Global Rules Research Articles

On the Legitimacy and Effectivity of the World Bank and Its Pandenic Emergency Financing Facility (‘PEF’) at the Time of the covid-19 Outbreak

Abstract Pandemic financing has in the current climate of disruption and turmoil of an ongoing global pandemic become the most highly debated and controversial issue within the field of international public health law and policy. From the perspective of international public health law and policy, a precondition for success is that financial resources and funds are employed in an effective manner. Whether the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (‘World Bank’ or ‘WB’) and the Pandemic Emergency Financing Facility (‘PEF’) – a financing mechanism housed at the WB – may be perceived as effective public health players shall be established by referring to their mandates, their inherent capacity for enhancing accepted global legal standards and rules on public health and their funding methods and practices. After the affirmation and consolidation of its role in the public health sector in the early 1990s, the WB has rapidly accredited itself as the most active intergovernmental institution dealing with pandemic and epidemic financing. Its direct involvement in public health trust funds, such as the Avian Flu Trust Fund Facility and the Health Emergency Preparedness and Response Multi-Donor Fund (the HEPRF), and its lending practices and internal policies and procedures were of crucial significance in this respect. Considering that acceptance of international institutions, including international financial institutions, has always been conditioned by their acknowledgment as legally legitimate, legitimacy is regarded as closely connected to effectiveness. The criteria for establishing legitimacy in relation to international financial institutions are increasingly, amongst others, the respect and promotion of rule of law standards in the recipient states. From this perspective, the WB’s functional and management structures, but not the PEF’s structures and management, have made noteworthy progress, and notwithstanding some deficiencies and peculiarities they present several elements of legitimate decision-making.

T Kondo (Ed) Law and Investment in Africa: The Governance of Foreign Direct Investment In Zimbabwe

Tinashe Kondo's book, Law and investment in Africa, narrates the efforts of a country to regain the trust [and the love] of foreign investors after several decades of argument and hostility. Encapsulated in the "Zimbabwe is open for business" slogan, these efforts show "how a country can move to regain credibility and commit to global rules despite its recent history".2 This review of Kondo's book concerns the manner in which readers can take advantage of this immensely useful publication. Particularly, this review looks into the book in order to advise law academics on possible strategies to integrate the book into their curricula in Zimbabwe and elsewhere on the continent.

Explainable AI for Psychological Profiling from Behavioral Data: An Application to Big Five Personality Predictions from Financial Transaction Records

Every step we take in the digital world leaves behind a record of our behavior; a digital footprint. Research has suggested that algorithms can translate these digital footprints into accurate estimates of psychological characteristics, including personality traits, mental health or intelligence. The mechanisms by which AI generates these insights, however, often remain opaque. In this paper, we show how Explainable AI (XAI) can help domain experts and data subjects validate, question, and improve models that classify psychological traits from digital footprints. We elaborate on two popular XAI methods (rule extraction and counterfactual explanations) in the context of Big Five personality predictions (traits and facets) from financial transactions data (N = 6408). First, we demonstrate how global rule extraction sheds light on the spending patterns identified by the model as most predictive for personality, and discuss how these rules can be used to explain, validate, and improve the model. Second, we implement local rule extraction to show that individuals are assigned to personality classes because of their unique financial behavior, and there exists a positive link between the model’s prediction confidence and the number of features that contributed to the prediction. Our experiments highlight the importance of both global and local XAI methods. By better understanding how predictive models work in general as well as how they derive an outcome for a particular person, XAI promotes accountability in a world in which AI impacts the lives of billions of people around the world.

