Is happiness good for your health? This common notion is tested in a synthetic analysis of 30 follow-up studies on happiness and longevity. It appears that happiness does not predict longevity in sick populations, but that it does predict longevity among healthy populations So, happiness does not cure illness but it does protect against becoming ill. The effect of happiness on longevity in heal...

The paper suggests a framework for analyzing democracies’ policies towards renegade states, i.e. states whose defining feature is regarded to be norm-breaking (e.g. Iran or North Korea). The paper argues that policies towards renegade states are heavily influenced by domestic cultures of control because the problem of recurrent violations of community norms as posed by renegade states to the in...

The onslaught on the World's wildlife continues despite numerous initiatives aimed at curbing it. We build a model that integrates rhino horn trade with rhino population dynamics in order to evaluate the impact of various management policies on rhino sustainability. In our model, an agent-based sub-model of horn trade from the poaching event up through a purchase of rhino horn in Asia impacts r...

In this paper we develop an economic growth model that includes anthropogenic climate change. We include a publicly funded research sector that creates new technologies and simultaneously expands the productivities of existing technologies. The environment is affected by R&D activities both negatively, through the increase of output from productivity growth, as well as positively as new technol...

OBJECTIVES We investigate the association between an extensive set of location-specific factors and the propensity of retirement-age individuals to remain in, or relocate to, those locations. In particular we investigate whether state and local fiscal factors influence the migration decisions of retirees, and we study the relative importance of fiscal and other factors in these decisions. MET...

A wide range of United States political policies influence the level of innovative entrepreneurial activity in the country, that is the number of new businesses started each year that bring truly new products and ideas to the market. These policies begin with an educational system that fosters a creative, inventive, and educated population with the skills to start new businesses. Immigration po...

Protecting systematically selected areas of land is a major step towards biodiversity conservation worldwide. Indeed, the identification and designation of protected areas more often than not forms a core component of both national and international conservation policies. In this paper we provide an overview of those Special Protection Areas and Ramsar Sites that have been classified in Great B...

BACKGROUND Policy decisions made within all sectors have the potential to influence population health and equity. Recognition of this provides impetus for the health sector to engage with other sectors to facilitate the development of policies that recognise, and aim to improve, population outcomes. This paper compares the approaches implemented to facilitate such engagement in two Australian j...

The recent world recession-some might even call it has been sweeping through developing countries since T a depression-is testing the vitality of urban poliWorld War 1I will be sustained through the end of this cies in developing countries. One is reminded of Dickcentury. Second, there are significant quantitative difens's Tale of Two Cities: "It was the best of times, it was ferences between c...

This paper takes as its starting point the assumption that the 'Epidemiological Imagination' has a central role to play in the future development of policies and practice to improve population health and reduce health inequalities within and between states but suggests that by neglecting the contribution that qualitative research can make epidemiology is failing to deliver this potential. The p...