The Determinants of Gender Differences in Income in Trinidad and Tobago

The present study employs 1993 Continuous Sample Survey of the Population data for Trinidad and Tobago to investigate the causes of gender income differentials. The findings suggest that such differentials are not well explained by differences in levels of human capital and other measured factors valued by the labour market. This result is robust to the disaggregation of the data into African, Indian and Other ethnic groups thereby raising the possibility of gender discrimination. African and Indian women's incomes would increase by over 20 per cent with the returns to the measured factors of their male, ethnic counterparts. Women would benefit from having men's industry distribution of jobs, but not men's occupational distribution. African women appear to be significantly more disadvantaged relative to their male counterparts than are Indian or Other women.     

The analysis of social interest rate in Trinidad and Tobago

In this article a Social Interest Rate (SIR) is derived for Trinidad and Tobago on the basis of an individualistic, independent and multi‐period consumption utility function. The component parameters of this rate are: a mortality‐based pure time discount rate, the growth rate of per capita real consumption and the elasticity of marginal utility of consumption. The final result is 6.2 per cent which is plausible and thus can be readily used by economic planners in various resource allocation policies in that country.     

The Pedagogy of Science and Environment: Experimental Evidence from Peru

In today's knowledge-based societies, understanding basic scientific concepts and the capacity to structure and solve scientific questions is more critical than ever. Accordingly, in this article we test an innovative methodology for teaching science and environment in public primary schools where traditional (teacher-centred) teaching was replaced with student-centred activities using LEGO kits. We document positive and significant improvements of 0.18 standard deviations in standardised test scores. Such positive results are mainly concentrated within boys that were located above the median of baseline academic performance.     

Structural and Behavioural Characteristics of Informal Service Employment: Evidence from a Survey in New Delhi

This article argues that at least two distinct categories within the informal sector - informal services and informal manufacturing - exhibit different structural and behavioural characteristics. While some segments of informal manufacturing may indeed be 'dynamic' as noted by some recent studies, the hypothesis is tested for the informal service employment on the basis of a survey by the author in New Delhi, India. It examines investment, earnings, returns to human capital, socio economic characteristics and scope for upward mobility of informal service employment. It finds formal education does not explain differences in earnings in the sample but background characteristics do; earnings in the informal service sector are neither the lowest in the economy nor are they comparable to wages in the urban formal unskilled sector, when differences between migrants and non-migrants are taken into account. On the basis of these results, the paper reflects on the nature of growth and structural change in the Indian economy and draws some analytical and policy implications.     

Capability Failure and Group Disparities : Some Evidence from India for the 1980s

This paper advances a particular measure of deprivation - called the Capability Failure Ratio (CFR) - on the dimensions of longevity, knowledge and income, and suggests how an (inequality-) 'adjusted' version of the CFR may be derived. These measurement concerns are explored in the context of relevant State-wise data for the Indian Union. The paper thus makes an attempt to enrich the analysis of human predicament by sensitising 'measures of central tendency' to distributional concerns.     

The Effect of Incentive Reforms Upon Productivity: Evidence from the Vietnamese Rice Industry

In this study we use region-level panel data on rice production in Vietnam to investigate total factor productivity (TFP) growth in the period since reunification in 1975. Two significant reforms were introduced during this period, one in 1981 allowing farmers to keep part of their produce, and another in 1987 providing improved land tenure. We measure TFP growth using two modified forms of the standard Malmquist data envelopment analysis (DEA) method, which we have named the Three-year-window (TYW) and the Full Cumulative (FC) methods. We have developed these methods to deal with degrees of freedom limitations. Our empirical results indicate strong average TFP growth of between 3.3 and 3.5 per cent per annum, with the fastest growth observed in the period following the first reform. Our results support the assertion that incentive related issues have played a large role in the decline and subsequent resurgence of Vietnamese agriculture.     

The Integration of Best Environmental Management Practices in Corporate Strategy: Empirical Evidence From Italian Local Governments

Local governments represent an important moving force in promoting sustainable development policies as they make up the level of governance closest to the citizens. The aim of this article is to examine whether Italian local governments exercise de facto their vital role in fostering sustainable development policies. In particular, we analyzed municipality behavior about adopting “green management strategies.” We investigated the main factors identified in management literature which might boost the adoption of these strategies. Several implications ensue from our findings. In particular, the research provides information to improve local government attitudes toward the sustainable development challenge.     

Manufactured exports and terms of trade of developing countries: Evidence from Sri Lanka

Terms of trade implications of diversification into manufactured exports in a traditional primary‐exporting country are examined in the light of the Sri Lankan experience over the past two decades. The empirical analysis focuses on trends in both commodity and income terms of trade, employing a methodology which takes care of the ‘spurious regression’ problem. The results suggest that, contrary to the ‘new’ terms of trade pessimism, export diversification has brought about significant terms of trade gains for the Sri Lankan economy. Overall, the study casts doubt on the robustness of results coming from analyses of price trends in aggregate manufactured exports and calls for systematic time‐profile analyses of the countries which have achieved significant export diversification in order to inform the policy debate.     

The Role of Civil Society Organizations in Monitoring Elections: Lessons Learned for the New Egypt

The purpose of this research article is to contribute to a better future for a New Egypt, after the January 25, Revolution of 2011, by focusing on how best to monitor elections by domestic civil society organizations (CSOs) through adopting an output, outcome, and impact model. It assesses comparatively the role of CSOs in monitoring elections in Ethiopia, Ukraine, and Nigeria, and derives lessons learned for Egypt. Through analyzing Egyptian CSOs websites and qualitative discussions and surveys with activists, proposed strategies for enhancing effectiveness are identified, including building wider coalitions and more use of new technology.     

