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The New Zealand Political Change Project was established in 1994 to promote collaborative academic research into the systemic consequences of the introduction of New Zealand's new electoral system, the mixed member proportional system (MMP). The project focuses on the impact in four distinct areas: (1) parliament, members of parliament, electoral law & procedure, & constitutional conventions & practices; (2) the executive branch, the public service, & government formation, durability, & termination; (3) policy outcomes; & (4) political parties & electoral behavior. The project has revealed that MMP has had important implications in a number of areas, including the diversity & character of parliamentary representation, the influence of smaller parties in the policy process, & the cohesion of parliamentary parties. However, the change has had limited impact in such important areas as the role & influence of the public service, the control of the political executive over the budgetary process, policy continuity, & overall governmental effectiveness. 12 References. A. Funderburg

"In this concise volume, Timothy Sisk defines power sharing as practices and institutions that result in broad-based governing coalitions generally inclusive of all major ethnic groups. He identifies the principal approaches to power sharing, including autonomy, federations, and proportional electoral systems." "In addition, he highlights the problems with various power-sharing approaches and practices that have been raised by scholars and practitioners alike, and the instances where power-sharing experiments have succeeded and where they have failed. Finally, he offers some guidance to policymakers as they ponder power-sharing arrangements."--BOOK JACKET

Electoral change creates important and competing incentives for political parties, parliamentary elites and candidates to transform their campaign techniques in order to maximize votes under the new realities - a process constrained by continued reliance on familiar techniques. In this article I examine two significant moments of electoral change in New Zealand from partisan stability to dealignment in the late 1980s, and from an SMP/plurality system to Mixed Member Proportional (MMP) representation in 1996 - as a way of exploring inertia and change in the transformation of campaigns at the constituency level. Drawing on findings from in-depth interviews conducted with individuals responsible for the parties' campaigns in the 1987 and 1996 New Zealand general elections, I explore the extent to which political campaign elites, parliamentarians and candidates responded to incentives to adopt a fundamentally new election campaign logic - in these two cases, dictated by the new tactical centrality of marginal seats and geographically defined constituencies in the modern first-past-the-post (FPP) campaign, and then by the ascendancy in their place of the party list vote, issue constituencies and nationwide campaigns under MMP.

Mixed electoral systems seek to combine elements from different voting methods so as to maximise the numbers of individually accountable constituency MPs, while achieving more proportional outcomes in terms of parties' representation. This paper looks in detail at two kinds of mixed systems: variants of the Additional Member System; and AV Plus (or SV Plus). We examine how they would have operated in British conditions during the 1990s—how ballot papers would be structured, how voters respond to them and what electoral outcomes would have resulted. Both approaches offer good prospects for achieving a consensus amongst electoral reformers on an alternative to first-past-the-post elections. We also show how the Jenkins Commission's proposals can be located within the broader development of 'British AMS' by the Labour and Liberal Democrat parties. In addition, we quantify the main impacts of the policy choices which the Commission made in designing the proposed system to be submitted to a referendum. The British case will be a key one for the wider debate in political science about the endogenisation of voting system changes within party systems.

Free-ranging koalas (Phascolarctos cinereus) were monitored by means of radio-relocation in the area of Blair Athol Coal Mine and surrounding properties. Daytime tree use, home range and diet of these koalas was determined in spring and autumn, as was the leaf moisture composition of potential fodder species. Koalas used on average 93 (male koalas) and 56 (female koalas) trees during the period of observation, occupying home ranges of 135 and 101 ha respectively. Mean sightings per tree were 1.19 for both males and females and home-range sizes were not significantly different between sexes or seasons. Koalas were observed returning to previously used daytime roosting trees infrequently (<12%). Although koalas were observed roosting in trees of the species that they ate, proportional species representation in the diet of these koalas during spring and autumn did not accurately reflect concurrent observations of their daytime tree-roosting behaviour. Koalas were observed to utilise non-fodder species for daytime roosting, and patterns of daytime tree use and diet selection varied between individuals inhabiting adjacent communities within the site. Leaf moisture of tree species represented in koala diets was greater in autumn than spring.

