Colonial experience and postcolonial underdevelopment in Africa

In this paper, we analyze the connection between the history of colonial rule and postcolonial development in Africa. We focus on the fact that many African colonies were governed by indirect rule. Under indirect rule, indigenous people are divided into two groups: a privileged ruling group and an unprivileged ruled group. Our model assumes that the ruled group cannot observe how the resources appropriated from them are divided between the colonial ruler and the ruling group. In this economy, excessive exploitation by the colonial ruler creates distrust among indigenous groups and a negative effect on postcolonial economic and political development.     

Indirect Rule and Varieties of Governance

This article reexamines the venerable concept of indirect rule. We argue, drawing on evidence from colonial and postcolonial South Asia, that indirect rule actually represented a diverse set of governance forms that need to be clearly distinguished. Using a new typology of varieties of governance, we show that colonial governments established suzerain, hybrid, and de jure governance, in addition to direct rule across territories, based on the incentives and constraints of the state. The repertoire of governance forms narrowed and changed but did not disappear during decolonization, showing that the postcolonial state had powerful reasons to maintain forms of heterodox governance. Dramatic shifts, alongside enduring continuity, challenge a simple narrative of path dependence and the adherence to tradition, instead showing that governments have made conscious choices about how to govern. We conclude by discussing the implications of these arguments for broader understandings of state power.     

Genro Rule in China and Japan: A Comparative Perspective

For a time in both Japan (roughly 1890–1915) and much more briefly in China (about 1987–1992), major political decisions were made by cohesive groups of retired elders of the founding generation. Necessary if not sufficient conditions for rule by elders include a closed system, with the elite not held responsible to a wider public; and a constitutional or practical vagueness about the locus of final political authority. The more general pattern in such systems is personal dictatorship, with rule by elders as an alternative when cultural or political conditions stand in the way of one-man rule. This essay explores the pattern, conditions, and characteristics of rule by elders in China and Japan as genro rule serves as an alternative to one-man rule in generational transitions in political regimes with a relatively cohesive ruling group and a weak institutional structure. Peter R. Moody, Jr. is professor of political science at the University of Notre Dame and he specializes in the study of Chinese politics. His more recent books include Tradition and Modernization in China and Japan, Political Change in Taiwan, and Political Opposition in Post-Confucian Society. He is editor of China Documents Annual and book review editor for the Review of Politics. He has written on Chinese politics, Asian international affairs, Chinese political thought, international relations theory, and theory of political parties.     

African chiefs: comparative governance under colonial rule

This paper analyzes how British colonial rule altered the club-like and competitive features of chiefdoms and weakened the incentives of political leaders to be accountable to citizens. Political institutions in late pre-colonial West Africa aligned the incentives of the chiefs such that they were responsive to their people. Alignment arose because of a high degree of competition between governance providers and because political leaders were effectively the residual claimants on revenues generated from providing governance services. I identify the mechanisms by which colonialism severed the link that aligned the incentives of government with those of its citizens. British indirect rule did that by reducing political competition and softening the budget constraints of the chiefs. Toward the end of colonial rule, chiefs became less accountable to their people as evidenced by the widespread corruption and extortion by the chiefs and by their unprecedented constitutional violations and abuses of power.     

Social elites,popular discontent,and the limits of cooptation

Public Choice - Rulers face challenges in governing distant or hostile populations. In response, they may coopt elites from those groups into relationships of indirect rule, thereby boosting their...     

The Political Economy of Growth: Democracy and Human Capital

Democracy is more than just another brake or booster for the economy. We argue that there are significant indirect effects of democracy on growth through public health and education. Where economists use life expectancy and education as proxies for human capital, we expect democracy will be an important determinant of the level of public services manifested in these indicators. In addition to whatever direct effect democracy may have on growth, we predict an important indirect effect through public policies that condition the level of human capital in different societies. We conduct statistical investigations into the direct and indirect effects of democracy on growth using a data set consisting of a 30-year panel of 128 countries. We find that democracy has no statistically significant direct effect on growth. Rather, we discover that the effect of democracy is largely indirect through increased life expectancy in poor countries and increased secondary education in non poor countries.     