Political instability and economic growth: Evidence from two decades of transition in CEE

This paper examines the nexus between political instability and economic growth in 10 CEE countries in transition in the period 1990–2009. Our results support the contention that political instability defined as a propensity for government change had a negative impact on growth. On the other hand, there was no causality in the opposite direction. A sensitivity analysis based on the application of a few hundred different variants of the initial econometric model confirmed the abovementioned findings only in the case where major government changes were applied to the definition of political instability.     

The EU and Multidimensional Forms of Power: Critical Moments and Change in Actorness and Power

This article introduces a framework for studying the European Union (EU) as power by focusing on what EU does rather than what EU is. Conceptualizing EU as a regional international society, EU is constituted along multidimensional lines. While a code of conduct limits internal and external practices, critical moments are important junctures for practitioners to reinterpret norms and rules, leading to the reproduction of EU as power. The practice of minority rights illustrates how a lack of intersubjectivity limits the EU’s power. It is first through practitioners’ engagement with norms and rules that new practices are established.     

Understanding regional peace and security: a framework for analysis1

The aim of this article is to build an analytical framework for understanding regional peace and security. Building on important insights from other theoretical approaches, it proposes that in order to comprehend the complexities of each regional cluster we have to account for: (a) agents of peace and security, (b) instruments of peace and security, (c) the security pattern, (d) the conflict pattern, (e) the positive peace pattern, and (f) the level of regional integration. Secondly, the article examines how these different components relate to each another. It introduces the concept of the ‘regional peace and security cluster’ (RPSC) and proposes that RPSCs can be classified as ‘regional fragmentations’, ‘regional coalitions’, ‘regional communities’ and ‘regional governmental polities’.     

The unbearable lightness of membership: Bulgaria and Romania after the 2007 EU accession

This paper focuses on the current political and socio-economic situation in the two most recent EU member states, Bulgaria and Romania. Overall, the post-accession period in both countries has been comparable to that in the East-Central European members that had joined the Union on 1 May 2004. However, there have been some significant differences in the post-accession path of Bulgaria and Romania, which set them apart from the rest of the EU-10, as well as among themselves. For instance, the problem of corruption has been a particularly salient theme for the political elites of both countries and it led to the paralysis of the cabinet in Romania during the first year of its membership and to the rise of powerful populist alternatives in Bulgaria. What has probably been even more distinguishing in the cases of Bulgaria and Romania is their apparent inability to swiftly deal with the political and social challenges emerging after accession, as well as to adequately respond to the process of Europeanization. The main reason for this has been the unfinished political and socio-economic transformation of both countries, accompanied by the consolidation of certain ‘reserve domains’, occupied by the former secret services and semi-mafia structures.     

Islamic Fundamentalism and Women's Economic Role: The Case of Iran

It is commonly believed that Islamic fundamentalism is responsible for the low female employment rate in the Middle East and North Africa. I earlier presented evidence from Indonesia indicating that the deteriorating conditions of women's economic role in the 1990s was related to the economic circumstances of the Asian Crisis, not to the rise of political Islam (Bahranitash, 2002). In fact, in Indonesia, increasing support for the Islamic movement was itself spurred by the Asian Crisis. As a contrasting case, I here examine Iran, a country where political Islam has been in power for over two decades. If commonly held views about the impact of the Islamic religion on female employment were true, one would expect a steady or sharp decline of the female employment rate in postrevolutionary Iran. The empirical data show the reverse. Women's formal employment rates increased in the 1990s and did so much faster than they had during the 1960s and 1970s, when a pro-Western secular regime was in power. This sharp increase in women's employment seriously challenges the view that religion explains women's economic status in Muslim countries. The evidence from Iran indicates that the situation of women's employment there has followed a common pattern of elsewhere in the South—an overall increase in female employment. This fact then suggests that the forces of international political economy, rather than religion, appear to be a determining factor in the state of women's economic role in Iran.     

The determinants of foreign direct investment inflows in the Central and Eastern European Countries: The importance of institutions

This study investigates the determinants of FDI inflows in six Central and Eastern European countries (CEEC) by incorporating the traditional factors and institutional variables over the 1996–2009 period. The study identifies whether and how these determinant factors differ across four investor countries (EU-15, the US, China, and Japan). The results verify the positive and economically significant role of GDP size, trade openness, EU membership, and institutions (measured by economic freedoms, state fragility, political rights, and civil liberties indices) on FDI inflows. The results also reveal the existence of notable differences in the determinant factors across four investor countries.     

The Theory of International Media Diffusion: Political Socialization and International Media in Transitional Democracies

Despite the long-standing normative assumption that, for individuals in transitional states, exposure to Western media cultivates stronger attachments to Western political and economic values, the evidence presented here suggests otherwise. Using mass public survey data from the mid-1990s in five Central and Eastern European countries, this article demonstrates a general lack of support for international media’s positive contributions to individuals’ democratic attitudes and preferences for market economies. This finding is particularly unexpected because the countries under investigation represent ideal cases based on their proximity to Western democracies and international (Western) media sources’ capacities for extensive transnational media penetration into the region. Yet this failure to find persuasive evidence of the influence of international media diffusion on the development of Western political values sharpens our understanding of the process of political socialization in democratizing countries by eliminating an assumed source and is thus relevant to students of democratization, international development, and mass media.

The Case of Nord-Ost: Dubrovka and the Search for Answers

The paper reviews the experience of the group Nord-Ost (The Regional Social Organisation for Assistance and Defence of the Victims of Terrorist Acts) as an example of an NGO that has taken a rights advocacy position which has led it into confrontation with the state. Nord-Ost demands the state's accountability for the consequences of its response to the 2002 Dubrovka terrorist attack. Thus, it confronts challenges common to other rights advocacy groups in Russia today.