Essays -- Public Choice and Constitutional Political Economy -- Public Choice: An Introduction -- Are Vote and Popularity Functions Economically Correct? -- Constitutional Political Economy -- Corruption -- Dictatorship -- Environmental Politics -- Experimental Public Choice -- Gordon Tullock at Four Score Years: An Evaluation -- Interest Group Behavior and Influence -- International Trade Policy: Departure from Free Trade -- James M. Buchanan -- Milton Friedman, 1912: Harbinger of the Public Choice Revolution -- Monetary Policy and Central Bank Behavior -- The Political Economy of Taxation: Positive and Normative Analysis When Collective Choice Matters -- Public Choice from the Perspective of Economics -- Public Choice from the Perspective of the History of Thought -- Public Choice Theory from the Perspective of Law -- Public Choice from the Perspective of Philosophy -- Public Choice from the Perspective of Sociology -- Public Finance -- Regulation and Antitrust -- Scholarly Legacy of Mancur Olson -- Shadow Economy -- Social Choice, Contracts and Logrolling -- Spatial Theory -- Trade Liberalization and Globalization -- William H. Riker -- Concepts -- Academia -- Al-Qaeda -- Alternative Voting Methods -- Altruism -- The Anatomy of Political Representation -- Approval Voting -- Arbitration and Bargaining -- Arrow's Impossibility Theorem -- An 'Austrian' Perspective on Public Choice -- Autocracy -- Autocratic Succession -- Bicameralism -- Blackmail -- Black's Single-Peakedness Condition -- Budgetary Processes -- Budget Deficits -- Bureaucratic Discretion -- Campaign Contributions and Campaign Finance -- Campaign Finance 1 -- Campaign Finance 2 -- Central Banks -- Chicago Political Economy -- The Clayton Act -- Coalitions and Power Indices -- Coalitions and Social Choice -- Coase Theorem and Political Markets -- Coercion -- Collective Action Under the Articles of Confederation -- Committee Assignments -- Committee Jurisdictions and PAC Contributions -- Committees in Legislatures -- Commons and Anticommons -- Constitution -- Constitutional Frameworks and Economic Progress -- The Constitution of the European Union -- Constitutional Political Economy -- The Contemporary Political Economy Approach to Bureaucracy -- Contractarianism -- Corruption 1 -- Corruption 2 -- Cost and Choice -- The Cost Disease of the Personal Services -- Customary Law -- The Demand-Revealing Process -- Deregulation of Postal Service -- Dictators and Social Contracts -- Direct Democracy -- Discrimination -- Dynamic Inconsistency -- Economic Freedom and its Measurement -- Economic Freedom and Political Freedom -- Economic Regulation -- The Economic Theory of Clubs -- Economists Versus the Public on Economic Policy -- Education and the State -- Efficiency of Democracy -- Efficiency of Democracy? -- The Efficiency of the Common Law Hypothesis -- Elected Versus Appointed Regulators -- Election Models -- Electoral College -- Electoral Competition in Mixed Systems of Representation -- The Elusive Median Voter -- Emerging from the Hobbesian Jungle -- Endogenous Morality -- Enron -- Environmental Politics and Economic Development -- The Euro -- European Political Integration -- Evolution of Institutions -- The Evolution of Law -- Experimental Economics and Public Choice -- Experimental Public Choice -- Expressive Voting and Redistribution -- Fair Division -- Fame and Politics -- Federal Reserve System -- Forecasting Presidential Elections in the United States -- Game Theory -- Game Theory in Public Choice -- Generality and the Efficiency of Government Decision Making -- Group Roles in Evolution and Cognition -- Growth of Local Government in the United States -- The Growth of Public Expenditure -- The Growth of the Relative Size of Government -- Heresthetics and the Evolution of the Us Constitution -- Homo Economicus -- Human Evolution and Political Behavior -- Ideology -- The Importance of the Middle in Spatial Politics -- Initiative and Referendum -- Institutions of Trade Protection -- Interest Groups 1 -- Interest Groups 2 -- International Game of Power -- International Organization -- Internet Voting -- Is Russia a Market Economy? -- Is Voting Rational? -- The Italian Public Finance Contribution to Public Choice -- The Judiciary -- The Law and Economics Movement -- Legal Precedents and Judicial Discretion -- Legal Rules and Standards -- Legislative Politics -- Legislators -- Leviathan Models of Government -- Logic of Collective Action -- The Logic of Liberty -- Logrolling 1 -- Logrolling 2 -- Meddlesome Preferences and Rent Extraction: The Tobacco Shakedown -- The Median in Politics -- The Median Voter Model -- Medieval Church -- Mercantilism -- Monetary Politics -- The New Deal -- Nonprofit Organizations -- The Origins of Social Choice Theory -- The Paradox of Rebellion -- Parchment Versus Guns -- Political and Cultural Nationalism -- Political Business Cycles -- Political Economics and Public Choice -- The Political Economy of FEMA Disaster Payments -- The Political Economy of Italian Electoral Reform -- Political Transaction-Cost Manipulation -- Pressure Groups and Uninformed Voters -- Principal-Agent Relationships in the Theory of Bureaucracy -- Prohibition -- Public Choice and Socialism -- Public Choice and the Chicago School of Antitrust -- Public Choice in Italy -- Public Enterprise -- Public Finance and the Median Voter Model -- Public Finance in Democratic Process -- Public Goods -- Public Schools -- Public Utility Regulation -- Rational Choice Approaches to Economic and Political History -- Rational Ignorance -- Rational Irrationality -- Reciprocity -- Redistributive Politics 1 -- Redistributive Politics 2 -- Regulating Government -- Regulatory Takings -- Rent Dissipation -- Rent Extraction -- Rent Seeking -- Rent Seeking and Political Institutions -- Rent-Seeking Games -- Rent Seeking in Development -- The Rule of Law -- Rules Versus Standards -- Self-Interest -- Selfish Gene -- September 11, 2001 -- Single-Peaked Preferences and Median Voter Theorems -- The Social Cost of Rent Seeking -- Sortition -- Standard Oil and Microsoft: Antitrust Lessons -- State-Sponsored Murder as a Rent-Seeking Activity -- Structure-Induced Equilibrium -- Supply of Public Goods -- The Supreme Court -- Takings and Public Choice: The Persuasion of Price -- Term Limits 1 -- Term Limits 2 -- Terrorism -- The Theory and Measurement of Economic Freedom -- Totalitarianism -- Trade Protectionism -- Transitional Economies -- Transitions from Autocracy to Democracy -- Triangulation -- Underground Government: The Off-Budget Public Sector -- The Value of Voting Rights -- Votes for Women -- Voting Equipment, Minorities and the Poor -- Voting in U.S. Presidential Elections -- Voting Paradoxes in List Systems of Proportional Representation -- The War on Drugs -- Welfare Economics and Public Choice -- Welfare Economics and the Theory of the State -- Why Government Succeeds.

