Suchergebnisse

THE AUTHOR TESTS A SIMPLE ASSET MARKET MODEL OF CAMPAIGN CONTRIBUTIONS, USING DATA FROM RECENT U.S. SENATE RACES. WHEN APPLIED TO "INVESTOR" PAC'S, THE MODEL PERFORMS SURPRISINGLY WELL AND SUGGESTS THAT THE CONTRIBUTIONS MARKET IS RELATIVELY EFFICIENT. WHEN APPLIED TO IDEOLOGICAL PAC'S, POLITICAL PARTIES, AND INDIVIDUALS, THE MODEL IS REJECTED. THE RESULTS NOT ONLY PROVIDE EMPIRICAL SUPPORT FOR THE MODEL BUT ALSO POINT OUT IMPORTANT DIFFERENCES IN THE APPARENT MOTIVES BEHIND DIFFERENT TYPES OF CONTRIBUTIONS.

EUROPEAN PROGRESS TOWARD MONETARY UNION MUST OCCUR WITHIN THE HIGHLY INSTITUTIONALIZED SETTING OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITY (EC). THIS PAPER EXAMINES THE WAYS IN WHICH FORMAL INSTITUTIONS AND DECISION-MAKING PROCEDURES HAVE THUS FAR CONSTRAINED THE ECONOMIC AND MONETARY UNION (EMU) PROCESS. THE EC'S STRUCTURE HAS BOTH CREATED DEMANDS FOR AND FACILITATED CROSS-ISSUE LINKAGES, WHICH HAVE CHARACTERIZED THE SUCCESSFUL BARGAINING ON EMU. HOWEVER, SUCCESS ALSO REQUIRES RATIFICATION. DOMESTIC RATIFICATION PROCEDURES AND CHANGES IN THE EC'S CONTEXT OF LINKAGE HAVE CREATED CHALLENGES FOR THE RATIFICATION OF THE MAASTRICHT TREATY. RATIFICATION IS ALSO TIED TO CONCERNS ABOUT DEMOCRATIC ACCOUNTABILITY, WHICH ARISE FROM CURRENT LEGISLATIVE PROCEDURES AND ARE THE SUBJECT OF ONGOING INSTITUTIONAL REFORM.

DESPITE WIDESPREAD CONCERN AND DISCUSSION, NO CONSENSUS EXISTS CONCERNING THE CAUSES OF THE U.S. INFRASTRUCTURE CRISIS OR ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR THE EFFICIENCY OF GOVERNMENT DECISION-MAKING. IN THIS PAPER, THE AUTHORS INVESTIGATE SEVERAL MODELS OF THE DETERMINATION OF LOCAL PUBLIC CAPITAL EXPENDITURES, BASED ON THE EXPERIENCE OF 163 MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENTS IN THE UNITED STATES. USING EULER EQUATION METHODS, THEY CANNOT ELIMINATE THE HYPOTHESIS THAT CONSTRUCTION SPENDING IS DETERMINED BY UNCONSTRAINED, FORWARD LOOKING MUNICIPAL PLANNING. CONSISTENT WITH THIS RESULT, THE STOCHASTIC STRUCTURE OF RESOURCE FLOWS IS AN IMPORTANT FEATURE OF THE DETERMINATION OF CONSTRUCTION SPENDING. ONLY UNANTICIPATED CHANGES IN A COMMUNITY'S RESOURCES ALTER ITS DEMAND FOR STRUCTURES.

EUROPEAN MONETARY UNIFICATION (EMU), THE CREATION OF A SINGLE EUROPEAN CURRENCY AND A EUROPEAN CENTRAL BANK, IS BOTH AN ECONOMIC AND A POLITICAL PHENOMENON. YET FEW STUDIES HAVE ATTEMPTED TO ADDRESS SIMULTANEOUSLY THE POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC DIMENSIONS OF THE PROCESS. IN THIS ESSAY, THE AUTHORS REVIEW AND EXTEND THE RELEVANT LITERATURES. THEY CONCLUDE THAT THE EMU IS DRIVEN PRIMARILY BY POLITICAL, RATHER THAN ECONOMIC, FACTORS, ALTHOUGH THE UNDERSTANDING OF THESE POLITICAL FORCES REMAINS INCOMPLETE.

THE AUTHORS ADDRESS TWO QUESTIONS: (1) IS A TWELVE-COUNTRY EUROPEAN MONETARY UNION FEASIBLE? (2) CAN MONETARY UNION BE ACHIEVED AT MULTI-SPEED (WITH A SMALL GROUP OF COUNTRIES GOING FIRST AND ADMITTING THE OTHERS LATER)? AFTER EXAMINING SEVERAL POLITICO-ECONOMIC ARGUMENTS CONCERNING FEASIBILITY, THEY CONCLUDE WITH A FAIR AMOUNT OF SKEPTICISM CONCERNING THE MULTI-SPEED CONCEPT. THE FINAL RESULT OF THE PROCESS OF MONETARY INTEGRATION WILL BE DEPENDENT UPON THE NUMBER OF COUNTRIES THAT INITIATE IT. THE AUTHORS' DISCUSSION OF FEASIBILITY SHEDS SOME LIGHT ON THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF THE RECENT TURMOIL IN THE EUROPEAN MONETARY SYSTEM.

The purpose of this paper is to present a new economic explanation for why a multiple‐party system can endogenously arise as a result of the electoral process. The traditional view on the electoral process (i.e., the median voter theorem) is that political parties that pursue policies in the interest of the median voter are led to a convergence of policies. However, this view cannot explain why either conservative or liberal parties win election in many democratic countries. In order to explain this paradox, the following model considers an economy with three types of parties: conservative, middle, and liberal parties. In the model, the policy of each party is assumed to be time‐consistent, so that the policy of the middle party generally leads to suboptimal outcomes for the majority voters. Thus, the "rational" majority voters try to elect the political party whose objective is biased. As a result, the electoral process may lead to a two‐party system where both conservative and liberal parties have a chance to win election.

This paper investigates the incentives for candidates to make informative campaign speeches concerning their policy intentions. Electoral competition is modeled as a game of communication in which candidates'policy preferences are private information and they compete by making pre‐electoral policy announcements. An equilibrium is shown to exist in which candidates reveal their true policy intentions. We find that campaign messages are more likely to be informative, the less powerful is the elected office, the more attractive are candidates'opportunities outside of office, and the more uniform are candidates'prior beliefs as to the median voter's preferred policy.

This paper argues that a model of sequential choice is superior to the standard rational choice model in explaining a process as complex and dynamic as the political realignment of the 1850s. Part 1 sketches the facts and processes that need to be encompassed by a model and identifies key branching points. Part 2 describes an appropriate model of sequential choice and discusses procedures for estimating transition probabilities and the impact of key variables on these transition probabilities. Part 3 identifies implicit assumptions of rational choice theory that limit its usefulness.

Two sequential games of the interactions among a PAC and two politicians contesting the same office are developed, and their subgame perfect equilibria are characterized. The politicians have distinct ideal points in policy space, and this drives the result that the policy platforms they campaign on are not identical. The PAC always contributes only to the politician whose platform is closest to the PAC's ideal point, who is the politician whose ideal point is closest to the PAC's ideal point; as a result, both politicians'policy platforms are closer to the PAC's ideal point. The sequence of play does not qualitatively affect the outcome, but the PAC has a second mover advantage. Exogenous shocks to the probabilities of winning only modify the basic outcome.