Targeting Civilians in Ethno-Territorial Wars: Power- and Preference-Based Sources of Ethnic Cleansing and Mass Killing Strategies

In internal ethno-territorial conflicts, what explains why state or rebel group leaderships use civilian-targeting strategies—expulsion or mass killing strategies designed to punish enemy civilians or to decimate the enemy civilian presence on contested territory? One argument is that those living under the worst initial conditions—defined in terms of collective goods such as weak collective autonomy, policy outcomes, and material conditions—are most likely to target enemy group civilians. Another approach focuses on relative power—arguing that the enemy civilian population is targeted either because of weaker or stronger relative power. A third approach argues that differences in leadership preferences—in particular, more ideologically extreme or power-seeking preferences—are likely to drive direct assaults on enemy civilians. We examine these proposed mechanisms in terms of expected effects on benefits and costs in a simple ethno-territorial bargaining framework. We argue that relative power advantages and more extreme nationalist preferences seem most likely to predict decisions to target enemy civilian populations. We expect strongly power-seeking preferences to lead to civilian targeting more conditionally—where there is a greater internal political threat along with either greater relative power or a more moderate enemy. Last, we do not expect that variation in initial conditions will have a significant direct effect. We apply the framework to explain patterns of civilian targeting following the collapse of Yugoslavia in 1991.

[Supplementary material is available for this article. Go to the publisher's online edition of Studies in Conflict & Terrorism for the following free supplemental resource: online appendix.]     

Trade creation,trade diversion and effective protection in the central American common market

Aggregate analyses suggest that the formation of the Central American Common Market (CACM) has resulted in little or no trade diversion, but different conclusions apply when the import data are appropriately disaggregated. Increases in the effective rates of protection for consumer goods have led to increased demand for extra‐regional imports of intermediate inputs and decreased demand for extra‐regional imports of final goods. On balance, the CACM is a trade‐diverting customs union for non‐durable consumer goods: trade‐creating effects are present in Honduras and Costa Rica, but trade‐diverting effects dominate in Guatemala, El Salvador and Nicaragua.     

Friends or Foes? Nonstate Public Goods Providers and Local State Authorities in Nondemocratic and Transitional Systems

Ordinary citizens often welcome nonstate provision of public goods and social welfare, but government officials, particularly in nondemocratic and transitional systems, may view nonstate actors as political competitors. Drawing on a combination of qualitative and quantitative data from rural China, this paper finds that some kinds of nonstate participation in public goods and social welfare provision can actually make local officials more optimistic about their ability to implement state policies and elicit citizen compliance. Local officials often believe that coproduction of public goods and services with community groups in particular, often with community actors taking the lead, can build trust and social capital that can spill over into increased citizen compliance with state demands, a central element of state capacity. Simply increasing levels of public goods provision, however, is not associated positively with optimistic perceptions of local state authority and capacity. Moreover, other forms of nonstate participation such as coproduction between private businesses and local officials or substitutive provision by nonstate actors have less potential for building trust between officials and citizens and are not seen by officials as beneficial for increasing citizen compliance.     

International Trade,R&D Spillovers and Productivity: Evidence from Indian Manufacturing Industry

This paper examines the effect of trade facilitated R&D spillovers on the productivity of manufacturing firms in India, inter-sectoral variation in the effect on productivity and the importance of firms' investment in R&D, technology imports and plant and machinery in enhancing the productivity effect. Using firm level panel data, the study shows that R&D spillovers have a significant effect on productivity and that this effect is greater in technology-intensive industries. The paper also shows that firms' investment in plant and machinery enhances the productivity effect of R&D spillovers. The paper provides detailed micro-level evidence on the argument that trade openness promotes technological progress in developing countries.     

Tariffs and Firm Performance in Ethiopia

We use data on Ethiopian manufacturing firms and commodity-level data on tariffs to examine the effects of trade liberalisation on firm performance. We distinguish the productivity gains that arise from reducing final goods tariffs from those that arise from reducing tariffs on intermediate inputs. We find no evidence that output tariff reduction improves productivity, but we find large positive effects of input tariff reductions. These are robust to alternative productivity measures, treating tariffs as endogenous, and various generalisations of the model. We conclude that policy measures designed to facilitate access to inputs produced abroad may lead to productivity gains.     