Behavioral Analysis in International Business Negotiations Based on the Bargaining Model of Game Theory

In the process of global digital trade rules negotiation, game and cooperation coexist, and all parties are actively seeking cooperative relationship while negotiating game. Against this background, this paper provides a comprehensive overview of the negotiation process of global digital trade rules and analyzes the core issues of the negotiations and their implied political game. This paper firstly compares the core issues of global digital trade rules negotiations at multilateral and regional levels and quantitatively reflects the weighting relationship between core issues and keywords by means of a dynamic thematic model. In order to judge the potential partnership of each country, this paper constructs a theoretical model of partner selection for global digital trade rules negotiation from the perspective of political game and uses the data of 62 major digital trade countries for empirical testing. Compared with traditional trade agreements, the consensus reached in digital trade negotiations is less influenced by traditional economic geography factors and more influenced by the level of digital trade restrictions and political distance. When signing digital trade terms, a country tends to choose countries with similar levels of digital trade restrictions and high political similarity as partners. Financial restrictions and trade restrictions are the most important digital trade restriction factors that countries pay attention to when negotiating, and political stability is the most important political factor that countries pay attention to when negotiating. Compared with developed countries, developing countries pay more attention to market size, cultural differences, and digital infrastructure when negotiating. The formulation of global digital trade rules may follow a reconstructive path from bilateral to regional to multilateral, promoting regional digital trade rule systems at this stage and gradually expanding the scope of negotiations to the multilateral level.

The Investment Protection Rules of the EU-Canada Trade Agreement

Abstract This article provides an in-depth analysis of the substantive protection provided to investors against indirect expropriations under the EU-Canada Free Trade Agreement (ceta) and under the Constitution of Finland. More specifically, we analyse these respective spheres of protection in a regulatory context in Finland where Canadian investors operate actively: industrial mining. The purpose of the comparative analysis is to provide tentative answers to three broad research questions: Can investors challenge legitimate public interest measures under ceta’s investment protection rules? Is the protection provided under ceta co-extensive with the protection provided under the constitutions of countries placing high on global rule of law rankings? And are countries upholding the rule of law safe from investor claims under ceta’s reformed investment protection rules? A more general purpose is to bring more depth and nuance into the debates concerning the reform of the investment treaty regime, which often travel at a high level of abstraction.

Explainable and Interpretable Anomaly Detection Models for Production Data

Summary Trusting a machine-learning model is a critical factor that will speed the spread of the fourth industrial revolution. Trust can be achieved by understanding how a model is making decisions. For white-box models, it is easy to “see” the model and examine its prediction. For black-box models, the explanation of the decision process is not straightforward. In this work, we compare the performance of several white- and black-box models on two production data sets in an anomaly detection task. The presence of anomalies in production data can significantly influence business decisions and misrepresent the results of the analysis, if not identified. Therefore, identifying anomalies is a crucial and necessary step to maintain safety and ensure that the wells perform at full capacity. To achieve this, we compare the performance of K-nearest neighbor (KNN), logistic regression (Logit), support vector machines (SVMs), decision tree (DT), random forest (RF), and rule fit classifier (RFC). F1 and complexity are the two main metrics used to compare the prediction performance and interpretability of these models. In one data set, RFC outperformed the remaining models in both F1 and complexity, where F1 = 0.92, and complexity = 0.5. In the second data set, RF outperformed the rest in prediction performance with F1 = 0.84, yet it had the lowest complexity metric (0.04). We further analyzed the best performing models by explaining their predictions using local interpretable model-agnostic explanations, which provide justification for decisions made for each instance. Additionally, we evaluated the global rules learned from white-box models. Local and global analysis enable decision makers to understand how and why models are making certain decisions, which in turn allows trusting the models.

