Francesco Costamagna

Bio: Francesco Costamagna is an academic researcher from University of Turin. The author has contributed to research in topics: European union & Welfare state. The author has an hindex of 6, co-authored 20 publications receiving 96 citations.

Unsupervised and supervised text similarity systems for automated identification of national implementing measures of European directives

Abstract: The automated identification of national implementations (NIMs) of European directives by text similarity techniques has shown promising preliminary results. Previous works have proposed and utilized unsupervised lexical and semantic similarity techniques based on vector space models, latent semantic analysis and topic models. However, these techniques were evaluated on a small multilingual corpus of directives and NIMs. In this paper, we utilize word and paragraph embedding models learned by shallow neural networks from a multilingual legal corpus of European directives and national legislation (from Ireland, Luxembourg and Italy) to develop unsupervised semantic similarity systems to identify transpositions. We evaluate these models and compare their results with the previous unsupervised methods on a multilingual test corpus of 43 Directives and their corresponding NIMs. We also develop supervised machine learning models to identify transpositions and compare their performance with different feature sets.

The European Semester in Action: Strengthening Economic Policy Coordination While Weakening the Social Dimension?

Abstract: The paper examines the impact of the European Semester on the European social dimension. The new coordination mechanism aims to strengthen economic policy coordination in order to fill the original EMU constitutional gap deriving from the choice to create a common currency without having an economic union in place. Its structure, which combines soft law and hard law procedures, allows EU institutions to exercise policy formulation, supervision and guidance on issues touching upon virtually the entire spectrum of Member States’ economic and social policies. The analysis shows that in its early cycles the Semester tended to prioritize economic objectives, such as budgetary discipline, over competing social ones. Indeed, social security systems have been mainly taken into consideration because of their impact on public finances. However, there are signs of a progressive reorientation of the strategy adopted at supranational level. Indeed, the recommendations adopted in the 2013 cycle of the European Semester pay greater attention to social objectives, while the Commission has recently taken some initiatives that should contribute to find a better balance between the ‘economic’ and the ‘social’ within the EMU.

National social spaces as adjustment variables in the EMU: A critical legal appraisal

Abstract: The article critically engages with the reconfiguration of the role and status of national social spaces within the EU constitutional fabric after the reform of European economic governance. Its main contention is that these reforms have converted national social spaces into adjustment variables whose main function is to contribute to the pursuit of EMU‐related objectives. This transformation alters the balance between the economic and the social dimension in the EU legal order, deforming one of the defining traits of its constitutional identity.

Saving Europe ‘Under Strict Conditionality’: A Threat for EU Social Dimension?

Abstract: This paper looks at the compatibility of EU anti-crisis measures with some key elements of the EU legal system. In particular, it focuses on the financial assistance programmes devised to rescue some EU Member States that, due to their unsustainably high public debts, came under severe pressure from the financial markets. In all these cases, recipient States have been invariably required to adopt draconian austerity measures in order to have access to the financial help. This paper argues that some of the conditions attached to the assistance packages raise doubts as to their compatibility with a number of basic social principles and objectives that represent the foundations of the EU social dimension. This is the case with regard to the social objectives enshrined in the Treaties, the allocation of competences between the EU and Member States in the social field and, lastly, some of the social rights contained in the Charter of Fundamental Rights.

Regulating Public Services and International Investment Law

Abstract: International investment law is increasingly becoming an important reference field of international economic law. The chapter examines if, and the extent to which, investment arbitral tribunals sought to meet the need to respect host State’s capacity to regulate in the public interest. Preliminarily, the chapter deals with the notion of regulation in the public service sector, by exploring its categorization as a right and as a duty of States. Subsequently, it assesses whether the regulation of public services is a matter falling within international investment law’s scope of application and whether all regulatory measures used to govern public services’ provision may fall under international arbitral tribunals’ scrutiny. It then analyses the controversial distinction between lawful regulation and regulatory expropriation under international investment law. To this purpose, the chapter takes into consideration the different approaches adopted by arbitral tribunals, in order to evaluate their capacity to meaningfully contribute to find a balance between investors’ and States’ competing interests with regard to public services. Lastly, the analysis turns to the increasingly important role played by the fair and equitable treatment standard in arbitral practice, also with regard to public services’ cases. In particular, this part of the chapter looks at the difficulties in finding an equilibrium between stability and regulatory change in the public services’ sector, by examining the impact of the legitimate expectations doctrine upon host States’ regulatory autonomy.

