Suchergebnisse

What are the implications of the trend toward granting central bank independence for partisan theories of the macroeconomy? The conventional view is that parties of the Left and Right strive to achieve distinctive macroeconomic outcomes when in government. However, when faced with an independent central bank, parties of the Left may prove unable to produce their preferred partisan outcomes, whereas Right parties may be privileged in their ability to pursue their goals. Moreover, granting the central bank independence can be expected to have differing effects depending on whether Left or Right parties prevail in government. These issues are explored with a pooled time-series model of inflation and unemployment in 16 Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development countries from 1961 through 1991. The results support the claim that the effects of partisan government and central bank organization are mutually contingent. The pattern of results anticipated by partisan theory only arises where central banks are under political control, whereas when central banks are independent, Left governments are disadvantaged and Right governments privileged in their ability to achieve their partisan goals. On the other hand, the effects of central bank independence also depend on the partisanship of government, casting doubt on the claim that an independent central bank always provides a "free lunch" of lower inflation with no attendant costs in terms of increased unemployment.

The war in Kosovo was ineffective because of the unwillingness of the West to fully commit to a war. There were two strictures that the West made in order to justify war. One that there would be a minimum of civilian casualties, & no NATO soldiers must die. This limited the war to aerial bombardments, & then to only very specific targets. The lack of ground forces meant the ethnic cleansing continued with little interruption. Even the withdrawal from Kosovo showed that the Serbian military was intact. Also, the aftereffects are not good as ethnic cleansing of Kosovar Serbs took place after the withdrawal, which hints of greater conflict later. R. Larsen