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The dispute between social classes for fractions of income was a central
theme for economic analysis at least since David Ricardo and Karl Marx. Its
importance as an interpretative key declined with the marginalist revolution
of the late nineteenth century and did not regain its central role in the
conventional economic approach ever since. However, its relevance was
maintained among heterodox economists such as Michal Kalecki and
reinvigorated by post-Keynesian thinking. This paper seeks to offer three
analytical contributions to the post- Keynesian literature: (1) it presents
an integrated framework on the relationship between distributive conflict,
inflation and economic growth in an open economy with government; (2) it
proposes the use of a general framework, based on liquid preference, assets
own interest rates, currency hierarchy and productivity differentials to
understand the determinants of the spot exchange rate; and (3) it suggests a
distinct monetary rule to take into account the role of interest rates on
distributive conflict inflation and demand and growth regimes.

Governance, the world over, has become the main framework for assessing the effective utilization of human and material resources for the development of a nation or an organization. This paper explores the link between governance failure, violence and its implication for internal security in Rivers State. The level of violence in the state is high and increasing particularly since 1999 when the nation returned to civil rule. Violence such as inter and intra communal conflicts, cult violence, armed robbery, kidnapping, political violence among others, now writ large in the state. The study utilized the qualitative and content analysis. The paper reveals that the pervasive nature of violence with negative effect on the internal security is the fall out of the failure of the governance in the state. The paper recommends, among other things that, good governance is a tool for empowering the people, which in turn, will reduce unemployment, poverty, marginalization and the recourse to violent aggression in the state.

The analysis focuses on the influence of illegal economies on local order and questions the conventional rationale of instability and violence through illegal activities. In an in depth-case study the analysis provides evidence that illicit economies can contribute to the development of local order rather than destroying it. The VRAEM is the current epicenter of drug production in Peru and therefore a well-fitting case for the analysis. The paper builds on qualitative data from participant observation, interviews and theory-based questionnaires collected in 2016 and 2017. The paper focuses on current center for drug production and on the social consequences, deepens our understanding of the influence of illegal economies on the local order. Understanding this influence is essential for designing policies for and understanding dynamics of state intervention. The drug economy played a significant role in the evolution of local order particularly in the areas of economy, security and rule. Even if this order does not resemble a normative state order, it is in itself stable and legitimate.

In 2010, I published a book, Bettymania and the Birth of Celebrity Culture. In this article, I want to revisit the topic, not because Bettymania matches our present reality but, rather, to measure our present paradigm against its originator. Whatever new era we now occupy, it can no longer be accurately dubbed "celebrity-driven." Given that our airwaves are saturated with reality TV and YouTube navel gazing, that Facebook has now turned everyone into an expert on personal branding and self-promotion, and that, in America, we have a celebrity as our commander-in-chief, this argument may strike many as wrongheaded; but, to a large extent, what we meant by celebrity culture and the rules that we affixed to it, no longer apply. A study of Bettymania may well offer us some understanding of celebrity culture, but the inception of that culture now seems trivial compared to its date of expiration, which, I argue, occurred the moment Donald Trump was elected President of the United States.

Often portrayed as behaviour that is inconsistent with policy goals, public noncompliance poses a significant challenge for government. To explore what compliance efforts entail on the ground, this study focuses on childhood immunization as a paradigmatic case where a failure to ensure compliance poses a public health risk. The analysis draws on 48 semi‐structured interviews with frontline nurses and regional/national public health officials in England (N = 15), Sweden (N = 17) and Israel (N = 16), all of which have experienced periodic noncompliance spikes, but differ in direct delivery of vaccination provision. Compliance efforts emerged as a joint decision‐making process in which improvisatory practices of personalized appeals are deployed to accommodate parents' concerns, termed here 'street‐level negotiation'. Whereas compliance is suggestive of compelling citizens' adherence to standardized rules, compliance negotiation draws attention to the limited resources street‐level workers have when encountering noncompliance and to policy‐clients' influence on delivery arrangements when holding discretionary power over whether or not to comply.