AbstractPrevious literature has assumed that there is a trade-off between cabinet stability, by means of a majority manufactured by a single-seat plurality system, and the alleviation of regional conflict, by means of a more proportional electoral system. This study demonstrates that no such tradeoff exists. The objective of this study is to find an alternative electoral system which satisfies both the criteria of majority government and multiregional representation. In a quasi-experiment, an electoral system with a district magnitude of two (M2) satisfies both of the above criteria. The results of the study show that a district magnitude of two can provide a large diffuse party with a majority of seats for the same amount of voter support as the present plurality system. In addition, M2 rewards this large diffuse party with seats necessary to form a minority government at a much lower level of voter support than does the existing system. Thus, M2 solves the problem of underrepresentation of regions in the government party, and is at the same time even more advantageous to a large diffuse party than is the present electoral system. If the argument of this study is correct, beneficiaries of the existing system should not be averse to implementing it.

If a country has no developed political party system, it is not really a democracy. And the development of political parties in Russia has a long way to go. The only branch of government in which parties play an influential role is in the State Duma (the lower house of parliament) -- not in the Federation Council (the upper house) or the executive branch. Addressing the question of why parties have developed so little elsewhere, it is argued that they are weak because the most powerful politicians choose to make them so. This institutional arrangement suits their purposes to control what happens in government from the top. Tracing the origins of this situation reveals that they lie in Russian history & culture, predating the Soviet period. Another impediment to party development is the scale of socioeconomic change in Russia. Socioeconomic cleavages were important to party development in Western Europe, with liberal & conservative parties representing different sectors of the population. However, there is reason for optimism for the future. While Putin enjoys solid support from the people, other major political actors do not; if Putin should cease to identify with Unified Russia, the majority party's future is uncertain. Also, a 2002 law passed by both houses & the president requires regional parliaments to be proportional in terms of political party representation. This will lead to party development at the regional level, which conceivably could spread upward. Tables. J. Stanton

The authors address issues of representation - the move to a proportional electoral system in New Zealand, the unsuccessful attempt to establish a domestic head of state in Australia, and the reform of the British House of Lords - and demonstrate that citizens increasingly want legislative institutions to more closely reflect the societies they serve. To discuss responsiveness, the governance of indigenous communities and their place within the broader society in Canada and New Zealand are examined, as is the role of institutions other than legislatures that are involved in protecting minority rights and responding to various forms of diversity. A separate chapter analyses the basis for and merits of proposals to reform the Canadian House of Commons. In addition, authors review the dynamics of federalism, intergovernmental relations, and other processes of multi-level governance in Canada, the United Kingdom, and South Africa. Public debate about adapting governance processes to changing conditions and citizen values is a necessary condition of successful democracies and there is much to learn from progress and false starts in other parliamentary democracies. Contributors include Jonathan Boston (Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand), Paul Chartrand (consultant, Victoria, British Columbia), Stéphane Dion (minister of Intergovernmental Relations, Government of Canada), David Docherty, Mason Durie (Massey University), Robert Hazell (University College London), Christina Murray (University of Cape Town), Cheryl Saunders (University of Melbourne), Leslie Seidle, Jennifer Smith (Dalhousie University), and Lord Wakeham (former chairman of the Royal Commission on House of Lords Reform).