Strengthening European Union fisheries by removing harmful subsidies

Harmful fisheries subsidies have historically contributed to fleet overcapacity and continue to be allocated to the fishing industry to artificially maintain its profitability. However, in this contribution we show that removing harmful subsidies and reducing overfishing will help to recover the resource biomass, subsequently leading to increased levels of sustainable catches, income and well-being of fishers, and reduces inequities in income and consumption when fish stocks are not effectively managed. Maintaining harmful fisheries subsidies is socially and economically inefficient. Taking the example of the EU fishing fleet, one of the largest fishing fleets in the world, we use the total factor productivity to show that small-scale fishing fleet's productivity is almost two-fold in the North Atlantic and 16% higher in the Mediterranean and Black seas compared to large-scale vessels. This result is explained because the harmful fisheries subsidies disproportionately allocated to large-scale vessels introduce distortions in the efficient allocation of inputs. With critical WTO negotiations ongoing regarding the global rules on fisheries subsidies, the EU must take advantage of the opportunity to lead a desirable transformative change while also supporting developing nations to truly achieve global sustainable and equitable fisheries.

A Classification of Different Approaches to Green Finance and Green Monetary Policy

In recent years, green finance has emerged as a commonly used strategy for dealing with environmental problems. However, it still remains to be seen whether green finance deals effectively with current global environmental problems. More recently, proposals regarding greening monetary policy have emerged. The goal of this paper is to provide a conceptual framework that helps to distinguish between different forms of green finance and monetary policy. We systematically analyse forms, tools and measures of green finance and monetary policy against different theoretical backgrounds. In so doing, we fill a research gap by providing an appropriate classification that is intended to facilitate future academic research. We provide different categories and distinguish, on an abstract level, between neoliberal, reformist and progressive forms of green finance. Furthermore, we provide sub-categories on a more concrete level of abstraction. With this, we focus on both financial market regulation and monetary policy strategies. Against the background of our categorisation, the different focuses on green finance and green monetary policy and the (often implicitly) underlying theoretical assumptions become transparent. The classification has significant implications for the evaluation of different perspectives and is, therefore, important for academic debate. The classification also potentially represents a basis for policy related discussions. We conclude that neoliberal forms of green finance and monetary policy that rely on the assumption of the effectiveness of markets for contributing to sustainability tend to neglect or abstract from potentially adverse distributional effects. Reformist forms of green finance and monetary policy are more skeptical of the effectiveness of market processes and, therefore, consider a greater role for government policies. In addition, reformist approaches are more concerned about the potentially adverse distributional effects of environmental policies. Finally, progressive green finance and monetary policy adopts a more global perspective on environmental issues and links the discussion intrinsically with questions of global inequality and socio-ecological transformation. Moreover, progressive approaches are skeptical of global capitalism at a systemic level and therefore demand global rules and financial and monetary regimes that allow for solutions of environmental problems based on global solidarity and a democratic economic governance.

Етикетні мовленнєві акти в аспекті лінгводидактики

Abstract. The works of M. Kurushina, I. Linchak, I. Lysenko, M. Shevchenko, H. Sokolova, T. Plotnikovа, D. Polyakov, I. Valchenko and І. Zozula are devoted to the issue of teaching methods in a foreign language audience at the beginner level in Ukrainian linguistics. They study special features of the formation of reading and speaking skills in the Ukrainian language. They examine the types of lexical units, grammatical categories, multi-genre texts that are appropriate for studying at the initial stage. Modern methods of teaching Ukrainian as a foreign language are based on the communicative approach, which resulted in a paradigm shift from the study of vocabulary and grammar to language acquisition through speech acts as ways of communicative interaction in specific communication situations. At the beginner level of learning the Ukrainian as a foreign language, speakers (foreigners studying in Ukraine, students of Ukrainian Studies in the world, the Ukrainian diaspora, children of migrant workers studying at Saturday and Sunday schools abroad) should master the skills of realizing the following etiquette speech acts: apologies, greetings, wishes, thanks, congratulations and farewells. In this regard, the present paper considers features of realization of etiquette speech acts to successfully introduce them into the educational process of Ukrainian as a foreign language at the beginner level (A1). The paper outlines a set of etiquette speech acts, which are studied in a foreign language audience at the beginner level and describes the socio-cultural context of their realization, communicative situation, an addresser / addressee status, communicative goal. It also identifies lexical and grammatical means for the verbalization of etiquette speech acts, which will be studied by foreign language speakers at the beginner level. These are utterances and lexemes that form the content of the relevant speech acts to meet the communicative needs at the beginner level (phrases of greetings and farewells, names of the holidays, names of abstract concepts, etc.). A set of grammatical categories is specified for making correct utterances: indirect cases of nouns and personal pronouns, exclamatory case of nouns; for correct naming of the addressee: conjugation of verbs (to greet / to wish) in the present tense, noun-adjective agreement, examples of verb government, etc. The object of the analysis is also language means of forms of address to the interlocutor, which belong to the global rules of communication, determine its tone, and the violation of which often causes communicative deviations in the Ukrainian language. A system of exercises and tasks for reading, listening, developing monologue and dialogic speech provides effective learning of the etiquette speech acts.