AbstractThis paper explores the fiscal autonomy of Vietnam's public hospitals through analysing the formal autonomy rules and the actual autonomy practices among selected hospitals. We argue that Vietnam's autonomisation of public hospitals underpins the increasing switch of healthcare costs from the state onto society alongside the transition from the universal and free healthcare services to a mix of state subsidy and fees‐for‐services. Utilised as a strategic instrument, hospital autonomy is reinforced in service provision, capital mobilisation, and allocation of net revenues, leaving autonomy in other dimensions increase incrementally. Consequently, Vietnam's hospital autonomisation has occasioned various revenue‐maximising practices including the provision of "patient‐requested" services, provider‐induced supply of unnecessary services, excessive use of high‐tech diagnostic equipment, inappropriate prescription of drugs, increase in patients' length of stay, and receipt of informal payments. While discerning healthcare reform in a country context, this paper expects to offer lessons to policy‐makers in developing countries, which reform their healthcare services along the market principle.

The Philippines' long democratic experience has been remarkably free of deeply politicized cleavages. Roman Catholicism as a hegemonic religion prevents religious polarization, ethnic identity fragmentation limits ethnic polarization, and weak parties forestall ideological or class polarization. Nevertheless, the country suffered a crisis of polarization during the short-lived Estrada presidency (1998–2001) and that of his successor, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo (2001–2010). The severe conflict was a product of power maneuvers by anti-Estrada forces, followed by anti-Arroyo actors returning the favor, given her gross abuses of power. Echoing Machiavelli's famous distinction, the conflict pitted Estrada's popoli (the many) against Arroyo's oligarchic grandi (the few). This Machiavellian conflict ended with an oligarchic reassertion of Madisonian democratic rule through the electoral victory of Benigno Simeon Aquino III in 2010. We conclude the article by considering whether the populist challenge of current president Rodrigo Duterte (2016– ) might spark a similarly destabilizing conflict in the years to come.

Cooperation for development is a mechanism of solving problems, which appear in contemporary world. The concept of soft power is determined by the interest of developed countries to maintain peace at international level, and development for cooperation allows this indispensable thing to develop democracy and economies of the developing countries. At international level, there is an anarchic state of things, messy and Hobbesian, where states as main actors of international relations act in a Machiavellian way, guided by their egoistic interest, determined by the fear of territorial integrity threat. In this study, we define the particularities of cooperation policy for development; outline the hidden aspects of foreign policy of big powers, whose available force imposes rules and laws at international level. Eastern Partnership states benefit from several programs of cooperation policy for development, that is why it is extremely important for their leaders to learn all the aspects this phenomenon.
Keywords: cooperation, regional cooperation for development, soft power concept, national interest, democracy

AbstractA stream of recent judgments by the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Justice has shed light on the procedures that govern treaty-making by the European Union. This article explores how this case law approaches the principle of institutional balance and the duty of cooperation between the institutions. It argues that the former is construed in a balanced manner on the basis of a literal interpretation of primary law that promotes strict compliance with procedural rules and does not favour a particular institution. As for the duty of cooperation, whilst its procedural dimension is strengthened, its scope remains somewhat elusive. The analysis identifies a pragmatic streak in the Court's balanced approach, and argues that there is an inherent limit to the impact of constitutional law on inter-institutional disputes. Ultimately, the less time and energy the institutions waste on turf wars about their procedural powers, the greater their contribution to inceasing the efficiency of the Union's treaty-making practice.

The main aim of the research is to evaluate the variability of prices of selected wood assortments in the Płock Forest District. Prices of eight wood types were analysed according to the rules of time series decomposition using the CENSUS II X-11 method. The cycles length was also evaluated by means of Fourier spectral analysis. Data were obtained from the Płock Forest District and covered the years 2004—2014 on a monthly basis.
On the basis of the conducted study, it was found that wood prices in the Płock Forest District are characterised by a clear share systematic variability which means that a trend and cyclicality can be distinguished. The results of this research have also shown considerable scale of seasonal and accidental fluctuations in wood prices. The analysis of wood prices showed a growing trend for all assortments, while the dynamics of seasonal fluctuations differed depending on the assortment. Significant intensity of random fluctuations was found, which were characterised by high amplitude of deviations.

