Negotiating chile's entry to nafta: trade and investment issues

In December 1994, the United States, Canada, and Mexico agreed in principle to extend the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) to Chile at the Summit of the Americas. This paper examines Chile's accession to NAFTA with special reference to key issues in the negotiations. It discusses the rationale for extending NAFTA to Chile from the U.S. and Chilean perspectives. The study also examines how NAFTA negotiators may address issues such as trade and investment rules, technical standards, dispute settlement obligations, intellectual property rights, phase-in periods, and labor and environmental standards.     

Science,enterprise and profit: ideology in the knowledge-driven economy

Key policy documents relating to the 'knowledge-driven economy' show that policy makers, university heads and other interested academics have come to view the task of creating science-based industries through the lens of enterprise ideology.Proceeding on the assumption that the scientific fundamentals are already in place, the belief is that industrial applications can be achieved by infusions of enterprise. Such a framing is attractive to those unwilling or unable to engage with the complexities of scientific research or new product development. It offers a surface intelligibility combined with an apparent amenability to straightforward policy interventions. At the same time it is quite unclear, apart from the taking of risks, what attributes and behaviours are actually involved in enterprise. Even the relevance of risk is questionable. Despite the ideological pressure to demonstrate a link between entrepreneurship and risk, none of the relevant research has succeeded in doing so. Nor has risk been a prevalent feature of new venture creation in general and science-based start-ups in particular. The policy is an act of faith, based neither on research nor on experience. Its reliance on enterprise is less a solution than a hope that one will spontaneously appear.     

Local Government at the Nexus?

The modernisation of local government in the UK, pursued by Labour governments since 1997, has covered many, often conflicting elements. Councils have been encouraged to be both strategic ‘place shapers’ and also involved in the nurturing of democratic engagement. This latter theme of ‘democratic renewal’ has in itself contained paradoxical elements, but has been a consistent focus of attention. This debate around democratic renewal has also taken place in the context of a broader ‘rethinking’ of local governments’ role, in an era of partnerships, governance and new models of service delivery. Normatively and practically new justifications for local government have been sought. One such normative foundation has drawn on a range of theoretical perspectives to reimagine the place of local government in the democratic polity, seeing local authorities and local councilors as facilitators or nurturers of democratic health. In particular, broad theoretical developments in communicative and deliberative democracy, and also, more recently, on work based in ‘second generation’ governance theory, have been drawn upon to place local government at the nexus of state and civil society. This paper will examine the possibilities for such a role, from a normative standpoint, to argue that local government can have only limited success in this role, particularly in the context of New Labour's restructuring of the local state.     

The personal social services

The Future of London's Government: Research and Consultation Project by the Greater London Council, GLC, March 1986, pp.240. (Free ‐ available from Room 708, London Strategic Policy unit,. Middlesex House, 20 Vauxhall Bridge Road, London SW1V 2SB.)

Welfare Rights Work in Social Services, Geoff Fimister, Macmillan, 1986, pp.166, £15.00 hardback, £5.95 paperback.

The Structure of Local Government in the European Community and The Structure of Local Government in 20 Arab Countries, compiled by Eileen Martin Harloff, WLA, The Hague, 1986, pp.74 and 64 respectively, each $6.00 IULA members; $10,000 others.

Decentralized Economic Development Activities and their Implications for In‐Service Training, Andrew Coulson, Local Government Training Board, 1986, pp.10, £6.00 (£3.00 for local authorities).

Council Non‐Manual Workers and Low Pay, Nasreen Rahman, Low Pay Pamphlet No. 41, Low Pay Unit, June 1986, £3.00.     