Socializing the European Semester? Economic Governance and Social Policy Coordination in Europe 2020

Abstract: This paper analyzes how EU social objectives and policy coordination have been integrated into the Europe 2020 Strategy and the Union’s emerging post-crisis architecture of economic governance. Based on published and unpublished documents as well as interviews with high-level policy makers, the paper argues that since 2011, there has been a progressive ‘socialization’ of the ‘European Semester’ of policy coordination, in terms of an increasing emphasis on social objectives and targets in the EU’s priorities and country-specific recommendations; an intensification of social monitoring, multilateral surveillance, and peer review; and an enhanced role for social and employment actors, especially the Employment and Social Protection Committees. The paper interprets these developments not only as a response by the Commission and other EU institutions to rising social and political discontent among European citizens with the consequences of post-crisis austerity policies, but also as a product of reflexive learning and creative adaptation by social and employment actors to the new institutional conditions of the European Semester: another form of ‘socialization’.

The Process of International Legal Reproduction: Inequality, Historiography, Resistance

Abstract: That all states are free and equal under international law is axiomatic to the discipline. Yet even a brief look at the dynamics of the international order calls that axiom into question. Mobilising fresh archival research and drawing on a tradition of unorthodox Marxist and anti-colonial scholarship, Rose Parfitt develops a new 'modular' legal historiography to make sense of the paradoxical relationship between sovereign equality and inequality. Juxtaposing a series of seemingly unrelated histories against one another, including a radical re-examination of the canonical story of Fascist Italy's invasion of Ethiopia, Parfitt exposes the conditional nature of the process through which international law creates and disciplines new states and their subjects. The result is a powerful critique of international law's role in establishing and perpetuating inequalities of wealth, power and pleasure, accompanied by a call to attend more closely to the strategies of resistance that are generated in that process.

Does the review deserve more helpfulness when its title resembles the content? Locating helpful reviews by text mining

Abstract: Online review helpfulness has always sparked a heated discussion among academics and practitioners. Despite the fact that research has extensively examined the impacts of review title and content on perceptions of online review helpfulness, the underlying mechanism of how the similarities between a review' title and content may affect review helpfulness has been rarely explored. Based on mere exposure theory, a research model reflecting the influences of title-content similarity and sentiment consistency on review helpfulness was developed and empirically examined by using data collected from 127,547 product reviews on Amazon.com. The TF-IDF and the cosine of similarity were used for measuring the text similarity between review title and review content, and the Tobit model was used for regression analysis. The results showed that the title-content similarity positively affected review helpfulness. In addition, the positive effect of title-content similarity on review helpfulness is increased when the title-content sentiment consistency is high. The title sentiment also negatively moderates the impact of the title-content similarity on review helpfulness. The present research can help online retailers identify the most helpful reviews and, thus, reduce consumers' search costs as well as assist reviewers in contributing more valuable online reviews.

Actas del XIX Congreso del Instituto Internacional de Historia del Derecho Indiano: Berlin 2016. Vol. 1

Abstract: En este volumen se han incluido 74 comunicaciones presentadas en el Congreso. Tal como establecen las normas del Instituto Internacional de Historia del Derecho Indiano, se han publicado todos los trabajos presentados en el Congreso. El Congreso se celebro en la ciudad de Berlin (Alemania) del lunes 29 de agosto al viernes 2 de septiembre de 2016