The life satisfaction approach to valuing public goods: The case of terrorism

Terrorism has large social costs that are difficult to quantify for the well-known problems of eliciting people’s preferences for public goods. We use the LSA to assess these costs in utility and monetary terms. Based on combined cross-section time-series data, we estimate the costs of terrorism for France and the British Isles. We find large negative effects of terrorism on life satisfaction that translate into considerable compensating surpluses for a hypothetical reduction in terrorism, in particular for the serious conflict in Northern Ireland. The effects of terrorism are robust and differ across groups in accordance with prior expectations.     

Environmental mediation: An alternative approach to policy stalemates

Environmental mediation is a new and innovative attempt to overcome the policy stalemates that frequently hinder effective environmental policymaking. It brings together environmentalists, business groups, government officials, and a neutral mediator in an attempt to negotiate a binding settlement to a specific controversy. This essay describes this approach, discusses its advantages over more traditional dispute resolution processes, and explains how it is able to produce acceptable agreements in such a difficult policy area.     

Explaining right‐wing terrorism and violence in Western Europe: Grievances,opportunities and polarisation

What explains cross‐national variation of right‐wing terrorism and violence (RTV)? This question remains largely unanswered in existing research on the extreme right because (1) events data suitable for cross‐national comparisons have been lacking, and (2) existing analyses fail to capture RTV's causal complexity, which involve multiple causal paths (equifinality) comprising causal conditions that become sufficient for the outcome only in combination (conjunctural causation). To help fill these gaps, this article uses new events data in a qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) research design, aiming to explain variation in the extent of RTV in 18 West European countries between 1990 and 2015. In doing so, the article identifies two ‘causal recipes’ that consistently distinguish countries with extensive RTV experience from those with low or moderate RTV experience. The first (North European) recipe involves the combination of high immigration, low electoral support for anti‐immigration (radical right) parties, and extensive public repression of radical right actors and opinions. The second (South European) recipe involves the combination of socioeconomic hardship, authoritarian legacies, and extensive left‐wing terrorism and militancy. Notably, both recipes contain elements of ‘grievances’ and ‘opportunities’, suggesting that these two theories, which are conventionally seen as contrasting, may be more fruitfully seen as complementary. Furthermore, a highly polarised conflict between far right activists and their enemies represents a third necessary condition for extensive RTV to occur. The article concludes by highlighting the paradox that countermeasures intended to constrain radical right politics appear to fuel extreme right violence, while countermeasures that may constrain extreme right violence would imply an advancement of radical right politics.     

An alternative approach to explaining political popularity

Previous empirical work on the relationship between political popularity and economic events has either not attempted to model the alternative policies of the different parties, or has modelled them in a rather simplistic manner. It has also typically assumed that voters are backward-looking in contrast to recent work on expectations theory. An approach is outlined which is based on a forward-looking comparison of the parties and incorporates the effect of news. An alternative derivation relying on the evaluation of the stock of goodwill built up for each party is also suggested. Empirical evidence from the Gallup opinion poll provides some support for these hypotheses.     

Building institutional capacity for policy analysis: An alternative approach to sustainability

The project approach to development assistance has been criticized for failing to build lasting capacity. The problem lies not in the project approach itself, but in a failure to understand the constraints to capacity development and a consequent misdirection of effort. Policy analysis capacity is developed as an example. Policy analysis requires skills and abilities that public sector institutions in developing countries cannot sustain, owing to a combination of structural and organizational factors, among which personnel constraints are key. These factors inhibit the effectiveness of the standard approach, which seeks to establish analytic capacity within a specialized government unit (‘internal’ capacity). An alternative approach is to build ‘process’ capacity—the ability to get analysis done by other institutions, rather than the ability to do analysis internally. The author concludes that project strategies should be redirected toward a greater emphasis on building process capacity as a useful adjunct to internal capacity.     

Trust as an alternative to risk

Many students of trust see it as a way to mitigate risk through the development of strong institutions that create trust. I offer an alternative view of trust, moralistic or generalized trust, that depends upon a psychological foundation of optimism and control. This form of trust, in contrast to arguments by Paldam and others, has “value” independent of experience. Using data from a survey of metropolitan Philadelphia in 1996, I show that if you believe that “most people can be trusted,” you are substantially more likely to see your neighborhood as safe at night even controlling for both the objective level of crime as well having been the victim of a crime, having had parents who were the victims of crime, watching local television news (which exposes people to violent events), where you live (central city and suburb), and gender. Trust thus “reduces” perceptions of risk independently of personal experience.     

