An evaluation of some microeconomic consequences of a future oil embargo

In order to develop an energy policy designed to help insulate the economy against the effects of a future oil embargo, projections of the effects of an embargo are necessary. Past work has concentrated on the aggregate output loss from an embargo, but has not carefully considered other important effects. This paper examines two important effects. First, the most heavily damaged sectors are identified, showing the automobile industry to have by far the most significant damage. Second, a large part of the economic damage done by an embargo is shown to be due to a decline in the demand for output rather than as a direct consequence of reduced petroleum supplies. This finding is significant for two related policy reasons. First, it implies that even if policy makers could replace all of the embargoed oil, major economic disruptions could still result from an embargo. Second, policies designed to minimize demand disruptions can achieve significant benefits, at low cost, and should have a high priority in policy matters pertaining to embargoes.Financial support for this work was received from the Department of Energy, and this paper is a condensed version of a report sent to the DOE. Views expressed in this paper are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the position of the Department of Energy.     

An estimation of the lag structure of the economic impact of an oil embargo

A number of economic models have been used to estimate the economic losses resulting from oil embargoes, but they have not been able to provide good answers about how quickly an economy would recover once the embargo was over. This study uses a phase lag analysis to estimate the lag structure of an embargo, and concludes that the major economic effects should be expected to disappear about six weeks after an embargo ends.The views expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the position of the Department of Energy.     

Economic globalization and voter turnout in established democracies

This paper asks whether international economic integration negatively affects electoral turnout. The theoretical model builds on the premise that economic integration constrains the ability of national governments to shape outcomes. Citizens are conscious of such constraints and take them into account when considering the costs and benefits of casting a vote in national elections. The result is a lower inclination to vote under conditions of high economic integration. Consequently, aggregate turnout is lower the more internationally integrated a national economy is. Analysis of aggregate data for parliamentary elections in 23 OECD democracies over the period 1965–2006 robustly supports this hypothesis. The empirical estimates suggest economic globalization as a central cause of the general decline in turnout within established democracies.     

Two Diasporas: Overseas Chinese and Non-resident Indians in Their Homelands’ Political Economy

This paper, through a comparative study of the roles Chinese and Indian diasporas in the United States play in the political economy of their respective homelands, explores the relationship between the diaspora and homeland development and how this dynamic relationship contributes to economic growth and foreign relations of the homelands. The author argues that the roles of Indian and Chinese diasporas in their respective homelands’ development consistently reflect, and are heavily influenced by, their homelands’ economic development strategies as well as political history and culture. The author also argues that the impact of the diaspora on the foreign relations of their homelands is conditional upon the state of bilateral relations between their homeland and the country of residence. This study raises issues for future research, such as the relationship between the diaspora and regime type of the homeland. The author concludes by suggesting that since activities of overseas Chinese and non-resident Indians provide a unique perspective in the comparative study of Chinese and Indian political economy, the two diasporas warrant more scholarly and policy attention. Zhiqun Zhu, Ph.D. is currently Assistant Professor and Chair of International Political Economy and Diplomacy at the University of Bridgeport, Connecticut. He is the author of US-China Relations in the 21 ^st Century: Power Transition and Peace (Routledge, 2006). His research and teaching interests include international political economy, East Asian politics, and US-China relations. He wishes to thank panelists at the 102^nd annual conference of the American Political Science Association in Philadelphia for their helpful comments. He also wants to acknowledge Dr. Dave Benjamin’s useful suggestions and editorial assistance.     