Abstract This paper introduces social-interaction based expectations in a New Keynesian frame and compares the characteristics with that of the standard rational expectation model. Agents in this model are connected with each other and build their rational expectation on their neighborhood's opinions and recent economic developments. Instead of precise forecast they use rule of thumbs which reflect whether they assume a positive or a negative future. As result an endogenous business cycle arises. The autocorrelation of the output gap is much larger than in a model with rational expectation and two-way causality from output gap to expectation about output gap arises while kurtosis decreases and correlation between inflation and output gap is quite negative. The use of different networks changes the characteristics of the model. Situations where people trust much more their social network than economic developments can lead to continual recession, boom, inflation or deflation. JEL classifications: E10, E32, E71 Keywords: Rational expectations, non linear dynamics, animal spirit

This report examines the pending Proposal for a directive on unfair trading practices in business-to-business relationships in the food supply chain, and its proposed amendments. It provides a general overview of the current content of the Proposal and analyses the proposed rules from a legal perspective. We find that: (1) the CAP legal basis may prove insufficient for regulation that covers the entire agri-food chain; and may (2) result in a strained relationship with the competition and consumer acquis; (3) the empirical basis for the prevalence of unfair trading practices, and the effect of their prohibition is relatively dire, which results in uncertainty with regard to the achievement of the future UTPD's intended effect and effectiveness; (4) the choice for specific targeted prohibitions instead of general umbrella clauses may lead to ad hoc regulation that leaves large loopholes; (5) the institutional enforcement mechanism makes it likely that the Proposal contributes to the foundation for a new area of EU law, which will increasingly regulate practices in business-to-business relationships.

Over the course of three decades, vocabularies of radical democracy have pressed their stamp on democratic thought. Trading on the intuition that there is more to democracy than elections, they have generated critical insights into the important role that practices of pluralisation and critique play in bettering institutional politics. As a result, few would today deny the radical democratic contribution to democratic thought. What many might question, however, is its continuing traction. The article probes this question, focusing on the nuanced place of democracy in contemporary radical work. It grapples with the difficulties that this poses for radical democrats, and it suggests that a way of overcoming these difficulties – that threaten to undermine the coherence of radical democracy – is to rethink and reconstruct the distinctiveness of its vocabulary. The article attempts such a reconstruction. It develops the idea of the promissory rule of the many, and it discusses the ways that this idea rejuvenates broader democratic thought.

AbstractConsiderable research shows the presence of an economic vote, with governments rewarded or punished by voters, depending on the state of the economy. But how stable is this economic vote? A current argument holds its effect has increased over time, because of weakening long-term social and political forces. Under these conditions, short-term forces, foremostly the economic issue, can come to the fore. A counter-argument, however, sees the economic vote effect in decline, due to globalization. Against these rival hypotheses rests the status-quo argument: the economic vote effect remains unchanged. To test these claims, we estimate carefully specified models of the incumbent vote, at both the individual and aggregate levels. Western European elections provide the data, with particular attention to Denmark, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, The Netherlands, Norway, and Sweden. Perhaps surprisingly, we find the economic vote to be stable over time, a 'standing decision' rule that voters follow in national elections.

This article explores the concept of "populist hangover" in the context of Southeast Asia. Its intention is to provide analysts of populism with a series of lessons derived from the Southeast Asian experience. "Populist hangover" is the notion that, though democrats bemoan the arrival of the populist due to the use of popular support to dismantle effective democratic institutions, the departure of the populist does not return the polity to its previous institutional standard. The primary reason for this is the fact that populism's emergence is both a cause and symptom of social/political exclusion. As a result, the departure of the populist prior to the resolution of this exclusion creates social/political circumstances not conducive to a "return to normal", democratic or otherwise. The article uses two "populist hangover" cases to support its theoretical argument – the "short hangover" of the Thai military's political re-emergence and the "long hangover" of the continued hegemonic authoritarian rule of the People's Action Party in Singapore.