Transfer Function for Relative Blast Overpressure Through Porcine and Human Skulls In Situ.

The overarching objective of the Office of Naval Research sponsored Blast Load Assessment Sense and Test (BLAST) program was to quantify neurofunctional risk from repeated blast exposure. However, human studies have limitations in data collection that can only be addressed by animal models. To utilize a large animal model in this work, researchers developed an approach for scaling blast exposure data from animal to human-equivalent loading. For this study, energy interacting with the brain tissue was selected as a translation metric because of the hypothesized association between observed neurological changes and energy transmitted through the skull. This article describes the methodology used to derive an energy-based transfer function capable of serving as a global correspondence rule for primary blast injury exposure, allowing researchers to derive human-appropriate thresholds from animal data. To generate data for the development of the transfer functions, three disarticulated cadaveric Yucatan minipigs and three postmortem human surrogate heads were exposed to blast overpressure using a large bore, compressed-gas shock tube. Pressure gauges in the free field, on the skull surface, and pressure probes within the brain cavity filled with Sylgard silicone gel recorded the pressure propagation through the skull of each specimen. The frequency components of the freefield and brain cavity measurements from the pig and human surrogates were interrogated in the frequency domain. Doing so quantifies the differences in the amount of energy, in each frequency band, transmitted through both the porcine and the human skull, and the transfer function was calculated to quantify those differences. Nonlinear energy transmission was observed for both the porcine and human skulls, indicating that linear scaling would not be appropriate for developing porcine to human transfer functions. This study demonstrated similar responses between species with little to no attenuation at frequencies below 30 Hz. The phase of the pressure transmission to the brain is also similar for both species up to approximately 10 kHz. There were two notable differences between the porcine and human surrogates. First, in the 40-100 Hz range, human subjects have approximately 8 dB more pressure transmitted through the skull relative to porcine subjects. Second, in the 1-10 kHz range, human subjects have up to 10 dB more pressure transmitted into the brain (10 dB more attenuation) relative to the porcine subjects. The fundamental goal of this study was to develop pig-to-human transfer functions to allow researchers to interpret data collected from large animal studies and aid in deriving risk functions for repeated blast exposures. Similarities in porcine and human brain physiology make the minipig experimental model an excellent candidate for blast research. However, differences in the skull geometry have historically made the interpretation of animal data difficult for the purposes of characterizing potential neurological risk in humans. Human equivalent loading conditions are critical so that the thresholds are not over- or underpredicted due to differences in porcine skull geometry. This research provides a solution to this challenge, providing a robust methodology for interpreting animal data for blast research.

