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Belgium has consistently produced world-class footballers, outperforming many larger football associations despite having a smaller talent pool and fewer resources. This paper aims to (1) examine the development pathways of Belgian professional players over the past decade and (2) quantify the role of opportunities in European leagues outside the “Big 5” for a comparative analysis of different player development systems. By exploring how Belgian players progress through various leagues and systems, this study seeks to identify strategic insights that can inform the development practices of both Belgian football and other European nations with similar constraints.

Data on player performance were collected over ten seasons (2013/14 to 2022/23) from 15 European leagues, including the “Big 5” (England, France, Germany, Italy and Spain) and ten other prominent leagues (Austria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Greece, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Scotland, Switzerland and Turkey). The variables collected included player name, nationality, team, league, season, appearances, minutes played, age and position. For Belgian players in the sample, the youth academies they attended were also noted.

Belgian players have achieved significant success, particularly in terms of transitioning into the “Big 5” leagues. However, the number of “home-grown” players making appearances and gaining minutes in the Belgian league is relatively low (ranking 13th of the 15 leagues studied). In contrast, Belgian players rank third in terms of total minutes played in the “Big 5” leagues, behind Portuguese and Dutch players. Anderlecht was the most successful Belgian club in developing professional players, and other key contributors were clubs with consistent Champions League participation.

While substantial research exists on player development in the “Big 5” European leagues, comparatively little attention has been given to other significant European leagues. This paper addresses that gap by examining the role of smaller leagues in developing young talent, despite their limited resources and reduced access to Europe's elite competitions. The findings highlight the need for policy reforms and strategic improvements at both the national and European levels to enhance player development pathways.

This paper proposes new methods of fault detection for fuel systems in order to improve system availability. Novel fault systems are required for environmentally friendly lean burn combustion, but can carry high risk failure modes particularly through their control valves. The purpose of the developed technology is the rapid detection of these failure modes, such as valve sticking or impending sticking, and therefore to reduce this risk. However, sensing valve state is challenging due to hot environmental temperatures, which results in a low reliability for conventional position sensing.

Starting with the business needs elicited from stakeholders, a quality functional deployment process is performed to derive sensing system requirements. The process acknowledges the difference between test-bed and in-service aerospace needs through weightings on requirements and maps these customer requirements to systems performance metrics. The design of the system must therefore optimise the sensor suite, on- and off-board signal processing and acquisition strategy.

Against this systems engineering process, two sensing strategies are outlined which illustrate the span of solutions, from conventional gas path sensing with advanced signal processing to novel non-invasive sensing concepts. While conventional sensing may be feasible within a test cell, the constraints of aerospace in-service operation may necessitate more novel alternatives. Acoustic emission (detecting very high frequency surface vibration waves) sensing technology is evaluated to provide a non-invasive, remote and high temperature tolerant solution. Through this comparison, the considerations for the end-to-end system design are highlighted to be critical to sensor deployment success in-service.

The paper provides insight into different means of addressing the important problem of monitoring faults in combustor systems in gas turbines. By casting of the complex design problem within a systems engineering framework, the outline of a toolset for solution evaluation is provided.

The paper provides three areas of significant contributions: a diversity of methods to diagnosing fuel system malfunctions by measuring changes fuel flow distributions, through novel means, and the combustor exit temperature profiles (cause and effect); the use of analytical methods to support the selection (types and quantities) and placement of sensors to ensure adequate state awareness while minimising their impact on the engine system cost and weight; and an end-to-end data processing approach to provide optimised information for the engine maintainers allowing informed decision-making.

Purpose – The purpose of this chapter is to advance understanding of regional industry or innovation clusters and the opportunities that the cluster framework provides policymakers for delivering economic impact, clarifying economic priorities, and coordinating disparate programmatic efforts, and to articulate some basic principles for formulating cluster strategies.

Methodology/approach – As the cluster concept enters its third decade and the body of related literature reaches a new level of maturity a consensus has emerged among academics and policy thinkers on the economic benefits of clusters. In fact, clusters have emerged as major focus of economic and policy discussion just now – in what the authors dub a “cluster moment” – by dint of their demonstrated practical impact, their value in paradigm discussions, and their potential utility in policy reform. The chapter reviews the benefits of clusters and traces their ascendance – and re-emergence post-recession – among policy thinkers.

Findings – New research confirms that strong clusters tend to deliver positive benefits to workers, firms, and regions. As a paradigm, they reflect the nature of the real economy and as a matter of policymaking, clusters provide a framework for rethinking and refocusing economic policy. In pursuing cluster-based economic development strategies, policy leaders should not try to create clusters; use data to target interventions, drive design, and track performance; focus initiatives on addressing discrete gaps in performance or binding constraints on cluster growth; maximize impact by leveraging pre-existing cluster-relevant programs; align efforts vertically as well as horizontally; and let the private sector lead. All three tiers of the nation's federalist system have distinct and complementary roles to play in advancing the cluster paradigm.

