Perikles is usually seen as a great statesman and clever leader of the Athenians. In the mid fifth century BC, he seems however to have been in serious political trouble and may well have been in danger of losing the struggle for power and of being ostracised. The fact that his incentives...

Good health is crucial for human and economic development. In particular poor health in childhood seems to be of utmost concern since it causes irreversible damage and have implications later in life. Recent research suggests globalization is a strong force affecting adult and child health...

A critical appraisal is made of an article in this journal by Dabelko and McCormick. In the article, the authors try to estimate the opportunity cost of defence. With simple tools from economic analysis it is shown that their methodological approach reveals a fundamental misunderstanding of this...

Using data covering 38 countries across the 1965–2005 period, this paper shows that former British colonies tend to exhibit higher levels of carbon dioxide emission than other countries.

In the classical period, it was a duty and an honour for rich Athenians to perform liturgies - to provide services for the common good. Using a rational-actor perspective, it is shown that the origin of this practice may go back to 594 B.C., when Solomon introduced a property qualification for...

The TECH research network collected patient-level data on three procedures for treatment of heart attack patients, (catheterization, coronary artery by-pass grafts and percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty), for seventeen countries over an eighteen year period to examine the impact of...

From a beginning of small isolated settlements, the city-state (polis) emerged in Greece in the course of four centuries as a political, geographical and judicial unit, with an assembly, council, magistrates and written laws. Using a rational-actor perspective, it is shown how this process was...