SOCIJALNA BEZBEDNOST I RIZICI SAVREMENIH MIGRACIJA

Social security implies the realization of comprehensive guarantees to citizens from certain risks, most often socio-economic, but also others related to them, in an objective and subjective sense, which are integral parts of social security (social security, social protection, social development and social risks). Social security is often equated with social security, especially in its broader sense, although are not synonymous, and implies a comprehensive and integrated system of social measures that guarantee an adequate standard of living and well-being, can include a range of related systems and subsystems, ideas and concepts of security and other factors (economic, political, demographic, environmental, etc.) that are associated with it have a greater or lesser impact and determine the character of its actions. Social security is most directly related to human security and sustainable development. Achieving the highest possible level of social security is no longer just a possibility and ability of nation states but also of the entire global world system, with a system of international relations, which aspires to realize the idea and vision of a global society with a number of international supranational and global institutions, institutes and rules, who need to realize his premises. The central problem in the current form of globalization, as a system of international relations, is the constant increase of socio-economic inequalities and other inequalities, at the level of global society, between regions and states and within states and which is actualized as a result of structural inequalities stemming from neoliberalism, dominant economic-political model and its rules. As a consequence of endangering the socio-economic security of people and their identities, modern migrations with their risks appear, of which the capacity of migrations to become a terrismogenic factor (factor generic of terrorism) is of special importance. The paper deals with issues of social security and social risks; globalization, increasing socio-economic inequalities and social risks, and the relationship between social risks and migration as a terrismogenic factor, with reference to the analysis of migration risks in the Republic of Serbia.

Forecasting of Steam Coal Price Based on Robust Regularized Kernel Regression and Empirical Mode Decomposition

Aiming at the problem of difficulties in modeling the nonlinear relation in the steam coal dataset, this article proposes a forecasting method for the price of steam coal based on robust regularized kernel regression and empirical mode decomposition. By selecting the polynomial kernel function, the robust loss function and L2 regular term to construct a robust regularized kernel regression model are used. The polynomial kernel function does not depend on the kernel parameters and can mine the global rules in the dataset so that improves the forecasting stability of the kernel model. This method maps the features to the high-dimensional space by using the polynomial kernel function to transform the nonlinear law in the original feature space into linear law in the high-dimensional space and helps learn the linear law in the high-dimensional feature space by using the linear model. The Huber loss function is selected to reduce the influence of abnormal noise in the dataset on the model performance, and the L2 regular term is used to reduce the risk of model overfitting. We use the combined model based on empirical mode decomposition (EMD) and auto regressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) model to compensate for the error of robust regularized kernel regression model, thus making up for the limitations of the single forecasting model. Finally, we use the steam coal dataset to verify the proposed model and such model has an optimal evaluation index value compared to other contrast models after the model performance is evaluated as per the evaluation index such as RMSE, MAE, and mean absolute percentage error.

What Are We Actually Talking About? Conceptualizing Data as a Governable Object in Overlapping Jurisdictions

Abstract Data form an increasingly essential element of contemporary politics, as both public and private actors extend claims of their legitimate control in diverse areas including health, security, and trade. This paper investigates data governance as a site of fundamental normative and political ordering processes that unfold in light of ever-increasing inter- and transnational linkages. Drawing on the concept of jurisdictional conflicts, the paper traces the evolution of data governance in three cases of transatlantic conflicts as diverging definitional claims over data. The paper argues that these conflicts reveal varying conceptualizations of data linked to four distinct visions of the social world. First, a conceptualization of data as an individual rights issue links human rights with the promotion of sovereignty to a vision of data governance as local liberalism. Second, proponents of a security partnership promote global security cooperation based on the conceptualization of data as a neutral instrument. Third, a conceptualization of data as an economic resource is linked to a vision of the digital economy that endorses progress and innovation with limited regulation. Fourth, a conceptualization of data as a collective resource links the values of universal rights and global rules to a vision of global protection.

The Failures and Reform of Corporate Governance

The concern of the companies, employers’ organizations and public authorities to the “governance” crisis is justified by the need for economic recovery and the identification of new forms of management to meet the requirements of sustainable development model. The current crisis has shaken the global governance rules applicable after the ’70s and has highlighted the major difficulties related to controlling the managerial remuneration, risk management, the transparency of the activities of corporations, the role and responsibility of shareholders, etc.Offering a new perspective and way of approaching the crises, as well as the analysis of the failures of shareholder governance in the context of the generalized crisis of capitalism and efforts to renovate the economic and financial theory, within this article we have suggested the areas and main sets of measures to ensure a double reform of corporate governance, both in theoretical and ideological perspective, as well as in institutional and legal perspective.

