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The recent financial crisis caused by corruption and opacity has led us to examine how the informal economy and other factors affect tax revenues using a three-pillar theoretical analysis. Empirical research has not thoroughly explored the shadow economy's impact on direct and indirect taxes, tax revenues, and the central bank's independence from the shadow economy and tax collection. This paper used 2010–2018 data from 129 countries. The shadow economy and tax revenues had a substantial negative relationship. The shadow economy also changed the fiscal authorities' policy mix by reducing direct taxes and increasing indirect taxes. Finally, the central bank's independence mitigated the shadow economy's negative effects on tax revenues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• We propose a new estimator of the Democracy Effect that overcomes selection effects. • It weighs the behavior of each type of voter by its prevalence in the whole population. • We derive the distribution of this new weights-based estimator of the democracy effect. • Applications to two experiments find a significant effect in one but not the other. Dal Bó et al. (2010) show experimentally that the effect of a policy may be greater when it is democratically selected than when it is exogenously imposed. In this paper we propose a new and simpler estimation strategy that does not require information on the vote of subjects in the exogenous treatment. The new estimation strategy is based on calculating the average behavior under democracy by weighting the behavior of each type of voter by its prevalence in the whole population (and not conditional on the vote outcome). We derive the distribution of this new weights-based estimator of the democracy effect and show it eliminates selection effects under certain conditions. We apply the new estimation strategy to the data in Dal Bó et al. (2010) and to the data from a new experiment for which we cannot use the previous estimation strategy as we do not have information on how subjects would have voted in the exogenous treatment. We find a significant democracy effect in the former but not on the latter application. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a strategy for fostering digital citizenship at school that transcends the mere use of digital devices or instructional methods focused solely on their use. The core premise of this proposal rests on the need for an ethical-political debate concerning digitization in education. In addition, it emphasizes the need to cultivate a form of digital literacy that blends science and technology with the humanities, and erases the traditional boundaries between making and thinking. The proposed approach encapsulates two primary concerns: firstly, it asserts that digital literacy serves as a foundation for meaningful participation in digital societies; secondly, it underscores the importance of democratizing digital technologies by incorporating the perspectives, needs, and concerns of children. Drawing inspiration from the theories of pragmatism and responsible research and innovation (RRI), we present a conceptual framework for digital citizenship. To operationalize this approach, we adapt John Dewey's pragmatic model of inquiry as a method that can be applied within the school setting. This pragmatic methodology serves as a conduit for developing hands-on experience geared towards developing digital citizenship. The practical implementation of this methodology is illustrated through an actualized experience with 10- and 11-year-old children in a public primary school, regarding the issue of care robots. This paper advocates for a symbiotic relationship between theoretical understanding and practical application, and puts forward a concrete proposal for the integration of digital citizenship in schools in the form of a four-phase procedural model, based on the creation of what we term 'the encounter' between the educational community and the research and development community. • Democratization of technologies requires citizens' conditions of possibility. • "Digital citizenship" integrates the objectives of RRI and pragmatism. • The "encounter" implies a shared responsibility of education and technoscience. • Digital citizenship represents an alternative to neoliberal dynamics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Area-based initiatives (ABIs) set out to improve livability and living conditions in disadvantaged urban neighborhoods by making use of extensive citizen participation. ABIs are often criticized for constituting a form of undemocratic tokenism; this creates the illusion that residents have a say over urban development because citizens are only given consultative power. This paper takes a different perspective. We follow the 'systemic turn' in democratic theory, which addresses how direct citizen participation can reduce problems of inclusion, communication, and collective action created by defects in representative democracy. We find evidence that our case, the Grønland-Tøyen ABI in Oslo, Norway, at its best, is able to include new, previously marginalized groups in formulating a collective will that eventually impact city government policy. We argue that these cases show the potential of ABIs to enhance government effectiveness, as the participatory process creates preferable solutions to those produced by city experts. We also argue that it is the narrow scope of the participation schemes, rather than the lack of power devolved to citizens, that limits the ABIs contribution to urban democracy. This hinders the ABI's ability to address social justice and puts the legitimacy of the participatory arrangements at risk. • The paper argues ABIs have the potential to enhance urban democracy by including marginalized groups in decision-making. • The Grønland-Tøyen ABI in Oslo includes marginalized perspectives in policy formulation through targeted recruitment. • The narrow scope of participation schemes limits ABIs' ability to address social justice issues. • The paper argues that this narrow scope, rather than limited citizen power, hinder ABIs contribution to democracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When do electoral incentives encourage candidates to target immigrants with discriminatory rhetoric? I address this question through a novel dataset of refugee-related tweets by elites in Lebanon, the country hosting the most Syrian refugees per capita globally. I find that Lebanon's 2018 election, the first under a new set of electoral rules, precipitated an increase in anti-migrant tweets. However, the electoral campaign did not affect candidates' rhetoric uniformly, but rather fueled xenophobic discourses specifically among Christian candidates, whose voter base is particularly hostile towards refugees, and especially among Christians facing the fiercest electoral competition. This paper makes three contributions: theoretically, it elucidates the consequences of partisan competition for xenophobia; conceptually, it relaxes an assumption common in the ethnic institutions literature that ethnic composition is fixed over time; and empirically, it demonstrates how social media data can be harnessed for expanding a nascent literature on migration politics in the Global South. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Voting is essential to assure democracy. The voting process is supported by mission-critical systems that have among others functional, cybersecurity, and data privacy requirements. Comprehensive approaches are required to identify the requirements and technologies needed to design the solution. STPA is a method for identifying system safety requirements that have been extended to identify cybersecurity requirements. LINDDUN is a privacy threat modeling methodology that supports analysts in privacy-eliciting and mitigating threats in software architectures. Blockchain is a technology that uses a peer-to-peer computer network as a public distributed ledger. We propose an approach that uses STPA and its extensions to identify the cybersecurity and data privacy requirements, and incorporates the blockchain technology to design the solution for the mission-critical e-voting system. We built a proof of concept of the solution and performed cybersecurity and data privacy tests. The tests showed that the solution meets the critical cybersecurity and data privacy requirements. The major contributions of this paper include an approach that employs cybersecurity and data privacy threat modeling techniques to enhance the STPA analysis of a system, and the design of a Blockchain-based, verifiable e-voting system. • Secure voting upholds democracy via mission-critical systems. • STPA, enhanced by STRIDE, identifies cybersecurity needs. • LINDDUN aids privacy threat analysis in a software architecture. • Our approach designs a secure, privacy-focused voting system. • Blockchain technology underpins our system for enhanced cybersecurity. • We built a prototype to test cybersecurity and privacy. • Test showed that our solution meets crucial security and privacy needs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Employing various panel data analyses including threshold panel model, this paper has examined how economic status determines the relationship among democracy, macroeconomic variables and happiness. Considering panel data of 83 countries over the time period from 2010 to 2016, this study tries to establish that, factors determining subjective well-being (SWB) or life satisfaction has different effects differently for low and high income countries. This study has found that though per capita GDP has no direct impact on happiness, it establishes the role of other variables in determining happiness. It has been found that countries with higher level of income democratic quality and inflation have significant impact on happiness. The impact of democratic quality is positive whereas the impact is negative in case of inflation. Moreover, inequality and health expenditure per capita by the government respectively have negative and positive impact in case of low income countries. It is also evident that unemployment has a strict negative impact across all type of countries but the magnitude is higher in low income countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]