on Environmental Decisions in Scotland: Perspectives from a Kuznetsian Thought Experiment

2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (22) ◽  
Author(s):  
Vincent Onyango
Keyword(s):  
Thought Experiment ◽  
Environmental Decisions ◽  
Austerity Policy

scholarly journals The effects of recent austerity on environmental protection decisions

2019 ◽  
Vol 30 (5) ◽  
pp. 1218-1234 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vincent Onyango ◽  
Paola Gazzola ◽  
Geoffrey Wood
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Environmental Protection ◽  
Statistical Tests ◽  
Environmental Parameters ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Study Approach ◽  
Environmental Decisions ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Austerity Policy

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to establish the evidence for, the why and how recent austerity policy atmosphere associated with the UK government affected environmental protection decisions within planning in Scotland. Design/methodology/approach A qualitative analysis based on perspectives gathered via questionnaire survey targeted at stakeholders involved in planning in Scotland was undertaken. The questionnaire responses were analysed thematically, supplemented by using statistical tests of significance and variance to show how responses differed across participants. Findings The evidence showed that austerity policy atmosphere resulted in a pervasive neoliberal imperative of resuscitating the economy; whilst producing subtle and adverse effects on environmental decisions. This was best understood within a neo-Gramscian perspective of hegemony, borrowed from the field of political economy of states. Research limitations/implications The gathered views were constrained within unknown biases that the participants may have had; and because the case study approach was not equipped to generalise the results beyond the study, more research testing cause-effect between the austerity and selected environmental parameters is needed, from various contexts. Practical implications Decision-making frameworks should explicitly acknowledge the unique pressures during austerity periods; and contemplate resilient decision-making frameworks that can withstand the hegemonic tendencies which prioritise economic goals above environmental ones. Originality/value Whilst the area of austerity’s impacts on the environment remains poorly evidenced, empirically, this seminal paper uses robust analysis to establish how the austerity policy atmosphere affects environmental decisions. This is insight into what may be happening in other similar situations outside Scotland, raising concern as to whether and how we should approach the challenge of hegemonic ideas.

Epistemological Status of Models and Thought Experiments in Economics

2015 ◽  
pp. 123-140 ◽  
Author(s):  
O. Koshovets ◽  
T. Varkhotov
Keyword(s):  
Natural Science ◽  
Thought Experiment ◽  
Thought Experiments ◽  
Theoretical Modeling ◽  
Epistemological Status ◽  
Epistemological Analysis ◽  
Field Of Inquiry

The paper considers the analogy of theoretical modeling and thought experiment in economics. The authors provide historical and epistemological analysis of thought experiments and their relations to the material experiments in natural science. They conclude that thought experiments as instruments are used both in physics and in economics, but in radically different ways. In the natural science, a thought experiment is tightly connected to the material experimentation, while in economics it is used in isolation. Material experiments serve as a means to demonstrate the reality, while thought experiments cannot be a full-fledged instrument of studying the reality. Rather, they constitute the instrument of structuring the field of inquiry.

On Education as a Commodity (The Distinguishedl Lecture)

1993 ◽  
Vol 32 (4I) ◽  
pp. 541-582 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Ali Khan
Keyword(s):  
Undergraduate Education ◽  
Thought Experiment ◽  
British Museum ◽  
Native Literature ◽  
Correct Estimate

I have no knowledge of either Sanskrit or Arabic. But I have done what I could to form a correct estimate of their value. I have never found one ... who could deny that a single shelf of a good European library was worth the whole native literature of India and Arabia. i If truth is not to be found on the shelves of the British Museum, where, I asked myself, picking up a notebook and a pencil, is truth.2 Education is a weapon whose effect depends on who holds it in his hand and who is struck with it.Consider a shop, here and now, which stocks a finite but very large number of commodities, each of whose characteristics is known to both the shoppers and the shopkeeper, and each of whose prices is posted at the shopdoor. Let one of these cOinmodities be units of undergraduate education, measured in years. The following scenario, thought-experiment if one prefers, brings out how the shop functions. I send someone shopping. I give him a slip marked "five years of undergraduate education." He takes the slip to the shopkeeper, who.......

What is the meaning of the pullback Schwarzschild metric?

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matheus Pereira Lobo
Keyword(s):  
Black Hole ◽  
Thought Experiment ◽  
Schwarzschild Metric

We propose a thought experiment regarding the pullback Schwarzschild metric, considering that there is no interior of a black hole.

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