The Analysis of Factors of Formation of the Modern System of Political Governance: Global, Regional and Local Levels

The relevance of the work is due to the growing influence of the processes of globalization and the need for a systematic and theoretical understanding of the interdependence of different levels of development and adaptation of the political system in the modern world. The situation of the COVID pandemic, which began in 2020 and demonstrated the dominance of global attitudes and rules over regional and local attitudes and rules, gives special relevance to this article. The purpose of the work is to clarify the essence and possibilities of applying system analysis to the process of public administration at the level of global integration, regional and local levels of public administration. At the same time, the essence of system analysis is not reduced to solving problems of management and decision-making on very complex problems, but a complete system and methodology for analyzing the adaptation practices of modern political systems at the global, regional and local levels is built. The author comes to the conclusion that it is the local level that is the basis for the formation of the modern political system, and it is worth focusing on it, and not on the global and regional levels, when carrying out certain political changes and transformations. The regional level is an add-on to the local level, and can include multiple local levels. The task of the regional level is to prevent conflict between multiple localities, to ensure their harmonious coexistence and development. Due to the spread of digitalization, the regional level loses its function as an intermediary between the local and the global. The global level of formation of the political system today, in turn, is an “umbrella” level. It appears as a categorical imperative of the political system, but it is not its mandatory guide or guide of development.

Finding Maximum k-Cliques Faster Using Lazy Global Domination

A clique in a graph is a set of vertices, each of which is adjacent to every other vertex in this set. A k-clique relaxes this requirement, requiring vertices to be within a distance k of each other, rather than directly adjacent. In theory, a maximum clique algorithm can easily be adapted to solve the maximum k-clique problem, although large sparse k-clique graphs reduce to large dense clique graphs, which can be computationally challenging. We adapt a state of the art maximum clique algorithm to show that this reduction is in fact useful in practice, and introduce a lazy global domination rule which sometimes vastly reduces the search space. We include experimental results for a range of real-world and benchmark graphs, and a detailed look at random graphs. We also use thread-parallel search to solve some harder instances.

Global public health security and justice for vaccines and therapeutics in the COVID-19 pandemic.

A Lancet Commission for COVID-19 task force is shaping recommendations to achieve vaccine and therapeutics access, justice, and equity. This includes ensuring safety and effectiveness harmonized through robust systems of global pharmacovigilance and surveillance. Global production requires expanding support for development, manufacture, testing, and distribution of vaccines and therapeutics to low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Global intellectual property rules must not stand in the way of research, production, technology transfer, or equitable access to essential health tools, and in context of pandemics to achieve increased manufacturing without discouraging innovation. Global governance around product quality requires channelling widely distributed vaccines through WHO prequalification (PQ)/emergency use listing (EUL) mechanisms and greater use of national regulatory authorities. A World Health Assembly (WHA) resolution would facilitate improvements and consistency in quality control and assurances. Global health systems require implementing steps to strengthen national systems for controlling COVID-19 and for influenza vaccinations for adults including pregnant and lactating women. A collaborative research network should strive to establish open access databases for bioinformatic analyses, together with programs directed at human capacity utilization and strengthening. Combating anti-science recognizes the urgency for countermeasures to address a global-wide disinformation movement dominating the internet and infiltrating parliaments and local governments.

Racing Clean in a Tainted World: A Qualitative Exploration of the Experiences and Views of Clean British Elite Distance Runners on Doping and Anti-Doping.