乡镇经济增长模式之转变：以T镇为个案

国内外很多学者对中国乡镇经济高速增长的原因进行了深入研究,但是对于如何能够实现从粗放型经济增长模式转变为集约型经济增长模式则关注不够,而正好是这一转折点推动了乡镇企业质的提高.为了探讨乡镇经济增长模式转变的道路,通过个案研究的方法来寻找证据.通过对T镇的考察,运用理性选择的理论解释了乡镇领导人是如何促进乡镇经济增长模式转变的,这也是文章的创新之处.即乡镇领导人一方面通过集体企业改制甩掉了那些长期亏损的企业,淘汰了粗放型的发展模式,虽然说付出了巨大的代价,但是实现了乡镇经济整体的受损最小化;另一方面,乡镇领导人通过工业园建设提升了乡镇经济的规模和效益,通过招商引资吸引了乡镇经济增长所需的技术和资金,集约型经济增长的生长实现了经济发展的获益最大化.通过这两种路径,乡镇领导人的理性选择影响了经济增长模式的转变.通过对T镇的个案研究,希望能够同前人的研究展开对话,同时亦希望推广此项研究的外部效度.     

理性预期与启动中国经济

理性预期理论旨在从心理学角度分析经济主体的理性预期对经济发展的影响。作认为,随着市场经济体制的建立,经济主体对未来经济形势扔预期已在很大程度上影响了我国经济发展状况。因此,本以理性预期理论为基础,从心理预期角度分析了制约我国当前经济进入趋势性回升的因素,并提出了政策建议。     

经济发展的内在机制

本文从经济增长的源泉出发,从生产力和生产关系两个方面探讨了微观经济个体相互作用以形成整体经济发展的过程,并就经济发展的未来趋势作了展望.     

再论战后日本经济体制的特征、问题及改革--对战后日本经济体制的历史学分析

学术界普遍认为,日本当代经济体制是为适应日本战后的经济环境、经战后改革而形成的,这种观点值得商榷.本文指出近些年来,强调日本战时经济体制是战后经济体制的原型,认为二者的关系是未经战后改革而割断的"持续"关系,已成为一股强劲的学术潮流,传统观点已遭到动摇.本文还提出了日本经济体制的几项特征,对这些特征逐项进行了扼要的历史考察,并论述了日本战时经济体制的历史作用,以及当今日本的改革所面临的根本问题.     

Perceptions and reality: Economic voting at the 2004 European Parliament elections

Abstract.  One of the most influential explanations of voting behaviour is based on economic factors: when the economy is doing well, voters reward the incumbent government and when the economy is doing badly, voters punish the incumbent. This reward-punishment model is thought to be particularly appropriate at second order contests such as European Parliament elections. Yet operationalising this economic voting model using citizens' perceptions of economic performance may suffer from endogeneity problems if citizens' perceptions are in fact a function of their party preferences rather than being a cause of their party preferences. Thus, this article models a 'strict' version of economic voting in which they purge citizens' economic perceptions of partisan effects and only use as a predictor of voting that portion of citizens' economic perceptions that is caused by the real world economy. Using data on voting at the 2004 European Parliament elections for 23 European Union electorates, the article finds some, but limited, evidence for economic voting that is dependent on both voter sophistication and clarity of responsibility for the economy within any country. First, only politically sophisticated voters' subjective economic assessments are in fact grounded in economic reality. Second, the portion of subjective economic assessments that is a function of the real world economy is a significant predictor of voting only in single party government contexts where there can be a clear attribution of responsibility. For coalition government contexts, the article finds essentially no impact of the real economy via economic perceptions on vote choice, at least at European Parliament elections.     

Party strategies,world demand,and unemployment in Britain and the United States, 1947–1983

This paper replicates and extends earlier work on the politics of macroeconomic policy by considering political effects on unemployment in Britain and the United States from 1947 to 1983. Unemployment falls under left-wing governments and rises under right-wing governments. However, these partisan effects on unemployment in an open economy like Britain's can only be satisfactorily estimated relative to the level of world economic activity. The United States has major effects on world economic activity but is also subject to feedback from the economies of other countries. Politicians' strategic incentives and economic regime constraints determine whether partisan effects on unemployment will be sustained, transitory, or absent. In Britain, only a model in which partisan impacts are transitory satisfactorily estimates the effects of changes of party control. In the United States, only the transitory-impact model is able to estimate partisan effects in recent administrations.     