Exchange Rate Pass-through in South Africa: Panel Evidence from Individual Goods and Services

This study estimates pass-through for South Africa using samples of final goods and services, and homogenous imports. Estimated pass-through to consumer goods prices is low, roughly 16 per cent in the two years following an exchange rate change; surprisingly, it is somewhat higher for services. Deviations from long run PPP appear to disappear relatively quickly, with a half-life of about 16 months. For imports, pass-through estimates are much higher, averaging around 60 per cent, but with wide source-country variation. Finally, there is virtually no support for a simple linear trend change in either pass-through or in reversion to PPP during the sample.     

Focusing on quality care rather than ‘checking boxes’: How to exit the labyrinth of multiple accountabilities in hybrid healthcare arrangements

Accountability relations in modern-day welfare states have multiplied due to the complex interaction of institutional and sectoral logics. Against this backdrop, this article seeks to unravel complexities which surround accountability relations in hybrid healthcare arrangements. For this purpose, a framework of multi-faceted identity is suggested in order to theoretically grasp multiple accountabilities of healthcare professionals. Accordingly, healthcare professionals have a cross-cutting identity (being a professional) that is fortified with nested identities such as the one of partner, citizen and manager. Each identity facet is attached to a specific accountability form such as professional and civic society accountability. By focusing on three settings of healthcare provision—hospital, outpatient and integrated care—the usefulness of a multi-faceted identity framework will be illustrated. It is concluded that developing a more nuanced understanding of healthcare professionals’ multiple identities and attached accountabilities might be a good starting point for planning healthcare redesign.     

Economic growth and import requirements

This article points out that our knowledge of the specific form and analytical reasons underlying the interrelationship known to exist between international trade and economic growth is limited and that this situation is largely due to the lack of an adequate theoretical framework. Comparative cost theory is not very helpful in this respect be cause the explanation of the rise of trade it provides does not lead to useful and unambiguous inferences about the role of trade in economic growth nor about the characteristics of trade flows during growth.

The difficulty may in part be attributed to the circumstance that comparative cost doctrine provides theoretical support for an ideal system of trading which nations have consistently refused to follow. The article suggests that this situation of fact results because the primary objective that nations pursue in trading is not to exploit (at a given level of employment and capacity use) whatever comparative cost differences may exist, but to ‘develop’ their national economies; and to this end the policy objectives that are given highest priority in all countries are those that induce a maximum level of domestic manpower employment and as intensive a utilization as possible of the national resource base. The trade implications of adhering to this ‘national development’ objective are easy to visualize: nations will tend to import only those commodities needed to supplement their own output so that total supply (domestic plus imported goods) fits the prevailing requirements; and they will import such commodities because an important condition for growth is a reasonable long‐run coincidence between the commodity composition of total supply and total demand. Since no country can have an all‐encompassing resource base nor attain full productive diversification, it follows that all countries must have certain minimum import requirements.

The core of the article is devoted to a discussion of an exponential‐type formula (M = ay^b P^e A^d) which defines aggregate import requirements in terms of the level of per‐capita income, the population and the geographical area of the respective countries. The discussion shows that the formula implicitly takes into account characteristics of the resource base such as its magnitude, quality and degree of exploitation. This formula, in its linear logarithmic form, is then used for a regression analysis of the imports of a uniform sample of 53 countries in three years, viz. 1953, 1958 and 1963. Data of 20 countries in 1913 and U.S. data for the period 1889–1953 are similarly analysed. The results show that the formula permits excellent fits of the data and that all the variables selected—including area—are statistically significant even at the 99 per cent confidence level. These results are interpreted as supporting evidence of the validity of the views advanced earlier regarding the economic motivation for trading and the factors that determine levels of import requirements.

The last part of the article deals with some of the implications of the empirical findings (regarding the function of trade and the role of natural resources in economic growth, the possibilities of successful import substitution and the relation between geographical size and trade requirements—relation of practical importance in connection with customs unions and similar economic integration arrangements). A few broad policy implications of the views advanced in the article are also presented.     

