The institutional dimension of election design

The traditional approach to election design focuses solely on the best method to aggregate the preferences of the voters. But elections are run by institutions, and the interests of the institution may not be reflected in the preferences of the voter. In this comment I discuss how institutional considerations come into play in election design in three areas: political representation, corporate voting, and judging in competitions. As an illustration of this institutional approach I appraise the method by which the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences selects the nominees and winners of the Oscars.     

Reform of the United Nations Security Council: equity and efficiency

Rents and political motives are present in many aspects of public policy. This article considers the role of rents, rent seeking, and the political choice of environmental policy. Rents are introduced into the political choice of price and quantity regulation under conditions of uncertainty. The model shows how political-economy aspects affect the choice between price and quantity regulation. The contesting of rents associated with different policies affects the regulatory structure and influences the political choice of an environmental policy target. The primary conclusion is that the political choice of environmental policy depends on the interaction between the efficiency of rent transfer and the size of rent-seeking groups within the economy.     

Constitutional political economy,democratic theory and institutional design

Democracy and constitutionalism are both central to the Western political tradition. And yet, constitutional restrictions are often perceived to be in tension with democratic commitments. I argue that the constitutional political economy approach developed by Nobel Laureate James Buchanan resolves the tension between constitutionalism and the values of democratic governance by shifting the analysis from a system-attributes perspective that focuses on the particular institutional properties of a political order to a system-legitimacy perspective that focuses on the manner in which political institutions gain democratic legitimacy. In so doing, the approach reveals that constitutionalism can be understood as a natural expression of democratic values.     

In through the back door: Social equity and regional governance

Abstract

A leading impulse for new regionalism in the 1990s was the sense that suburban and central cities are economically interdependent and should work cooperatively toward common regional welfare in the face of globalized competition. If this is so, we should witness an emergence of regional policies that combat concentrated poverty, segregation, and place‐based inequalities that impose significant economic costs. This article assesses the extent and types of metropolitan equity efforts under new regionalism, the pathways through which they arise, and their prospects.

Research finds that equity‐based regional policies are increasing; they take diverse forms and are commonly shaped by state or federal programs, but they are not explicit and primary parts of regional agendas. While regional entities have not advanced explicit discussions about equity, a confluence of intergovernmental programs and quality of life issues has added regional equity to the portfolio of metropolitan goals.     

Bureaucratic institutional design: the case of the Italian NHS

We propose a model where a regional government’s choice of the number of bureaucratic agencies operating in a region depends upon the degree of substitutability and complementarity of the bureaucratic services being demanded. We show that, if the government perceives the citizens’ demand as a demand for substitutable services, it will choose provision by two independent agencies. If the government perceives the citizens’ demand as a demand for complementary services, it will choose provision by a single consolidated agency. Exogenous shocks to the number of citizens amplify these incentives. Evidence from the Italian National Health Service (NHS) supports this hypothesis. Results show a positive effect of proxies of substitutable services on the number of regional local health authorities and a negative effect of proxies of complementary services. The major immigration amnesties, taken as shocks to the number of citizens entitled to the service, magnify these effects.     

Coupling citizens and elites in deliberative systems: The role of institutional design

A significant shortcoming in contemporary deliberative systems is that citizens are disconnected from various elite sites of public deliberation. This article explores the concept of ‘coupling’ as a means to better link citizens and elites in deliberative systems. The notion of ‘designed coupling’ is developed to describe institutional mechanisms for linking otherwise disconnected deliberative sites. To consider whether it is possible and indeed desirable to use institutional design to couple different sites in a deliberative system, the article draws on insights from a case study in which a mini‐public was formally integrated into a legislative committee. The empirical study finds that it is not only feasible to couple mini‐publics to legislative committees, but when combined, the democratic and deliberative capacity of both institutions can be strengthened. To be effective, ‘designed coupling’ requires more than establishing institutional connections; it also requires that actors to step outside their comfort zone to build new relationships and engage in new communicative spaces with different sets of ideas, actors and rules. This can be facilitated by institutional design, but it also requires leaders and champions who are well‐placed to encourage actors to think differently.     

