Spatial Analysis

There are large variations between the topographical features in connection to which the Early Helladic people chose to settle, differences in terms of form, elevation, size and in the specific location of the settlements. Many settlements share, however, the natural definition added to them by their topography. I will consider the local topography of some Early Helladic settlements in a discussion on how the people of the period may have experienced and made use of the local topography in the creation and definition of settlement space. Humans are categorizing beings and based on our own position in different contexts we tend to create spaces which in relation to our surrounding render the relative “other”. We create or assign boundaries that distinguish different contexts from each other. These boundaries are constantly renegotiated, but at a given point in time they define our position and guide our actions. The topography of a hill may supply the limits – the boundaries – of the settlement located there and at the same time be the marker of that settlement. The perception of an “inside” and an “outside” of a settlement may similarly have been reinforced by natural features of the landscape, by elevation, rivers or a common focus. Independent of topographic location, as it seems, Early Helladic settlement focus remained, generally, within a confined area. I will argue that this circumstance may be interpreted in the framework of tradition, topography and the search for a well-defined location of the right size.

"To what extent can multinationals affect policy outcomes? Any sophisticated discussion of a corporate political strategy requires an answer to this question. Unfortunately, any scientific examination of this topic faces several challenges: How can we account for the fact that counter- vailing interests may also be lobbying a bill? If we are using roll call data, how can we observe the effect of lobbying on bills that don’t make it to the floor? How does the legislative logroll manifest itself? To that end, this paper supplements the discussion of the extent to which lobbying activi- ties by MNEs can affect legislative outcomes using new statistical techniques to account for the latent traits inherent in Congressional behavior. With the Bayesian roll call analysis technique introduced by Clinton, Jackman, and Rivers (2004), I operationalize the differences in ideal point estimations conditioned by bills lobbied and not lobbied by a sample of multinational enterprises, by issue.

I find that MNE lobbying activities condition ideal point estimations for several issues. I observe a mean spatial shift of up to 0.204 on corporate social responsibility-related issues and of up to 0.185 on operations-related issues. Further, I find that legislators who shift the most are leaders in the House of Representatives. While limited, the findings suggest that MNEs are able to affect legislator behavior on CSR-related issues to a greater extent than they are on profit- motivated issues, and that MNE influence on individual legislator behavior – instead of simple committee influence – can be substantial. Altogether, the study puts a new spin on an old issue in corporate political strategy and contributes to the scholarly discussion of lobbying and interest groups."

In this paper we present a Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) case-study applied to a Rural Development Program (RDP), which allocates resources to support agri-environmental schemes to pay farmers for the provision of environmental services. In particular, the paper examines the use of spatially explicit assessment methods. The results show that the spatial distribution of certain key environmental measures is not always the best-performing one in environmental terms, based on a series of spatially explicit environmental indexes. Spatial analysis thus represents a useful tool for providing input to decision-makers, especially when dealing with complex instruments such as RDP that entail consideration of a variety of objectives, stakeholders, beneficiaries, and environmental aspects.

""This paper studies the relationship between migration and trade, with the aim of measuring both direct and indirect network effects. We analyze trade of differentiated and homogeneous goods using an econometric approach inspired by spatial econometrics, proposing a new way to dene country neighbors based on the most intense links in the migration network. We find that migration signicantly affects trade across categories both in direct and in indirect way. The indirect impact highlights a stronger competitive effect of third country migrants for homogeneous goods. We also confirm that the effect of migration channels is higher on differen-
tiated goods.

Keywords: Trade; Migration; Gravity model; Spatial econometrics, Networks

JEL Codes: F14, F22, C21""

"Questo volume rappresenta la terza edizione di un ciclo di lavoro iniziato nel 2006 per la tesi di dottorato. Questa, discussa nel 2010 (prima edizione, GATTIGLIA 2010), è stata parzialmente pubblicata, come monografia sintetica nel 2011 (seconda edizione, GATTIGLIA 2011) o in articoli (GATTIGLIA 2012, GATTIGLIA 2012a, GATTIGLIA G. 2011a) e trova ora (terza edizione) una pubblicazione più ampia alla luce di molti dati nuovi. Negli ultimi 2 anni, infatti, il lavoro di studio su Pisa, non solo medievale, è proseguito all’interno del progetto MAPPA (Metodologie Applicate alla Predittività del Potenziale) , che ha reso possibile una capillare raccolta dati attraverso i quali si è potuto ricomporre più compiutamente il quadro idrogeologico, geomorfologico e topografico e sottoporre a verifica, in molti casi modificando, parte delle ipotesi fatte in quelle sedi. I dati qui analizzati sono open data sul MOD (ANICHINI et alii 2013) (l’archivio open data dell’archeologia italiana www.mappaproject.org/mod) o interrogabili  su webGIS (MAPPAgis www.mappaproject.org/webgis).
Nel primo capitolo viene sinteticamente raccontata la storia dell’archeologia urbana a Pisa. Nel secondo capitolo lo sguardo si allarga sul contesto territoriale e sul paesaggio. I percorsi fluviali e le aree palustri vengono analizzati per capire come l’ambiente abbia condizionato nel bene e nel male lo sviluppo della città medievale. Ma siccome l’uomo non è stato passivo di fronte ad esso, lo studio del sistema portuale e della viabilità terrestre permette di comprendere quali soluzioni siano state adottate per sfruttare i vantaggi geografici e generare profitti economici e commerciali.Il terzo ed ultimo capitolo è diviso in due parti. La prima vuole illustrare le grandi trasformazioni urbanistiche nel lungo periodo che va dalla fine della romanità (VI secolo) alla conquista fiorentina (inizio XV secolo).  La seconda parte fa parlare le tracce materiali, le fonti archeologiche, quei tasselli della storia che hanno permesso di ricostruire il quadro generale. Saranno soprattutto i dati provenienti dagli scavi a raccontare com’erano gli edifici, le strade, gli opifici e le botteghe artigianali, il sistema di smaltimento dei rifiuti e di approvvigionamento dell’acqua, infine la ricchezza e lo status sociale dei suoi abitanti.
"