We propose a theory of party competition (two parties, single-issue) where citizens acquire party membership by contributing money to a party, and where a member's influence on the policy taken by her party is proportional to her campaign contribution. The policy consists of informed and uninformed voters : only informed voters join parties, and the party campaign chest, the sum of its received contributions, is used to advertise and reach uninformed voters. Parties compete with each other strategically with respect to policy choice and advertising. We propose a definition of political equilibrium, in which party membership, citizen contributions, and parties' policies are simultaneously determined, for each of four financing institutions, running a gamut between a purely private, unconstrained system, to a public system in which all citizens have equal financial input. We compare the representation and welfare properties of these four institutions. ; Nous proposons une théorie de la politique (deux partis, une seule question) dans laquelle les citoyens deviennent membre d'un parti en le financant et dans laquelle l'influence d'un de ses membres sur la politique proposée par le parti est proportionnelle à sa contribution. L'électorat est constitué de votants informés et non-informés: Seuls les votants informés rejoignent les partis, et le budget de campagne d'un parti, la somme des contributions qu'il reçoit, est utilisé pour communiquer en direction des votants non-informés. Les partis sont en compétition stratégique par rapport à leur choix politique et leur communication. On propose une définition de l'équilibre politique dans laquelle l'appartenance partisane, les contributions et les politiques sont déterminées simultanément, pour quatre modes institutionnels de financement, allant d'un système non contraint purement privé à un système public dans lequel tous les citoyens ont le même impact financier. On compare les qualités des quatre systèmes en termes de représentation et de bien-être.

1 Introduction -- 1.1 Arrivals in time -- 1.2 Reliability -- 1.3 Safety assessment -- 1.4 Random stress and strength -- Notes on the literature -- Problems -- 2 Point processes -- 2.1 The probabilistic context -- 2.2 Two methods of representation -- 2.3 Parameters of point processes -- 2.4 Transformation to a process with constant arrival rate -- 2.5 Time between arrivals -- Notes on the literature -- Problems -- 3 Homogeneous Poisson processes -- 3.1 Definition -- 3.2 Characterization -- 3.3 Time between arrivals for the hP process -- 3.4 Relations to the uniform distribution -- 3.5 A process with simultaneous arrivals -- Notes on the literature -- Problems -- 4 Application of point processes to a theory of safety assessment -- 4.1 The Reactor Safety Study -- 4.2 The annual probability of a reactor accident -- 4.3 A stochastic consequence model -- 4.4 A concept of rare events -- 4.5 Common mode failures -- 4.6 Conclusion -- Notes on the literature -- Problems -- 5 Renewal processes -- 5.1 Probabilistic theory -- 5.2 The renewal process cannot model equipment wearout -- Notes on the literature -- Problems -- 6 Poisson processes -- 6.1 The Poisson model -- 6.2 Characterization of regular Poisson processes -- 6.3 Time between arrivals for Poisson processes -- 6.4 Further observations on software error detection -- Notes on the literature -- Problems -- 7 Superimposed processes -- Notes on the literature -- Problems -- 8 Markov point processes -- 8.1 Theory -- 8.2 The Poisson process -- 8.3 Facilitation and hindrance -- Notes on the literature -- Problems -- 9 Applications of Markov point processes -- 9.1 Egg-laying dispersal of the bean weevil -- 9.2 Application of facilitation — hindrance to the spatial distribution of benthic invertebrates -- 9.3 The Luria-Delbrück model -- 9.4 Chance placement of balls in cells -- 9.5 A model for multiple vehicle automobile accidents -- 9.6 Engels' model -- Notes on the literature -- Problems -- 10 The order statistics process -- 10.1 The sampling of lifetimes -- 10.2 Derivation from the Poisson process -- 10.3 A Poisson model of equipment wearout -- Notes on the literature -- Problems -- 11 Competing risk theory -- 11.1 Markov chain model -- 11.2 Classical competing risks -- 11.3 Competing risk presentation of reactor safety studies -- 11.4 Delayed fatalities -- 11.5 Proportional hazard rates -- Notes on the literature -- Problems -- Further reading -- Appendix 1 Probability background -- A1.1 Probability distributions -- A1.2 Expectation -- A1.3 Transformation of variables -- A1.4 The distribution of order statistics -- A1.5 Conditional probability -- A1.6 Operational methods in probability -- A1.7 Convergence concepts and results in the theory of probability -- Notes on the literature -- Appendix 2 Technical topics -- A2.1 Existence of point process parameters -- A2.2 No simultaneous arrivals -- Solutions to a few of the problems -- References -- Author index.