Difference in Marx: the lumpenproletariat and the proletarian unnamable

This article considers the place of difference in Marx's politics through an exploration of his categories of the lumpenproletariat and the proletariat. Far from a simple set of class subjects or empirical peoples, these two categories are argued to describe particular modes of political composition . Despite the frisson of difference and excess which is usually associated with Marx's lumpenproletariat, it is argued to describe a mode of composition - and, in relation to anarchism, a politics - oriented not towards difference and becoming, but towards present identity . The proletariat, on the other hand, is shown to be not a People, historical Subject or identity, but a 'minor' political mode of composition immanent to the manifolds of capitalism, and premised on the condition that, as Deleuze puts it, 'the people are missing'.     

Manpower and Counterinsurgency: Empirical Foundations for Theory and Doctrine

How does manpower affect counterinsurgency? Important debates about counterinsurgency theory, military doctrine, force planning, and ongoing military operations revolve around assumptions about the role manpower plays in determining counterinsurgency outcomes. But these assumptions have not, by and large, been subjected to large-n analysis. This paper helps serve that role by examining new data on counterinsurgents’ deployments across 171 campaigns since World War I. These data provide insight into a range of important issues, such as how force size should be measured, whether it is related to counterinsurgent success, whether troop nationality matters, and whether the role of manpower varies across contexts. Of these findings, the most notable is that conventional rules of thumb for force sizing, including the recommendation put forth in official US military doctrine, receive no empirical support. These findings therefore challenge the prevailing wisdom, while laying the groundwork for a range of future scholarship.     

Research and trends in governmetal accounting and reporting

Budgeting is a form of financial reporting using accounting information. This paper reviews current research and trends in governmental accounting and reporting for state and local governments in the United States. In the first section, the contributions of the Governmental Accounting Standards Board are reviewed, including the conceptual framework now guiding the evolution of accounting standards. Also reviewed are developments that are expected to have a significant impact on budgeting in the future, including service efforts and accomplishments reporting, financial condition, and budget reporting. The second section reviews accounting research in four distinct areas: capital markets; financial reporting; behavioral experiments; and, public choice. The future of governmental accounting and reporting will reflect changes in the standards of practice and the use of theory to direct research.     

The Reliability of Lie Detection Performance

We examined whether individuals’ ability to detect deception remained stable over time. In two sessions, held one week apart, university students viewed video clips of individuals and attempted to differentiate between the lie-tellers and truth-tellers. Overall, participants had difficulty detecting all types of deception. When viewing children answering yes–no questions about a transgression (Experiments 1 and 5), participants’ performance was highly reliable. However, rating adults who provided truthful or fabricated accounts did not produce a significant alternate forms correlation (Experiment 2). This lack of reliability was not due to the types of deceivers (i.e., children versus adults) or interviews (i.e., closed-ended questions versus extended accounts) (Experiment 3). Finally, the type of deceptive scenario (naturalistic vs. experimentally-manipulated) could not account for differences in reliability (Experiment 4). Theoretical and legal implications are discussed.     

Trust,regulation, and redistribution why some governments overregulate and under-redistribute

For many social scientists, government intervention is linked to low levels of social trust and corruption, while others associate it with high trust and low corruption. We aim to reconcile these contrasting views by distinguishing the opposing effects of trust on two alternative types of government intervention: regulation and redistribution. We argue that distrusting individuals demand more governmental regulation (H1) but less government redistribution (H2), and this could be one of the mechanisms explaining why countries with low levels of trust tend to both overregulate and under-redistribute. And the effects of trust on policy preferences are conditional on the quality of institutions. The higher the level of quality of government in a particular region, the more high-trusting individuals will like government redistribution and dislike government regulation that restricts the operations of free markets (H3). We test these hypotheses with data from the latest round of the European Quality of Government Index (EQI) survey, which covers 77,000 individuals from 185 regions of 21 EU member states.