Research limitations/implications (if applicable) – The paper includes no new/original data.

Practical implications (if applicable) – Given that clusters have emerged as a major focus of economics and policy, this chapter lays out a core set of general principles for pursuing cluster-based economic development strategies – and for avoiding common pitfalls – to which policymakers can adhere.

Originality/value of paper – The chapter advances cluster thinking and cluster strategies as a paradigm with the potential to accelerate regional economic growth and assist with the nation's needed restructuring and rebalancing toward a more productive post-recession economy.

This paper attempts to explore the interrelationships between the split-share structure reform and privatization processes in light of the interplay between the listing announcements of the non-traditional shares of the Chinese firms within the steel industry and market reaction to these listed shares, as well as to analyze the value gained by the firms due to the privatization processes.

The paper examines market reaction to the listing announcements of non-traditional shares as traditional shares by employing event-study methodology. To determine the success of privatization process and value creation to the firm, the paper utilizes multivariate analysis.

The exogenous factors emphasized in a topographical order, explicitly profitability, efficiency, and leverage, are related to the privatization processes and split-share structure reform that impact the market. The study supports that market reacts positively to the listing announcements of non-traditional shares. Being listed improves value to the firm.

The limitation of this study is the lack of data on country, industry, and firm factors; and this study merely relates to one specific industry and one country.

The paper fills a gap in the literature by articulating the impact of privatization and split-share structure reform on both market reaction and firm value. It focuses on the impact of a dynamic process rather than the impact of a static constituent on market reaction and firm value, as the previous studies have been concentrating on. The research shows that there is an accelerated privatization process of state-owned firms in Chinese steel industry and their integration in capital markets.

Rhoden Partners has won a design award for the automated assembly machine for linear bearing cages which it designed and manufactured for Firsteel Metal Products. Anna Kochan reports.

IN a preface of Smiles' you will find the statement: “Without exaggerating the importance of this class of biography, it may at least be averred that it has not yet received its due share of attention.” The truth of this statement holds good to‐day. That our national industries lie at the root of national progress is recognized by library authorities, inasmuch as efforts are continually made to bring into prominence books on the useful and industrial arts, without, however, bringing under public notice biographies bearing very closely on the history and development of certain British trades and industries. There may be a feeling that this “class” falls under the head of “lives of very great inherent importance indeed, but which appeal to comparatively small circles of readers, from the large demand they make upon the possession of special culture or knowledge.” In point of fact, accounts of industrial processes (be they ever so clearly written) have little fascination for the general reader, but the lives of men who have created or developed those industries seldom lack incident and romance, and thereby appeal to the popular mind. On the ground of its democratic character, industrial biography deserves the librarian's attention —life‐records in most cases of men “ignorant of letters; without art; without eloquence; who yet had the wisdom to devise and the courage to perform that which they lacked language to express.”

Though contemporaries, Adam Smith and Sir James Steuart are commonly portrayed as if they belonged to different eras. Whereas Smith went down in history as both founder of the science of political economy and patron saint of economic liberalism, Steuart became known as the last, outdated advocate for mercantilist policies in Britain. Smith himself was responsible for popularizing the notion of the “system of commerce” as an approach to political economy that dominated the early modern period. As a historiographical concept, the mercantile system became a misguided international trade theory grounded upon the Midas fallacy and the favorable balance of trade doctrine. Smith’s treatment of international trade in the Wealth of Nations, however, was criticized for its inconsistencies and lack of analytical clarity even by some among his own followers. Given Smith’s doubtful credentials as an international trade theorist, the chapter investigates the reasons that led him and Steuart to be placed on opposite sides of the mercantilist divide. The authors analyze the works of both authors in depth, showing that their disagreements had chiefly to do with different views on money and monetary policy. Additionally, the authors explore how early nineteenth-century writers such as Jean-Baptiste Say and J. R. McCulloch helped forge the intellectual profiles of both Steuart and Smith.

The aim of this paper is to examine the changed nature of public accountability during a supreme emergency and explore how legal and auditing mechanisms have come to the fore, concluding that misappropriation of public monies is not an inevitable outcome.

The paper explores an illustrative example, the UK government's procurement of personal protective equipment during the early stages of the Covid-19 pandemic.

In circumstances of a supreme emergency where parliamentary scrutiny and competitive contract tendering are suspended, other forms of public accountability come to the fore, with civil society actors becoming more evident.

The paper relies on illustrative examples based on the Westminster model of government. The study advanced the notion of deferred accountability and identifies areas for further study, potentially in different jurisdictions.

The paper highlights the need for a variety of active and engaged civil society actors.

The paper contributes an empirical case to how an account of government behaviour is established. The paper also contributes to a deeper understanding of the nature and role of legal and government audit accountability mechanisms.