http://hdl.handle.net/10468/3 2013-05-24T04:53:42Z 2013-05-24T04:53:42Z Donnelly, Mary White, Fidelma http://hdl.handle.net/10468/1126 2013-05-14T02:00:15Z 2013-04-01T00:00:00Z

Report on Irish consumers' awareness and knowledge of legal rights Donnelly, Mary; White, Fidelma This Report presents the results of an empirical study conducted by staff at the Faculty of Law, University College Cork (the UCC study ) in relation to consumers self-perception and their actual knowledge of the law. It builds upon earlier studies concerning Irish consumers by the National Consumer Agency and on the Special Eurobarometer Report (No. 342, 2011) on consumer empowerment. The UCC study assesses actual knowledge and focuses largely on consumer rights which derive from domestic law and it investigates how well informed and knowledgeable Irish consumers are in respect of these rights.

2013-04-01T00:00:00Z Doran, Justin Jordan, Declan http://hdl.handle.net/10468/774 2012-11-15T03:00:09Z 2013-01-01T00:00:00Z

Decomposing European NUTS2 regional inequality from 1980 to 2009: national and European policy implications Doran, Justin; Jordan, Declan Purpose - This paper analyses income inequality for a sample of fourteen European countries and their composite regions using data from the Cambridge Econometrics regional dataset from 1980 to 2009. The purpose of the paper is to provide insight into the dynamics of regional and national cohesion among the EU-14 countries studied. Design/methodology/approach - Initially, inequality is decomposed using the Theil coefficient into between and within country inequality to assess the extent to which convergence has occurred. To investigate the underlying causes of the changes in inequality, the Theil coefficient is further decomposed to assess the contribution of productivity and employment-population ratio differentials to inequality. Findings - The results indicate that while between-country inequality has declined, within-country inequality has increased by approximately 50 percent. Subsequent decomposition indicates that while productivity levels among regions have converged, the employment-population ratios have diverged substantially driving increasing levels of inequality. This suggests that while EU cohesion policies have reduced productivity inequalities they have had little effect in stimulating convergence of employment-population ratios across regions.Research limitations/implications - The paper argues that national priorities, particularly in the context of the current European economic crisis, are likely to hinder European Union level policies to reduce income inequality at a regional level. This may result in further increases in regional inequality among European regions. Originality/value - This paper's main contribution is to highlight how national convergence can lead to regional divergence being overlooked. The value of the paper is that it provides policy insights, based on empirical evidence, for European cohesion policy.

2013-01-01T00:00:00Z Ring, Sinead Mary http://hdl.handle.net/10468/1135 2013-05-23T02:00:13Z 2013-01-01T00:00:00Z

Principles and prejudice: The erosion of fairness in admissibility determinations relating to historic child sexual abuse trials in Ireland Ring, Sinead Mary This thesis interrogates the construction of fairness to the accused in historic child sexual abuse trials in Ireland. The protection of fairness is a requirement of any trial that claims to adhere to the rule of law. Historic child sexual abuse trials, in which the charges relate to events that are alleged to have taken place decades previously, present serious challenges to the ability of the trial process to safeguard fairness. They are a litmus test of the courts’ commitment to fairness. The thesis finds that in historic abuse trials fairness to the accused has been significantly eroded and that therefore the Irish Courts have failed to respect the core of the rule of law in these most serious of prosecutions. The thesis scrutinises two bodies of case law, both of which deal with the issue of whether evidence should reach the jury. First, it examines the decisions on applications brought by defendants seeking to prohibit their trial. The courts hearing prohibition applications face a dilemma: how to ensure the defendant is not put at risk of an unfair trial, while at the same time recognising that delay in reporting is a defining feature of these cases. The thesis traces the development of the prohibition case law and tracks the shifting interpretations given to fairness by the courts. Second, the thesis examines what fairness means in the superior courts’ decisions regarding the admissibility of the following kinds of evidence, each of which presents particular challenges to the ability of the trial to safeguard fairness: evidence of multiple complainants; evidence of recovered memories and evidence of complainants’ therapeutic records. The thesis finds that in both bodies of case law the Irish courts have hollowed out the meaning of fairness. It makes proposals on how fairness might be placed at the heart of courts’ decisions on admissibility in historic abuse trials. The thesis concludes that the erosion of fairness in historic abuse trials is indicative of a move away from the liberal model of criminal justice. It cautions that unless fairness is prioritised in historic child sexual abuse trials the legitimacy of these trials and that of all Irish criminal trials will be contestable.

2013-01-01T00:00:00Z Helbing, Dirk Bishop, Steven Conte, Rosaria Lukowicz, Paul McCarthy, James B. http://hdl.handle.net/10468/1121 2013-05-14T02:00:17Z 2012-11-01T00:00:00Z

FuturICT: Participatory computing to understand and manage our complex world in a more sustainable and resilient way Helbing, Dirk; Bishop, Steven; Conte, Rosaria; Lukowicz, Paul; McCarthy, James B. We have built particle accelerators to understand the forces that make up our physical world. Yet, we do not understand the principles underlying our strongly connected, techno-socio-economic systems. We have enabled ubiquitous Internet connectivity and instant, global information access. Yet we do not understand how it impacts our behavior and the evolution of society. To fill the knowledge gaps and keep up with the fast pace at which our world is changing, a Knowledge Accelerator must urgently be created. The financial crisis, international wars, global terror, the spreading of diseases and cyber-crime as well as demographic, technological and environmental change demonstrate that humanity is facing serious challenges. These problems cannot be solved within the traditional paradigms.Moving our attention from a component-oriented view of the world to an interaction-oriented view will allow us to understand the complex systems we have created and the emergent collective phenomena characterising them. This paradigm shift will enable new solutions to long-standing problems, very much as the shift from a geocentric to a heliocentric worldview has facilitated modern physics and the ability to launch satellites.The FuturICT flagship project will develop new science and technology to manage our future in a complex, strongly connected world. For this, it will combine the power of information and communication technology (ICT) with knowledge from the social and complexity sciences.ICT will provide the data to boost the social sciences into a new era. Complexity science will shed new light on the emergent phenomena in socially interactive systems, and the social sciences will provide a better understanding of the opportunities and risks of strongly networked systems, in particular future ICT systems. Hence, the envisaged FuturICT flagship will create new methods and instruments to tackle the challenges of the 21st century.FuturICT could indeed become one of the most important scientific endeavours ever, by revealing the principles that make socially interactive systems work well, by inspiring the creation of new platforms to explore our possible futures, and by initiating an era of social and socio-inspired innovations.

2012-11-01T00:00:00Z