Enrico Bertacchini

Embracing Diversity, Correcting Inequalities: Towards a New Global Governance for the UNESCO World Heritage

This paper addresses imbalances affecting world heritage sites in terms of how well conserved they are and what resources are available for their valorisation. The authors propose a policy mechanism of global governance divided into three steps. The first is a tax mechanism based on collecting resources from tourist activities and redistributing these resources at a regional level. The second step is meant to ensure an objective approach to measuring the needs and risk value of world heritage sites. The third step consists in using valorisation strategies to generate new economic resources, in particular from cultural tourism. The authors proposal is a contribution to the growing literature on UNESCO world heritage sites which helps ground the approach to decision making adopted to raise funds for conservation.

Shifting the balance of power in the UNESCO World Heritage Committee: an empirical assessment

This article analyzes whether emerging nations are extending their influence across the UNESCO World Heritage Committee and, if so, how this affects decision-making processes concerning the inscription of sites on the World Heritage List. We use both quantitative and qualitative approaches to identify patterns in decision-making processes regarding inscriptions at the World Heritage Committee sessions. Our results suggest that in the last decade, a group of emerging powers including China, South Africa, Russia, and India has dominated the UNESCO World Heritage decision-making process. At the same time, our results suggest an increasing ‘politicization’ of decisions emerging from the polarization of positions concerning the role and legitimacy of Advisory Bodies’ technical recommendations. Our finding contributes to discussions of the role and contribution of the BRICS countries in challenging the existing structures of multilateral governance by presenting the example of World Heritage, UNESCO’s self-proclaimed flagship program.

Cultural Commons: A New Perspective on the Production and Evolution of Cultures

This compelling book offers a fresh and novel approach to study cultural and artistic expression from the perspective of ‘the commons’. It demonstrates how identifying cultures as shared resources is useful in eliciting the main factors and social dilemmas affecting the production and evolution of cultural expression.

Never Two Without Three: Commons, Anticommons and Semicommons

A semicommons regime exists when the efficient use of a resource requires the co-existence of both common and private uses. In a seminal article, Henry Smith examined the system of semicommons property in regard to medieval open fields. In such a system, peasants shared common land for collective grazing, but used privately owned scattered strips for grain growing. This paper provides the first formal model of semicommons property regimes. Our model demonstrates (1) how the costs of strategic behavior in semicommons regimes may outweigh those in commons regimes and (2) how semicommons regimes may solve collective action problems by introducing anticommons arrangements. We extend previous property literature by offering new insights as to conditions in which mixed property regimes emerge and fragmentation solutions are favored.

Defining Cultural Commons

This compelling book offers a fresh and novel approach to study cultural and artistic expression from the perspective of ‘the commons’. It demonstrates how identifying cultures as shared resources is useful in eliciting the main factors and social dilemmas affecting the production and evolution of cultural expression.

Loving Cultural Heritage. Private Individual Giving and Prosocial Behavior

The aim of this paper is to analyse patterns of private individual giving to Cultural Heritage institutions in Italy. Based on the emerging economic literature on pro-social behavior, we carried out a Contingent Valuation survey to assess individuals’ willingness to donate to museums and heritage organizations according to different conditions and set of incentives. Our findings reveal that intrinsic motivations and accountability of the recipient institutions may be more effective drivers for eliciting charitable giving than the usually proposed fiscal incentives. The results provide avenues for future empirical research and policy suggestions for fund raising cultural institutions.

What If Hayek Goes Shopping in the Bazaar

The paper presents a comparative analysis of the peculiar institutional features of two retail markets: the middle eastern Bazaar and the western Mall (shopping center). We study the informational functions and performance of the different market institutions using an Agent Based Computational Economics (ACE) model under the assumption of behavioral learning by agents. Sellers decide which price setting strategy to adopt whereas buyers form their price beliefs exploring the market and decide which price to accept. The agents learn how to adapt and behave within the specific institutional framework to carry out their economic transactions, but market institutions, as mechanisms to coordinate information of market participants are expected to affect the price dynamics. The main area of interest concerns the question of whether the economic argument on the presumed underperformance of bazaar institutions respect to more competitive markets holds true or it is necessary a reassessment on it.

Innovazione e comunità creative nell'industrial design: una prospettiva storica

Il presente articolo analizza l’evoluzione dell’innovazione nell’industrial design attraverso un dataset che raccoglie i più importanti prodotti del XX secolo. In particolare, si esplorano tre principali questioni che hanno ricevuto finora una relativamente scarsa attenzione nella ricerca sull’innovazione nelle industrie creative. In primo luogo, se e in che forma l’innovazione in questo ambito sia caratterizzata da una natura culturale idiosincratica e la contraddistingue rispetto alle forme più tradizionali di innovazione. In secondo luogo, come la capacità creativa dei singoli talenti influenzi la performance innovativa collettiva delle comunità del design. Infine, quale sia il ruolo delle collaborazioni tra imprese e talenti creativi nella genesi delle innovazioni. Using a unique dataset of the most important products of the XXth century, the articles aims at analyzing the evolution of innovation in industrial design. In particular, we explore three main issues which have been rarely explored in the literature about innovation in creative industries. Firstly, we analyze whether and to what extent innovation in creative sectors is characterized by an idiosyncratic cultural component, which makes it different from traditional forms of innovation. Secondly, we explore how the creative capacity of individual talents influences the collective innovative performance of design communities. Finally, we add insights into the role of collaborations between firms and designers in generating innovation in this creative industry.

Virtual Worlds, Online Gaming Communities and Cultural Commons

This compelling book offers a fresh and novel approach to study cultural and artistic expression from the perspective of ‘the commons’. It demonstrates how identifying cultures as shared resources is useful in eliciting the main factors and social dilemmas affecting the production and evolution of cultural expression.