Issue competition in Western Europe: an introduction

Abstract

The special issue introduced in this article presents the results of the Issue Competition Comparative Project (ICCP). The project uses issue yield theory to provide a general, comprehensive perspective on issue competition (party competition through issue strategy) that goes beyond the extant focus on specific parties or specific issues. Relying on voter surveys and Twitter data collected in the context of recent elections in six West European countries, we address several key research questions concerning issue competition: (a) whether the strategies of different parties are loyal to classic 20th-century ideological alignments or rather actively challenging them; (b) whether different parties opt for conflict-mobilization or problem-solving issue strategic approaches; (c) whether party adherence to the issue opportunities identified by issue yield theory are rewarded by better electoral performance.     

Party leaders and voter responses to political terrorism

Public Choice - In this article, we study the political implications of terrorism rooted in extremist political ideologies. Our data uniquely allow studying the potential role of party leader...     

Asymmetrical Government: Multinational States in an Integrating Europe

The premodern European state was asymmetrical and differentiated.From the nineteenth century, with the rise of democracy, thepenetration of the state into society and later the demand fordistributive equity, asymmetry was less acceptable. Nonetheless,asymmetrical elements remained, and territorial intermediationwas an important feature of the nation-state. In the late twentiethcentury, the reemergence of minority nationalism, the restructuringof territorial politics, and the weakening of the nation-statein the face of globalization and European integration have allfostered a new asymmetrical territorial politics. Europe itselfis developing asymmetrically and, within states, national minoritiesare seeking a new place in Europe. The United Kingdom, Spain,and Belgium illustrate these trends. There is no model of theasymmetrical state to replace the old paradigm, but there isa variety of experiences to support it. This process will bemanageable as long as Europe does not itself develop state-likefeatures or a nation-building project of its own. Instead, itshould, while providing a capacity for common policymaking anda common system of basic rights, remain an ambiguous realm ofauthority, allowing competing national projects to coexist.     

Relational representation: an agency-based approach to global justice

This paper argues that Amartya Sen’s comparative approach to justice requires a politics that is attentive to the agency of the other. Rethinking representation as a relational, rather than a sovereign, concept captures the relationship between agency and justice that is emerging in global politics today. It is increasingly common that non-governmental actors engage with communities through practices of trust and responsibility without appeal to political authority. Relational representation helps clarify the dynamics of these relationships and provides a way to think about their purpose. That purpose is to effect changes that ameliorate suffering and injustice, working to re-present the represented persons as more capable persons, more free to use their agency.     

Knowing and doing: an integrated approach to education and training in South Africa

The Postgraduate Diploma in Management at the Graduate School of Public & Development Management (P&DM), University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, arises from our enthusiasm for a paradigm shift in the education of entry level public sector managers in South Africa; this is an approach that has developed out of moves towards a new public service that is development friendly and customer-oriented. The move away from traditional lecture-based classroom activities to interactive learning methods has given rise to much reflection on teaching, learning and appropriate assessment at P&DM. This has resulted in an appreciation for continuous learning as we pursue our quest to improve our facilitation in line with the needs of a student group that will graduate to face the immense challenges of making institutions work in a newly democratic polity. Our graduates are tasked with transformation in a rapidly moving environment. For them, a commitment to life-long learning is the most important attitude they can develop and for us it is the most important outlook we can nurture. This article focuses on three integrated areas: the Administrative Skills Course, which aims at establishing underlying skills on which students should build throughout the year; the Case Study Programme, which provides a simulation of real problems and issues faced by managers in the public sector; and the Internship Programme, which provides the opportunity for the integration of classroom learning and workplace practice. We focus primarily on the teaching methods and the integrative nature of these courses and programmes, highlighting aspects that have worked well and those that have not. The ongoing development of these programmes has been informed by relatively informal evaluations. We feel that the time has come for more rigorous investigation into the effectiveness of our teaching and both have research in progress. The design and findings of research in progress will be published at a later date.     

Britain and Europe: An Unforgettable Past and an Unavoidable Future

The title of this article is taken from the opening lines of Hugo Young's brilliant history of Britain's relationship with Europe, This Blessed Plot . That book begins with a sentence that says it all: 'This is the story of 50 years in which Britain struggled to reconcile the past she could not forget with the future she could not avoid.' Those words were written in the spring of 1998. Despite the early promise of Tony Blair's European policy, little has changed since. For France and Germany, the institutions of Europe represent a uniquely successful attempt to exorcise the past. For its part, Britain lives in the shadow of its history.
The struggle to reconcile national identity with strategic interests is as acute as it has ever been. For all that Mr Blair's government has done something in recent years to make Britain's case in Europe, it has failed to make Europe's case in Britain.     

Britain and Europe: An Awkward Partner or an Awkward State?

This article builds on the recent exchange between Jim Buller and Stephen George on the subject of British 'awkwardness' in relation to the European Union. While it engages with both authors, the article also seeks to bring the state back into the analysis. It makes a connection between the structure and organisation of the state and the behaviour of domestic political actors.