发展型政府理论与香港实践

发展型政府都将经济发展作为国家政策制定的重中之重,并且采取有力措施来实现经济发展目标。香港是典型的小经济体,对外在环境有非常大的依存度,一直关注如何维持与中国内地、周边、亚太地区乃至世界经济的良好互动。在把握有关发展型政府理论的脉络及主要观点的基础上,深入探讨发展型政府理论在香港的实践与CEPA框架下香港政府扮演的四重经济角色以及可能存在的风险。认为,应该从增强香港经济自主性、制度建设和增加内地与香港抵御金融风险的能力等方面入手,进一步完善CEPA。结论部分探讨了在CEPA框架下,内地和香港的各级政府成为更加有效的发展型政府的途径以及对两岸经济关系的启示。     

Repress or Respect? Precarious Leadership,Poor Economy and Labor Protection

How should insecure leaders deal with labor rights in the face of an economic downturn? Economic theory suggests that suppressing labor rights boosts the economy and that economic growth also dampens violent political opposition. As a result, the suppression of labor rights should contribute to more job security for leaders. However, some other scholars maintain that more repression actually increases the probability of opposition. As a result, the policy implication of this argument is that leaders would be better off if they choose to improve the protection of labor rights. Our simple formal model demonstrates that the second argument is more likely to be the case. The probit analysis of 146 countries from 1984 to 2004 bears out this prediction. We also find that this relationship is stronger in non-democracies than in democracies. Our study appears to provide some support to Bueno de Mesquita et al.’s (2005) statement that policies that are good for political survival may not necessarily be good for the economy.     

Reciprocal causation in a model of the vote: Replication and extension

Page and Jones, and others, have argued that recursive models of the vote fail to take account of the inherent complexity of the decision processes involved and that estimates from these models are prone to errors, which result in understatement of the amount of policy voting. They propose a causal structure, in which reciprocal influences are modeled explicitly, and estimate its parameters with partially independent samples from two presidential elections. Their model, however, is restricted to presidential contests and omits economic issues. Similarly, the literature on economic voting has ignored the presence of potential reciprocal influences on economic policy attitudes. This paper develops a novel measure of economic issue preferences, modifies the earlier model to include both economic and social issues, and tests the model on data from an independent sample of voters in the 1978 congressional elections. Estimates from the elaborated model generally comport well with the results obtained by Page and Jones, and the findings show a higher degree of economic issue voting than most previous studies.     

Better by design: Korea's neoliberal economy

Abstract

This paper examines the processes of bank and corporate restructuring in South Korea since the 1997–98 economic crisis, and seeks to highlight how the state has intervened in a highly dirigiste manner in order to expedite restructuring in both the commercial bank and corporate sectors. At the same time it demonstrates the clear neoliberal principles that have underpinned the state's attempts to promote restructuring. The state has shown a clear determination to take action against insolvent firms and financial institutions no matter how large or strategically important they may be, to impose hard budget constraints on key economic actors. Furthermore, the state has actively sought to engineer the sale of key domestic firms and banks to foreign investors. We argue that Korea's efforts to create a functioning neoliberal economy have been largely successful and are functional from the perspective of Korean capitalism, if not the perspective of individual Korean firms. Changes in the global economy in the two decades preceding the 1997–98 crisis imposed an increasingly inescapable pressure on the Korean state to effect a neoliberal transformation and Korea's future as a centre of capitalist accumulation has for some time been bound up with the success of the neoliberal project. In conclusion, this paper seeks to draw out the broader implications of this reading of the post-crisis restructuring programme for debates on global economic liberalization and the future of capitalist diversity.     