Inclusive Elite Bargains and the Dilemma of Unproductive Peace: a Zambian case study

This article seeks to contribute to recent debates on the link between political settlements and state building. It proposes a theoretical framework that centres on the alternative concept of ‘elite bargain’ and suggests that inclusive elite bargains can be expected to facilitate both peace and economic development. Yet a detailed case study of elite bargains in Zambia shows that all good things do not always go together. While inclusive elite bargains have indeed helped to avoid civil war, they have often constrained economic development—a dilemma of unproductive peace.     

Trade Liberalisation,the Peso,and Mexico's Commodity Trade Flows with the United States

We assess the effects of real peso devaluations, as well as the effects of GATT and NAFTA, on Mexico's in-payments and out-payments with the United States for 102 industries. We find that relatively few trade flows are sensitive to changes in the real exchange rate, probably due to production-sharing and intra-industry trade, but devaluations affect Mexican imports more than exports. Trade liberalisation has had a larger impact, particularly on imports of intermediate goods and exports of certain manufactures. Many affected export industries are ones that have previously been shown to have economies of scale.     

Walk the Talk: Private Sustainability Standards in the Ugandan Coffee Sector

We investigate the welfare and productivity implications of private sustainability standards in the coffee sector in Uganda. We use cross-sectional household survey data and an instrumental variable method with instruments that pass weak identification and over-identification restrictions. We find that triple Utz-Rainforest Alliance-4C certification increases income, and land and labour productivity, and reduces poverty. Double Fairtrade-Organic certification is found to be associated with higher producer prices but results in lower land and labour productivity, and thereby fails to increase producer income and contribute to poverty reduction. We conclude that private sustainability standards do not always live up the expectations they create towards consumers.     

Collective Remittances and Transnational Coproduction: the 3 × 1 Program for Migrants and Household Access to Public Goods in Mexico

Migrant hometown associations (HTAs) are mobilizing collective remittances to improve social welfare in their countries of origin. This paper assesses the effect of transnational coproduction of public goods in migrants’ places of origin by studying the 3?×?1 Program for Migrants. The 3?×?1 Program is a national social spending program in which the Mexican local, state, and federal government matches HTAs’ collective remittances to improve public services through cross-border public–private partnerships. The statistical analysis across municipalities that do and do not participate in the 3?×?1 Program shows that coproduction improves citizens’ access to public sanitation, drainage, and water, although not electricity. Moreover, a negative and statistically significant interaction term between 3?×?1 Program expenditures and family remittances reveals a substitution effect: in the presence of transnational coproduction, migrant households are less likely to improve public goods using family remittance resources, but in the absence of 3?×?1 Program participation they continue to improve their hometowns with family remittances. This research offers a theoretical mechanism and supporting empirical evidence of an important kind of intermediary institution improving social welfare in migrant places of origin.     

Household Welfare Effects of Agricultural Productivity: A Multidimensional Perspective from Ghana

Although poverty reduction policies in developing countries hinge on the link between smallholder productivity and welfare, micro level empirical evidence on this is limited in sub-Saharan Africa and neglects the multidimensionality of welfare. This article contributes through investigating the productivity-poverty relationship using a number of welfare measures with a three-period panel dataset for Ghana. The findings are that welfare is increasing with labour productivity irrespective of the measure used, but that dramatic increases in productivity would be required to achieve meaningful poverty reduction.     

Enduring Repression: Narratives of Loyalty to the Party Before,During and After the Gulag

This article documents the attitudes—especially those of loyalty—among Gulag prisoners and returnees toward the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), and seeks to ascertain how their incarceration subsequently influenced those sentiments. It is paradoxical that some prisoners—many of whom were falsely convicted—endured gruelling, barely survivable, lengthy terms of labour camp and prison and emerged maintaining their loyalty toward the system of government that was responsible for their imprisonment. With the materials that have become available, we can now begin to understand this phenomenon. Explanations include the ‘traumatic bond’ (Stockholm Syndrome), communism (the Party) as a surrogate for institutionalised religion, cognitive dissonance and functionalism. This issue may offer insight into the larger question of how repressive regimes are maintained.     

