网络经济与政府治理创新

网络经济的迅猛发展和深度扩张,无疑将对我国经济和社会的发展产生重大影响。我国要想抓住机遇,摆脱困境,惟一的出路就在于创新。只有通过改进政府治理,广泛开展创新行动,我们才能在新一轮网络经济的竞争与发展中获得相应的收益和位置,才有可能赢得后来居上的竞争利益和发展前景。     

市场经济背景与政府主导的制度创新

政府是制度创新最主要的主体.尤其是在我国目前转型期,政府在制度的创制中发挥着极重要的作用.但政府也有自身的缺陷.在向市场经济的转变中,政府要做的是为市场活动主体的制度创新提供一个既有严格规范又有一定自由活动空间的制度框架.从而构建一个以政府的制度创新为主导的,市场的制度创新也充满活力的制度创新格局.     

Leviathan in a dual economy

This paper studies the policies of a leviathan state with an ambition to make money and to stay in power. The economic framework is a developing country characterized by dual markets. Government revenue is raised by taxing the agricultural sector. Part of this revenue is offered to the politically influential urban population in the form of low productive but well paid public sector employment. I calculate the optimal level of rural taxation from the point of view of the Leviathan and investigate its effects on migration, industrialization, public sector employment and urban unemployment in different political scenarios.     

Price discrimination in a rent-seeking economy

This paper examines the incentive and the consequences of using discriminatory pricing by a monopolist in a rent-seeking economy. It is shown that, even if all consumer groups' demands have identical elasticities at any given price, the monopolist has an incentive to charge a lower price to high pressure consumer groups so as to alleviate their rent-seeking efforts in challenging its monopolistic power. Furthermore, it is shown that by allowing the firm to price discriminate total welfare may increase, even if all rent-seeking expenditures are completely wasteful.     

Roles of government in a mixed economy

This essay argues that market failure analysis provides an unsubstantial basis for assessing the kinds of things governments should be doing if they could do them well, and modern public choice theory an inadequate guide to obstacles to effective governmental action. The argument is supported by analysis of political rhetoric and actual policy in two arenas: support of R&D, and help for poor children.     

State government purchases in a federalist economy

This paper empirically examines the impact of state government purchasing preference laws on expenditures and revenue of individual states. Purchasing preferences allow firms located within a state to win state contracts without being the low bidder. We find that states with purchasing preference laws spend 3% more in real terms per capita than other states. Evidence is found indicating that the preferences require revenue increases to fund them (the tax base does not rise sufficiently), and that there is some apparent taxpayer resistance to these preferences. This evidence is consistent with a coalition model of state government behavior because it indicates there is significant redistribution of income between groups within the state.We thank the Center for Public Policy at the University of Houston for financial support. This paper benefitted by comments received from Gordon Tullock and an anonymous referee.     

Dimensions of democracies

Nomination: Arguments in favour of 'Democracies_—' by Manfred G. Schmidt, p.193
Reflections: Dimensions of democracy by Arend Lijphart, p.195     

Dimensions of democracies

Abstract The conventional wisdom concerning the choice between majoritarian electoral systems and proportional representation (PR) - and, more broadly, between majoritarian and consensus forms of democracy - is that there is a trade-off: PR and consensus democracy provide more accurate representation and better minority representation, but majoritarianism provides more effective government. A comparative analysis of 18 older and well-established democracies, most of which are European democracies, shows that PR and consensus democracy indeed give superior political representation, but that majoritarian systems do not perform better in maintaining public order and managing the economy, and hence that the over-all performance of consensus democracy is superior. This conclusion should also be tested among the growing number of slightly newer non-European democracies, which are already old enough to have proved their viability and can be studied over an extended period of time. If its validity is confirmed - and the evidence so far is very promising -it can have great practical significance for the future of democracy in the world.     

Towards a contextual theory of innovation

A contextual theoretical strategy should be pursued to overcome past deficiencies in the study of organizational innovation. The strategy is likely to lead to greater success in efforts to promote innovation. The heart of this strategy is to define the types of innovation processes at work and the contexts in which they operate. There are at least three innovation processes at work which operate in contexts defined by organizational and environmental characteristics and by the type of innovation under consideration.     

Money and politics in a small open economy

A time series analysis indicates monetary growth and the Gallup Poll in Canada are systematically related at ‘electoral cycle’ periodicities (5 to 20 quarters) under flexible exchange rates, and demonstrates the absence of an electoral component in Canadian monetary growth under fixed rates. These results confirm empirically a widely accepted extension of the Mundell-Fleming argument that monetary policy is effective only under flexible rates, which to my knowledge has not before been directly investigated: international constraints on the small open economy under fixed rates lead to the abandonment of monetary policy as an active instrument in electoral politics.     

Dimensions of Politics in the European Parliament

We investigate the dimensionality of politics in the European Parliament by applying a scaling method to all roll-call votes between 1979 and 2001 in the European Parliament. Contrary to most existing studies using these methods, we are able to interpret the substantive content of the observed dimensions using exogenous measures of national party policy positions. We find that the main dimension of politics in the European Union's only elected institution is the classic left-right dimension found in domestic politics. A second dimension is also present, although to a lesser extent, which captures government-opposition conflicts as well as national and European party positions on European integration.     

我国行政管理改革的特殊维度——立足我国国情借鉴“新公共管理“运动的思考

由于社会背景不同,因此,我国的行政管理改革只能借鉴而不能照搬西方的“新公共管理”模式。我们应当在审视自身国情的基础上,把握我国行政管理改革不同于西方“新公共管理”运动的特殊方面。这至少包括:为行政管理改革提供良好的法治环境;突出服务职能,同时强化必要的管制;大力培育非政府组织;有限制地引入市场机制和私营部门的管理方法;在促进规则制度建设的同时逐渐加大结果评价的权重;实现政治与行政的分离而又提升管理者的政治责任感。