Kevin Kelly's Complexity Theory: The Politics and Ideology of Self-organising Systems

Regarded as a contemporary prophet of the new technology and economy, widely acclaimed author and editor of Wired , Kevin Kelly argues that the realms of nature and human construction are becoming one. Human-made things are becoming more lifelike and life is becoming more engineered. Utilising complexity theory and other concepts fashioned on the paradigmatic logic of biological systems, Kelly envisions a future with radically different forms of social and organisational control. In this future world, control is dispersed in highly pluralistic, open, and decentralised systems. Natural, technological, economic and social elements of the system co-evolve towards a superior, neo-biological civilisation that (among other things) will foster bottom-up control, co-ordinated change and co-operation among all elements. We contest Kelly's metaphysic of the new economy and new technology, arguing that he illicitly collapses technology and the economy into nature, using nature metaphors to legitimate the new forms of economy and organisation. We argue that Kelly fails to factor in the logic of capital into his scenario and does not explore the consequences of the new organisation of economy and new technology for the environment and society.     

The Formation of Economic Perceptions in Post-Communist Countries of East Central Europe

In the early transition phase in post-communist Europe, citizens’ perceptions of the national economy appeared more favorable than objective economic indicators would suggest. With triple and quadruple digit annual inflation rates and a severe economic contraction, there was a substantial portion of the population in these countries who still thought that the national economy had been and would be improving. Thus, sociotropic economic perceptions in the wake of the democratic transformation appeared to be disconnected from the real economic situation. The purpose of this paper is threefold. First, it explores the link between objective economic indicators and public evaluations of the economy. Second, it investigates the microfoundations of economic perceptions. And finally, it tests a well-established proposition that political sophisticates are more accurate in their perceptions than their less informed counterparts. The findings of the study can be generalized to any political and economic system undergoing transition.     

在均势中崛起

本文通过研究西方均势理论、均势实践、美国当前的均势布局大棋局的理论和现实,认为美国的霸权是建立在其均势全球化布局之上的。这种霸权维护着国际经济和国际政治的不公正秩序。在此基础上,分析了大国在均势中崛起时应注意的问题。     

Instrument choice,political reform and economic welfare

The purpose of this paper is to formally examine the effect of placing constraints, such as the line-item veto or a balanced budget amendment, on legislative behavior. There are two basic findings that emerge from the analysis. First, constraints on one type of instrument, such as spending, will in general result in more widespread use of other kinds of instruments, such as regulation. Second, it is naive to conclude that constraints on legislative behavior will promote economic efficiency and/or reduce the growth of government. The primary contribution of the paper is to suggest how changes in the political environment can affect instrument choice, economic welfare, and the size of government.This research was supported in part by a grant from the National Science Foundation Decision, Risk and Management Science Program. The author gratefully acknowledges the helpful comments of Ed Campos and Allan Meltzer. The views in this paper are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Council.     

The Nature and Direction of Economic Reform in North Korea

In this article we critically examine the nature and direction of economic reform in North Korea. While North Korea began to experiment with reforms and a partial open-door policy in the mid-1980s, the most substantial attempt at economic restructuring occurred in July 2002. In these latest reforms, the government attempted to change the planned economic system through the introduction of price reforms, market and commodity relations, profit motivation and material incentives. However, scholars disagree on the nature and direction of economic restructuring. In order to analyze the state of economic transformation, we develop a conceptual framework of market socialism with a set of empirical indicators against which we examine the trends, direction and limitations of reforms. Our study strongly suggests that North Korea is moving away from the command economy towards a model of market socialism as practiced in China and Vietnam.     

China's dualist model on technological catching up: a comparative perspective

Abstract

The central question of this paper is whether China can go beyond simple technological transfer and toward innovation in this age of globalization. By adopting an institutionalist perspective, this paper argues that China has developed a dualist model during its economic transitional period in which the foreign sector has been isolated from domestic firms, while the domestic industrial sectors have also failed to develop organic linkages among themselves to facilitate technological learning and generate innovation. This paper discusses four major institutional arrangements that deeply influence China's technological development – the institutional logic of economic reform, the state's industrial policy, the financial system and the industrial structure. It suggests that, owing to these institutional elements, China has neither developed economies of scale, as compared with the South Korean case, nor has it built up a network-type of economy similar to its Taiwanese counterpart in order to generate the mechanisms needed for technological innovation.