Litigation Versus Legislation: Forum Shopping by Rent Seekers

To change the law, an interest group must choose between lobbyingthe legislature and litigating for new precedent. Lobbyingbecomes more likely as the relative benefits from rule changebecome greater, as the costs of lobbying become smaller and asthe voting strength of the interest groups becomes larger.Litigating becomes more likely as trial costs fall, as therelative benefits from rule change become greater, as theinclination of courts to change existing precedents increases,and as the interest group is involved in more trials. Examplesof using a litigating strategy include the NAACP is its battlefor racial integration and attorneys seeking change in tort law.Business, in resisting changes to tort law, has used the judicialprocess. The nature of equilibrium, if any, is not clear.     

Do Group Decision Rules Affect Trust? A Laboratory Experiment on Group Decision Rules and Trust

Enhanced participation has been prescribed as the way forward for improving democratic decision making while generating positive attributes like trust. Yet we do not know the extent to which rules affect the outcome of decision making. This article investigates how different group decision rules affect group trust by testing three ideal types of decision rules (i.e., a Unilateral rule, a Representative rule and a ‘Non‐rule’) in a laboratory experiment. The article shows significant differences between the three decision rules on trust after deliberation. Interestingly, however, it finds that the Representative rule yields more trust than the Non‐rule and also significantly more trust than the Unilateral rule, when analysing the results at group level. These findings challenge the theoretical understanding by, for example, deliberative normative theorists that more inclusive, consensual and non‐hierarchical decision‐making procedures enhance trust vis‐à‐vis other more hierarchical decision‐making procedures.     

Decision costs in legislative bargaining: an experimental analysis

We conduct an experiment to assess the effects of different decision rules on the costs of decision making in a multilateral bargaining situation. Specifically, we compare the amount of costly delay observed in an experimental bargaining game under majority and unanimity rule. Our main finding is that individual subjects are more likely to reject offers under unanimity rule. This higher rejection rate, as well as the requirement that all subjects agree, leads to more costly delay. This result provides empirical support for a classic argument in favor of less-than-unanimity decision rules put forth by Buchanan and Tullock (The calculus of consent: logical foundations of constitutional democracy, University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, 1962).     

An experimental study of the efficiency of unanimity rule and majority rule

Scholars traditionally claim that unanimity rule is more capable of producing Pareto optimal outcomes than majority rule. Dougherty and Edward (Public Choice 151(3):655–678, 2012) make the opposite claim assuming proposals are either random, sincere, or strategic. We test these competing hypotheses in a two-dimensional framework using laboratory experiments. Our primary results suggest: (1) majority rule enters the Pareto set more quickly than unanimity rule, (2) majority rule leaves the Pareto set at the same rate as unanimity rule, and (3) majority rule is more likely to select a Pareto optimal outcome than unanimity rule at the end of the game.     

The Role of Procedural Controls in OSHA's Ergonomics Rulemaking

Few, if any, regulations over the past decade have received as much publicity or engendered such controversy as the ergonomics regulation of the Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA). Some may see the ergonomics rule as the paradigmatic instance of procedural hurdles holding up and eventually destroying a regulation. This article examines the role that procedure played in the ergonomics rulemaking. Lessons are drawn from an analysis of the four publicly available versions of the regulation and interviews with seven high-ranking officials at OSHA and the Small Business Administration. Of the procedural hurdles faced by OSHA, the notice-and-comment requirement had the largest impact on the final rule. OMB review and requirements to conduct a cost-benefit analysis served largely as a fire alarm to political overseers, and the required small business panel had largely symbolic effects. The more traditional control of congressional budgetary oversight had the greatest effect by delaying the rule for three years, and thus eventually doomed OSHA's attempts to regulate.     

论社会主义法治一体建设

社会主义法治一体建设的实质，是统筹协调社会主义法治的各个领域、各个环节、各个层面，把社会主义法治视为一个整体，以一体建设的思维，全面推进社会主义法治。社会主义法治一体建设具有多方面的指向。从目标来看，法治国家、法治政府、法治社会需要一体建设。从主体来看，依法治国、依法执政、依法行政需要一体建设。从环节来看，科学立法、严格执法、公正司法、全民守法需要一体建设。此外，依法治国与以德治国也需要一体建设。社会主义法治一体建设既是社会主义的法治世界观，也是社会主义的法治方法论，可以在社会主义法治实践中得到普遍运用。     

Evolutionarily stable preferences in contests

We define an indirect evolutionary approach formally and apply it to (Tullock) contests. While it is known that the direct evolutionary approach in the form of finite population ESS yields more aggressive behavior than in Nash equilibrium, it is now shown that the indirect evolutionary approach yields the same more aggressive behavior, too. This holds for any population size N, if the evolution of preferences is determined by behavior in two-player contests. The evolutionarily stable preferences (ESP) of the indirect approach turn out to be negatively interdependent, thereby “rationalizing” the more aggressive behavior.     

