Suchergebnisse

Die vorliegende Studie ist das Ergebnis einer Fragestellung aus der praktischen Entwicklungsarbeit. Untersucht werden Remigranten in elf Dörfern im nördlichen Sahel Malis/Westafrika. Mittels einer standardisierten Befragung von 177 Arbeitswanderern wird der Frage nachgegangen, inwiefern das in der Ferne erworbenen Know-how für eine entsprechende Berufsausbildung in den Heimatorten genutzt werden kann. Die Studie kommt zu dem Ergebnis, dass die erworbenen beruflichen Kenntnisse im Widerspruch stehen zu den Möglichkeiten in den Heimatdörfern. Es handelt sich hier um das Phänomen, das der "Exode" das Potenzial für eine angepaßte dörfliche Ökonomie verringert, die für ein effektives Ressourcenmanagement erforderlich ist. Auf der anderen Seite bringt der Arbeitswanderer aus der Ferne jedoch auch eine Reihe von Innovationsvorstellungen mit, die positive Entwicklungen in den dörflichen Gemeinschaften anstoßen. (ICA)

International financial assistance (loans and grants) can potentially raise recipients' welfare in two ways, by affecting a direct resource transfer and by facilitating efficiency-enhancing reforms. In practice, barriers to reform limit the potential of assistance to deliver these two dividends. In this paper, we analyze assistance programs designed to ensure that recipient governments voluntarily adopt reforms and overcome barriers associated with: (i) the reaction of special interests to the prospect of reform; (ii) the possibility of default and political instability in the recipient countr

This paper develops a lobbying-by-firms model that draws on a more realistic characterization of the lobbying process; influence-seeking requires both money to 'buy access' and managerial time to 'utilize access'. This, more realistically grounded, modeling approach furnishes theoretical support for why one encounters different numbers of lobbying firms of varying sizes in different industries, without casting the (unrealistic) lifeline of the 'money-buys-policies' assumption or (unrealistically) casting out the role of money from the lobbying process. Theoretical legs are also furnished for the empirical finding of a negative and statistically significant (at the 1% level) relationship between industry concentration and 'direct lobbying' by the industry. Additional insights emerge from the model regarding how a cap on the lobbying-contributions of firms results, in fact, in an expansion of the amount of access-time purchased by some firms, and how a decline in the world price of an industry's good can generate greater inequality in access to politicians.

This paper introduces an alternative to the lobbying literature's standard assumption that money buys policies. Our model - in which influence-seeking requires both money to buy access and managerial time to utilize access - offers three significant benefits. First, it counters criticism that the money-buys-policies assumption is at odds with reality. Second, its much stronger lobbying incentives weaken the free-rider problem and raise incentives for lobby formation. Third, the model yields testable hypotheses on: the determinants of lobbying incentives; the number of lobbying firms in an industry; and the impact on industry lobbying by the size distribution of firms, contribution limits on firms, world price changes, and the ability to adjust labor employment.

International Financial Institutions (IFIs) tie resource transfers to capital‐scarce countries to improvements in their economic policies and institutions. The objective of this assistance is twofold: to augment the recipient's capital base and to improve its allocation of resources. This paper offers a political‐economy explanation for the limited success of some of these loan programs. In our model, governments select policies under the influence of interest groups. Their capacity to absorb IFI loans and their reform efforts are both unobservable to the IFI. An optimally designed loan mechanism must create sufficient incentives – in the form of rewards and punishments – to counter the influence of interest groups on economic policy choices. The loan mechanism is, however, constrained in two ways: it cannot punish a country so severely as to threaten its political stability and it must remain affordable to the IFI. Whenever reform incentives are inadequate, a government will accept the loan but cheat on the implementation of reforms. If, on the other hand, the mechanism design is optimal, it might be so costly to the IFI that a well‐entrenched interest group can block the reform program. Nonetheless, the availability of properly designed loan mechanisms will push governments to implement partial reforms even if the optimal mechanism is too costly for the IFI.