Trust in elections and the institutional design of electoral authorities: Evidence from Latin America

It is often assumed that the institutional organization of electoral management bodies (EMB) has an impact on the credibility of elections, but this proposition has been difficult to verify empirically. I examine whether the degree of autonomy from the political process of EMB administrators affects attitudes towards elections among citizens and legislators by analyzing mass and elite surveys across Latin America. I conclude that levels of confidence in the electoral process among political elites are higher in countries with politically autonomous EMBs, but this effect is muted in the analysis of citizen attitudes. This association holds after controlling for individual-level determinants of trust in elections and for other relevant country-level predictors in multilevel statistical models.     

Articulate statistics and educational equity

Policy research on educational equity from 1965 to 1975 challenged the conventional wisdom about schools. Apparently families, not schools, produce education, and the black-white achievement gap is not explained by school differences. But these counter-intuitive conclusions are drawn from studies of individual differences in achievement, and the radical political perspective articulated by that mode of analysis belittles and distorts relationships that moderates find significant. A moderate-style statistical articulation, that focuses primarily on between-race and between-status differences, is available. It produces findings that are largely consistent with the conventional wisdom when applied to data from Coleman's (1966) study of schools. Despite measurement problems, schools and other environmental variables statistically explain the bulk of the black-white achievement gap.The author is employed by the National Science Foundation, but the opinions expressed in this paper do not reflect policies or positions of the Foundation.     

Environmental equity and public participation

The principles and practice of public participation can serve to promote environmental equity for disadvantaged social groups. The effectiveness of such practice in preventing or reducing environmental inequity depends upon the use of participation methodology which caters to the cultural and social needs of such groups. These methods need to provide appropriate forms of information, suitable venues for participation, and access to expertise and education which enable the public to understand policy issues and formulate preferences. The extent to which public preferences are incorporated in policy decisions determines the worth of public participation programs in promoting environmental equity.     

Political and institutional environment and privatization prices

We study the link between the political and institutional context and privatization sales prices. The latter serves as a measure for assessing the extent to which privatization goals have been met. Whereas this link has been studied theoretically, there are very few, if any, empirical papers on this relationship. We use data from 308 privatizations around the world and apply a cross-country approach, including instrumental variables. We find that while the overall political regime does not matter much for prices, the political processes beyond the basic regime do matter. Institutional context also produces a significant impact on prices. Both results are robust to changes in specification.     

Rent-seeking and institutional stability in developing countries

We are grateful to Mark Toma, Gordon Tullock, Stephen Drew Smith, Bob Collinge and participants of the rent seeking panel held at the 1990 meetings of the Southern Economic Association for their helpful comments. Remaining errors are our responsibility.     

Efficacy,power and equity under approval voting

Approval voting allows each voter to vote for as many candidates as he wishes in a multicandidate election. Previous studies show that approval voting compares favorably with other practicable election systems. The present study examines the extent to which votes for different numbers of candidates can affect the outcome. It also considers generic powers of voters and the extent to which approval voting treats voters equitably. If there are three candidates, votes for one or two candidates are equally efficacious in large electorates. For four or more candidates, votes for about half the candidates are most efficacious. Although inequities among voters can arise under approval voting, the common plurality voting system is considerably less equitable than approval voting.     

State and local pension plans' equity holdings and returns

This article explores recent trends in the size and performance of the equity investments of state and local pension plans. It also provides a context for the discussion about investing Social Security trust fund reserves in private equities. Equity holdings and returns for five of the largest private pension plans were compared with those of state and local pension plans. Key findings discussed in the article include: Equities were the largest investment in the aggregate portfolio of state and local pension plans in 1999 and represented 67 percent of the $3 trillion in aggregate state and local pension assets. Equity allocation of the five private plans resembled that of the aggregate. About 80 percent of state and local pension plan holdings were domestic equities in 1999. The five largest plans had about the same domestic/foreign allocation of equity investments during that same period. In 1999, state and local pension plans held about 11 percent of the U.S. equity market, which includes foreign equities held in the United States. State and local pension plans held about 10 percent of domestic equities in the U.S. equities market that same year. Returns on equity investments over a 10-year period were more than 17 percent for both private pensions and state and local pension plans. Although private plans tend to have slightly higher total returns, the difference stems from the higher equity asset allocation of the private pensions that were studied.