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Context and Relevance Censorship conjures images of despotic governments strangulating the expression of political convictions. Censorship is the violation of a basic human right. But censorship appears in many forms, and the most effective approach may not be the most imposing. Hence, I look at censorship as a general case in which the flow of information is regulated in the interest of the censor. By “optimal” censoring, I understand a policy that suits the interests of the censor best in the long run.

In some political and economic situations, it may be desirable to have a company that operates with a legal structure that is midway between the two extreme poles of the private sector (i.e. privatisation) and the public sector (i.e. nationalisation). In such situations none of the existing legal forms for private or public enterprises creates the institutional conditions necessary for a profitable, collectively owned enterprise. A possible solution to this problem is the participatory legal form of a group of affiliated public service organisations.

Taking a case study on the crisis-beset Berlin Brandenburg Airport Company (BER) as an example, the author examines how the proposed alternative legal form for collective enterprises could have improved the legal and institutional framework of the airport company.

The problems that arose with Berlin Brandenburg airport had multiple causes. Had the airport company adopted the legal form of a group of affiliated public service enterprises, it might have been better able to deal with many of its problems because the organisational structure would have been more suitable. The case study demonstrates that the improved governance framework offered by a group of affiliated public service enterprises could have reduced the likelihood of the large scale, spectacular failure of the project that occurred.

A company that operates as collectively owned property is midway between the two extreme poles of private property and state property. In political and economic situations where such a solution is sought the question arises as to which legal or corporate form will provide the best conditions for successful management. The current lack of suitable available legal forms may be a factor in preventing the number of companies in collective ownership from increasing. The article points towards this gap and introduces the legal form of a group of affiliated public service enterprises, i.e. a collectively owned state consortium of social community interest enterprises.

The present paper aims mainly to target policy makers in the tourism industry. It seeks to give an overview about using the Portfolio Analysis (PFA) as a tool for analysing tourism flows based on the official accommodation statistics of Statistics Austria, which is electronically available for a 35‐year time series, for more than 1,600 communes, for 15 kinds of accommodation establishments and for more than 60 markets.

Large quantitative data sets deliver a holistic picture of tourism developments by taking several describing variables into account. Multivariate scatter plots using static and dynamic indicators are used as graphical illustration of these data sets.

Based on this comprehensive data set it turns out that the use of portfolio matrices is a useful tool for doing detailed and multidimensional analysis of the available data. Portfolio matrices may be focused on specific questions regarding the status quo of a region or the development of selected markets. In contrast to traditional methods of constituting and publishing tourism statistical data PFA fills potential information gaps by focusing on different variables considering a respective period of time. The paper presents example results for Austria, by using tourism flow, positioning and benchmark analysis.

The results concern data of the official statistics on overnights and arrivals. However, the approach might be used for similar work concentrating on alternative data sets.

The main user's value is receiving information obtained by integrated statistical data. This information is graphically illustrated and therefore easy to interpret, although it is based on highly integrated data of high quality and internal consistency. Depending on the field of interest various combinations of data presentations are feasible.

The paper contributes to the general problem of bringing theoretical models closer to decision maker's needs. It fills potential information gaps of what official statistics are capable of delivering and what is indeed requested by decision makers.

The purpose of this paper is to shed light to the concept of solar electricity transfer from North Africa to Europe in the frame of Article 9 of the European Renewable Energy Sources (EU-RES) Directive 28/2009/EC, to explain why efforts have not been successful up to now and to provide recommendations on how to proceed.

The authors have compared the “Supergrid” concept that was pursued by some institutions in the past years with the original “TRANS-CSP” concept developed by the German Aerospace Centre in 2006. From this analysis, the authors could identify not only major barriers but also possible ways towards successful implementation.

The authors found that in contrast to the Supergrid approach, the original concept of exporting dispatchable solar power from concentrating solar thermal power stations with thermal energy storage (CSP-TES) via point-to-point high voltage direct current (HVDC) transmission directly to European centres of demand could be a resilient business case for Europe–North Africa cooperation, as it provides added value in both regions.

The analysis has been made in the frame of the BETTER project commissioned by the Executive Agency for Competitiveness & Innovation in the frame of the program Intelligent Energy Europe.

One of the major implications found is that due to the time lost in the past years by following a distracted concept, the option of flexible solar power imports from North Africa to Europe is not any more feasible to become part of the 2020 supply scheme.

To make them a viable option for post-2020 renewable energy systems for electricity development in Europe, a key recommendation of the project is to elaborate a detailed feasibility study about concrete CSP-HVDC links urgently.

The analysis presented here is the first to give concrete recommendations for the implementation of such infrastructure.