The political economics of agricultural price support in Turkey: An empirical assessment

The present study is an attempt to explain the variations in the extent of protection provided to the producers of four selected agricultural crops in Turkey by a set of independent variables representing various economic and political events of the 1962–1983 period. The economic variables were selected in order to assess the divergence between the intentions of the policy makers and their actions as reflected in the level of support actually provided; while the political variables were chosen to assess the impact of elections, military takeovers and noticeable shifts in the underlying philosophy of the policy makers on the support provided. The regression analysis suggested that the political power of the agricultural producers was an important determinant of the policies implemented, especially during times of democratic practices; that during times of military regimes, the agricultural sector tends to be less protected; that there is indirect evidence for the existence of political business cycles synchronized to political elections: and, that general conditions in the economy can influence the behavioral rule of the policy makers.     

Critique of Marx's 1857 Introduction

A group of leading critical writers in the school of govenrmentality studies have recently called for a debate over the methoddological and political direction of studies of complex mode of government beyond confines of the State. This paper traces the divisions within the field to Foucault's ambiguous methodological legacy, in paraticular to an impoverished theorization of sovereignty. Rather, this paper emphasizes its centripetal function, within and between nation states, in maintaining hybrid forms of liberal rule in the effort to manage the centrifugal tendencies endemic in a pluralist liberal order. These modes of rule operate in tension with the role of liberalism as critique. On the basis of this analysis, it is argued that radical critique within this field is limited, erroneuously distances critique from liberlism and would be unduly restrictive for governmentality theorists who with to perform a more central role as public intellectuals. Liberalism could once more be the principal focus for a normatively comitted form governmentality studies, which in turn, could emerge as its principal vehicla for immanent critque and renewal.     

Gender and Organizational Rule Abidance

A long-standing contention in the public and private management literatures is that women use rule abidance as a way to compensate for their relative lack of organizational power. Many of the studies making this assertion rely on anecdotal evidence rather than theory-guided empirical studies. In this paper, the authors use survey data collected from four cities in a midwestern state to empirically test gender dimensions of rule abidance. The findings support long-asserted gender differences in rule abidance. Contrary to recent scholarship, however, the findings suggest that rule abidance among women is inversely related to organizational status, with higher-level women abiding by rules more so than women lower in the hierarchy.     

加强铁路货盗案件现场勘查之我见

铁路货盗案件现场勘查率偏低的原因:(一)货盗案件现场具有的特殊性是导致货盗案件现场勘查率低的直接原因;(二)制度不健全是导致货盗案件现场勘查率低的间接原因。提高货盗案件现场勘查率的几点建议:(一)依法建立科学的勘查制度;(二)设立现场勘查兼职技术员;(三)建立货盗案件现场勘查卷移交制度;(四)制定相应的经费补偿规定。     

The more the better? Rule growth and policy impact from a macro perspective

Do more rules improve overall policy performance? To answer this question, we look at rule growth in the area of environmental policy from an aggregate perspective. We argue that impactful growth in rules crucially depends on implementation capacities. If such capacities are limited, countries are at risk of ‘empty’ rule growth where they lack the ability to implement their ever-growing stock of policies. Hence, rules are a necessary, yet not sufficient condition for achieving sectoral policy objectives. We underpin our argument with an analysis of the impact of a new, encompassing measure of environmental rule growth covering 13 countries from 1980 to 2010. These findings call for ‘sustainable statehood’ where the growth in rules should not outpace the expansion in administrative capacities.     

The international rule of law

ABSTRACT

The rule of law is a moral ideal that protects distinctive legal values such as generality, equality before the law, the independence of courts, and due process rights. I argue that one of the main goals of an international rule of the law is the protection of individual and state autonomy from the arbitrary interference of international institutions, and that the best way to codify this protection is through constitutional rules restraining the reach of international law into the internal affairs of a state. State autonomy does not have any intrinsic value or moral status of its own. Its value is derivative, resulting from the role it plays as the most efficient means of protecting autonomy for individuals and groups. Therefore, the goal of protecting state autonomy form the encroachment of international law will have to be constrained by, and balanced against the more fundamental goal of an international rule of law, the protection of the autonomy of individual persons, best realized through the entrenchment of basic human rights.