This report constitutes the first deliverable of the project ENGIME – Economic Growth and Innovation in Multicultural Environments, financed by the European Commission – FP5 – Key Action: Improving socio-economic knowledge base. Contract HPSE-CT2001-50007

This paper addresses the potential tension between two broadly stated policy objectives: the preservation of distinctive cultural traditions, often through the mechanism of formal legal rights, and the fostering of civic virtue, a sense of local community and the advancement of common civic...

For several years now, many cities across the world have undergone, for administrative and political reasons, mergers that have considerably reduced the number of municipalities on a given territory. This tendency affects various urban contexts, as evidenced by recent mergers in Toronto, Ottawa...

Internet resources, extended media coverage and international organizations’ reports recently witness the increasing interest of western banks in new models of finance, particularly Islamic finance and microfinance. This new trend is not only channeled through the frame of corporate social...