Russia's Response to Crisis: The Paradox of Success

Russia's recovery from the deep economic crisis it experienced in 2008–2009 did not deliver clear political dividends for the Russian leadership. This is because of the context in which the crisis occurred and the way that the leadership, particularly President Medvedev, and many of its critics described the crisis. The oil-fuelled boom that preceded the crisis had the effect of deepening it. Economic recovery based on rising energy prices looks like a failure, rather than a success, and highlights the underlying structural problems of the Russian economy. Arguments about the need for modernisation from within government exacerbated this perception. This seems to have weakened the connection between approval for the leadership and economic growth, a staple of pre-crisis politics.     

A Watershed in White House Journalism: Explaining the Post-1968 Rise of Aggressive Presidential News

Presidential journalism is known to have grown substantially more aggressive through the 1970s and beyond, but a definitive explanation for this trend remains elusive. Some suggest that events surrounding Vietnam and Watergate transformed the professional norms of journalism. However, the trend could also be a more superficial and transitory response to other circumstantial factors that converged in the same time period, such as president-level characteristics (the prevalence of Republicans, Washington outsiders, and more vigorous news management efforts), the political environment (the rise of official discord), and the economic environment (a downturn in the business cycle). This study disentangles these various factors and assesses their relative success in explaining trends in journalistic conduct in the postwar era. Data are drawn from a large sample of presidential news conferences from 1953 through 2000, focusing on the aggressiveness of journalists' questions. The results strongly support the normative shift hypothesis, although economic factors have also been consequential. These results suggest a punctuated equilibrium model of journalistic change in relations between the White House press corps and the presidency.     

Casework,issues and voting in state legislative elections: a district analysis

Congressional research has addressed questions regarding the electoral consequences of service and policy responsiveness, as well as whether service responsiveness eliminates the need for policy responsiveness. However, less is known about the criteria by which constituents reward their state representatives. Part of the problem with resolving these questions at the state level has been the absence of data, since individual-level data on state legislative districts are hard to find and are unlikely to combine measures of both kinds of responsiveness. This study utilises data gathered in a particular state legislator's district (both data on actual member–constituent contacts and survey data) to discern more explicitly whether ombudsman service and constituent issue proximity to the incumbent affects vote choice. Our findings support the proposition that like their counterparts in Congress, state representatives prosper when paying attention to both service and policy responsiveness; however, we find convincing evidence that casework enables state legislators to gain support from constituents who otherwise would not vote for them.     

Millennium Development Goal 1: poverty, hunger and decent work in Southeast Asia

This article considers three questions: 1) what progress has been made in achieving MDG1 targets?; 2) what challenges remain?; and 3) what more could and should be done? To examine these questions, the article assesses the progress of Southeast Asia in seeking to achieve MDG1. It argues that the region is 'on track' to achieve MDG 1 targets, although significant challenges such as inequality remain. Economic growth, significant structural change and incorporation into global value chains have contributed to MDG progress. However, this is a double-edged sword as exposure to global economic turbulence can increase. The longer-term reduction of poverty, inequality and social exclusion is a question of empowerment of local producers within value chains-a shift in economic power and control through pro-poor strategies strong enough to effect substantive structural change. The article outlines key concepts; identifies the main characteristics of Southeast Asian poverty; outlines what more needs to be done; and concludes by reprising the article's findings and weighing the prospects for 2010-15 and beyond.     

Electoral Incentives and Partisan Conflict in Congress: Evidence from Survey Experiments

Does partisan conflict damage citizens’ perceptions of Congress? If so, why has polarization increased in Congress since the 1970s? To address these questions, we unpack the “electoral connection” by exploring the mass public's attitudes toward partisan conflict via two survey experiments in which we manipulated characteristics of members and Congress. We find that party conflict reduces confidence in Congress among citizens across the partisan spectrum. However, there exists heterogeneity by strength of party identification with respect to evaluations of members. Independents and weak partisans are more supportive of members who espouse a bipartisan image, whereas strong partisans are less supportive. People with strong attachments to a political party disavow conflict in the aggregate but approve of individual members behaving in a partisan manner. This pattern helps us understand why members in safely partisan districts engage in partisan conflict even though partisanship damages the collective reputation of the institution.