Background: Doping has been a prominent issue for the sport of athletics in recent years. The endurance disciplines, which currently account for 56% of the global anti-doping rule violations in athletics, appear to be particularly high risk for doping.Objective: Using this high-risk, high-pressure context, the main purpose of this study was to investigate the human impact of doping and anti-doping on “clean” athletes. The secondary aim of the study was to better understand the reasons for, and barriers to, competing “clean” among this group of athletes.Method: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 11 elite distance runners from the UK to explore: (1) the reasons and motivations for competing clean. (2) Perceptions of the anti-doping system, and experiences of being part of that system. (3) Views on the prevalence and causes of doping and the impact of doping on the lives of clean athletes. The interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed verbatim, and analysed using Reflexive Thematic Analysis.Results: Four major themes were identified: (1) The participants in this study have not been tempted to use prohibited substances or methods; they compete in their sport for the personal satisfaction of seeing how good they can be, rather than in pursuit of winning at all costs. (2) Anti-doping does not currently prevent doping effectively and is not implemented evenly across the globe. (3) Doping was perceived as a major issue and was felt to be borne out of certain sporting cultures in which doping is enabled. (4) Doping has impacted the careers of clean athletes in irreversible ways and presents a continuing challenge to the psychological preparation for competition.Conclusions: Clean athletes suffer negative consequences from both doping and anti-doping. ADOs must collaborate across borders to ensure a more even implementation of anti-doping activities, to facilitate a more level playing field on the global stage. ADOs must also acknowledge the existence of a large group of athletes who would never consider deliberately doping and make anti-doping work for these athletes too.

The Gender Disparity in COVID-19 Case Severity

SARS-CoV-2 has made the world come to a halt, causing unprecedented global protocols and rules being implemented. Many different characteristics of this virus emerged early on. A notable characteristic that was noticed was the disparity in COVID-19 severity between the two biological genders, with males having a significantly higher fatality rate in comparison to females. As studies continue to understand this disparity, this literature review intends to summarize a few of these findings. Research on these studies were found on public research engines like ScienceDirect, Biology Medcentral, and PubMed. Papers were all peer reviewed. Another tool that was used was from the Global Health 50/50 research initiative which provided sex dis-aggregated data on COVID-19 in all countries that had accessible data. Studies have indicated that genetic factors, lifestyle factors, and “other” factors are all reasons for the disparity. T-Cell and ACE2 protein amount difference in males and females have been suggested as possible reasons for the discrepancy. Studies have also suggested that increased COVID-19 viral load also increases infection severity. This is relevant as male attitudes towards COVID-19 public health guidelines are more relaxed compared to females. Other possible factors that could play into this disparity is smoking, with active smokers having increased COVID-19 infection severity. This relates to the fact that the percent of male smokers is much higher than females. These lifestyle factors are further supported by the fact that males have higher fatality rates in respiratory tract diseases including SARS and influenza.

Global supply chains, trade agreements and rules of origin

AbstractFree Trade Agreements (FTAs) usually come with restrictions on the use of intermediate inputs in order for final goods to qualify for free trade. I focus on Rules of Origin (RoO), which limit expenses on nonmember country's intermediate inputs. In a three‐country FTA formation game, I introduce international trade in intermediate inputs and RoO restrictions. In the case of symmetric countries, I show that as countries become more involved in global supply chains, measured by their input shares in foreign final goods production, global free trade is less likely to be a stable equilibrium outcome. Free riding is the main problem preventing countries from liberalising trade. Countries are better off being nonmembers of FTAs between the other two countries relative to global free trade. Rules of Origin can solve this problem by limiting the benefits countries get from other countries' free trade agreements. In the case of asymmetric countries, an additional incentive exists for the smaller country not to join: such a country gives up more than it gains from joining an FTA for a sufficiently high degree of asymmetry in country sizes. I show that global free trade is a stable Nash equilibrium under a larger region of asymmetric country parameter space in the case of RoO than without it. Therefore, it is shown that RoO is essential in order to attain global free trade.