Colonialism,Landlords, and Public Goods Provision in India: A Controlled Comparative Analysis

What is the impact of colonialism on public goods provision? This article examines India, once the world’s largest colony. While recent studies of the Indian case are divided, they overwhelmingly rely on econometric approaches. This article uses qualitative evidence to provide an important complementary perspective. Using controlled comparisons of the princely state of Travancore with the neighbouring provinces of Malabar and Tirunelveli, I find that colonialism generated less social welfare because British officials empowered landlords. Notably, this occurred despite Malabar and Tirunelveli instituting ryotwari (cultivator-based) land tenure. British rule in India may have promoted landlordism irrespective of land tenure policy.     

Criminality and Armed Groups: A Comparative Study of FARC and Paramilitary Groups in Colombia

Terrorist groups and armed insurgents regularly exploit illicit markets to launder money, traffic illegal goods, and purchase arms. In such an environment, the line between armed political organizations and criminal groups appears to break down. However, through a comparative study of paramilitary groups and Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia—FARC) in Colombia, this article finds that group goals, the political environment, and membership strongly influence the types of criminal activities a given armed groups undertakes. Thus, the membership and political agenda of sub-state armed groups not only distinguishes them from criminal groups—organized for and motivated by economic gain—but also shapes their criminal behavior.     

Privatization,efficiency and market failure : transforming ecuador's public sector

Much of the privatization that is occurring in Latin America is leading to improved efficiency. However, privatization in areas where markets do not yield efficient solutions, for example of public goods, like light houses, natural monopolies, mainly utilities, and goods with externalities, like education, can lead to lower output and higher costs in the long run. This paper first presents an outline of the shift in development theory with respect to the role of the public sector. It then examines the growth of Ecuador's public sector and its current debate on how privatization should proceed. It concludes that while careful privatization can be positive, privatizing natural monopolies like the electric utility and/or quasi-public goods, like highways are likely to be detrimental to long run economic development. In order for Ecuador's economy to continue to develop, the public sector still needs to play a significant role in developing human capital and physical infrastructure.     

The structure of employment and structural adjustment in the Philippines

Growth in the 1970s seemed, at that time, to have brought the Philippines to a rather high equilibrium growth path. But the foreign debt and political crisis in the early and mid‐1980s had brought the economy down to a lower equilibrium path. The recovery years (1987 to 1990) did not prove to be sustainable, given the extreme debt overhang, so that the economy retreated once again to the lower equilibrium path in the early 1990s. Significant debt reduction schemes and the new inflows (remittances of overseas workers and rising foreign investments) allowed a new growth trend. Whether sufficient growth can be maintained in the medium and long term will depend to a large part on uncontrollable external conditions. Significant improvements in trade and industrial policies are needed so that external deficits and imports will finance those sectors that allow for creation of high quality employment. Policy will have to shift resources away from the trade, real estate and other service sectors to strong tradeable manufactures. If the Philippines cannot get out of the boom—bust cycle, labour productivity in the medium and long term will stagnate and the share of those employed in the total labour force will remain stable, leading to stagnating employment opportunities and worsening income distribution.     

Unveiling the Features of a Regulatory System: The Institutional Grammar of Tobacco Legislation in Mexico

The United Nations will host a drug policy summit in 2016. This will be a good forum to evaluate the effectiveness of existing legal frameworks. The institutional grammar tool can help with such evaluation. This article uses the tool to analyze the inherent features of tobacco regulations in Mexico. The analysis shows that the legal framework seeks to curb consumption with a combination of information and choice rules, and administrative penalties. As the analysis reveals, the usefulness of the method depends upon the availability of a solid theory that allows one to link rule features and the behavior they expect to induce.     

Equal Employment Opportunity in the Public Service: Theory and Practice in Bangladesh

Although EEO has considerable appeal and is often part of a nation's constitutional and legal framework the application of the principle appears to be far from satisfactory in most cases. Generally the gap between theory and practice of EEO is too wide—especially in developing countries where a range of factors influences the implementation of EEO. As a result, EEO has remained largely elusive in such contexts. This article seeks to contribute to the understanding of EEO in a developing country — Bangladesh—from theoretical and practical terms. Based on mainly secondary sources of information it shows that despite constitutional provisions and the presence of various rules and regulations to this effect, there are a variety of ways in which EEO principle is compromised and violated in the public service. It further shows that in recent times the administration of EEO has been frustrated and undermined further given the increasing trends of politicization of the public service and the high incidence of corruption and patronage in its management.